Theirs To Defy: a Reverse Harem Romance Read online

  Theirs to Defy

  A Marriage Raffle Novel

  Stasia Black

  Contents

  Preface

  Map

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Epilogue

  Preview of Hunter: a Snow White Romance

  Afterword

  Also by Stasia Black

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2018 Stasia Black

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  For Lee Savino, who’s tireless encouragement and cheerleading made finishing strong possible <3

  In the not too distant future, a genetically engineered virus is released by an eco-terrorist in major metropolitan areas all over the globe. Within five years, almost 90% of the world’s female population is decimated.

  In an attempt to stop the spread of the virus and quarantine those left, a nuclear war was triggered. It’s still unclear who began attacking who, but bombs were dropped on all major US cities, coordinated with massive EMP attacks.

  These catastrophes and the end of life as people knew it was collectively known as The Fall.

  Map of the New Republic of Texas

  Chapter One

  DREA

  Compared to all the other places Drea had been imprisoned, President Goddard’s personal detention center was pretty nice, all things considered.

  It was in the basement of Fort Worth’s Omni Hotel. He had to have had it built special—a series of ten cells, bars and all. Smaller than you’d find in say a local county jail, but then, these were obviously just meant to hold one person apiece.

  Because that wasn’t creepy. That the president of the Republic kept his own little jail-slash-torture chamber in the bottom of what was essentially the capitol building.

  “Ya know, like you do,” Drea whispered under her breath, working her way down the bars, testing each one for weaknesses again. “Not abnormal at all.”

  She rolled her eyes at herself. It had been a real genius move joining the delegation from Jacob’s Well coming to the capitol yesterday. She’d been so sure she could convince the President to give her some troops to go back down to the Gulf Texas island, Nomansland, to rescue the women she’d been forced to leave behind three months ago.

  Her women. The women she’d promised to keep safe. Come to this island, she’d said. We’ll fortify it against the outside world, she’d said. She’d been so good at making speeches. Enough of men ruling over us! We’ll band tzogether and protect ourselves!

  She swallowed against the bitter taste in her mouth.

  Too bad she hadn’t been as good at fulfilling all those grandiose promises. Their greatest asset—secrecy—had lasted all of six months. She’d grasped too far, reached for too much. Elena told her not to keep accepting refugees. Elena said they should close their borders, ignore the outside world, become an island unto themselves.

  But had Drea listened?

  No.

  Drea had not listened. Drea said they could still take in women if they were careful. They’d use computer messages and neutral meeting places.

  Nothing is safe enough, Elena said. There’s one of us to every ten of them. Them being men. The Xterminate virus had wiped out 90% of the earth’s female population. It’s made them all animals. They’ll never stop hunting us.

  Elena was right.

  Two months after they opened up the island to refugees, one of their supposed ‘rescues’ turned out to be bait. The woman had a GPS implant so those watching could see where she was taken. It wasn’t the Black Skulls MC’s men who first besieged the island, but they took over pretty soon after.

  Drea and the women had weapons stockpiled, but they were no match for the all-out assault that lasted for days on end.

  In the end, surrender was the only choice if they were to survive.

  Though the months of abuse that followed hadn’t much felt like survival. More like hell on earth.

  The Black Skulls were one of the biggest players in the female slave trade. And they set out immediately ‘training’ the women who’d first come to Nomansland for shelter and safety.

  And then, when salvation did come? Did it come for the whole island? Oh no, of course not! A group of men came to rescue their wife who happened to be locked in a closet with Drea and they decided, oh look, we’ll save this one too.

  Her. Drea.

  Out of all the women there who actually deserved rescuing, they plucked her out, the one who’d led all the rest there like lambs to the slaughter.

  It had been her hubris and foolish pride to ever think that she could ever—

  She growled in furious frustration at herself as she continued feeling along every bar of her cell.

  She’d spent every waking moment of the last three months since her ‘rescue’ trying to get back to them. Trying to undo her wrongs, atone for her sins.

  Hence this ill-thought out trip to the capitol.

  If the President could have just given her something. Maybe not a battalion of troops, but what about a strike team. A helicopter. Something.

  But nooooooooooo, apparently President Douchie McDouchebag was a misogynistic pig who had a problem with women doing anything with their mouths other than sucking—

  Well, suffice it to say, the second she questioned His Almightiness, she’d ended up in this cell.

  She shook her head. Hadn’t she learned by now that if she wanted something done, she had to do it herself? No more trusting in the inherent goodness of her fellow man. That was a crock of shit. Maybe her fellow woman, but definitely not her fellow fucking man.

  If she was gonna free her women, she was gonna have to do it herself.

  “And hopefully not fuck it up this time,” she muttered under her breath. But no. She couldn’t afford to think that way. She go and get them free or die trying.

  She tugged again at the bars. They were steel, she was pretty sure. So bending them and trying to slip through wasn’t an option. And the joints and pegs were on the opposite side of the door so she couldn’t jimmy those loose. But maybe if she—

  “You sure are pretty.”

  Oh goody, the guard had decided to do rounds again. He sure did them an awful lot considering she was the only prisoner.
/>   She didn’t give him the satisfaction of a reaction to his words. He was middle-aged, had hair that was more gray than brown, and a potbelly that hung so far over his belt she imagined it had been half a decade since he’d been able to see his toes.

  But he thought she was pretty. Of course he did.

  Drea stilled.

  “And with all that pretty blonde hair. I bet you could make a fella feel reaaaaaaal good.”

  Drea breathed out a sharp breath.

  Don’t lose your temper. Don’t lose your temper.

  Do use all the tools at your disposal. Even if it makes you want to gag on your own dreadlocks.

  She slowly crossed her arms over her stomach in a way that propped her boobs up and out. She rubbed her arms.

  “Say, it sure is chilly in here,” she said, face slightly downturned so that she was only looking at the guard through her eyelashes. “Do you think I could borrow your jacket?” She bit her lip and continued blinking up at him. “I promise I’ll be good.”

  Shit, she was laying it on too thick, wasn’t she? He’d see right through her act and—

  “Well, I could always warm you up.”

  Or not.

  She smiled and dipped her head. “If it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I mean. I know all you men here at the capitol have such important jobs. Working for the President and all.”

  “Aw he wouldn’t mind me seeing to the comfort of a prisoner. The New Republic is all about treating folks humane.”

  “Oh my gosh,” Drea said, jumping up and down and clapping her hands—she was just purely channeling Sophia, the Commander’s daughter, now.

  Jesus, never thought she’d see the day. She might only be eight years older than the nineteen-year-old Sophia, but it felt like five decades separated them.

  The guard was just eating this shit up, though.

  Men were so fucking easy.

  She’d shake her head if she weren’t so busy keeping to her act.

  That’s right, buddy. Reach for those keys.

  She fought to keep her eyes on his face while his hand went to the keyring at his belt.

  He lifted a warning finger. “Step back now. Don’t give me any trouble or you’ll regret it.” He touched the retractable billy club on his belt.

  “Oh no, sir,” Drea simpered. “I would never. If I could just have a friend in this cold place, it would mean everything. I’ll do anything just to have someone on my side helping me. I’ll pay you back however you want.”

  He grinned lasciviously. “However I want, huh?”

  Drea nodded over and over, feeling like a bobblehead. She backed up against the far wall right beside the twin bed, hands up where he could see them.

  He reached down and readjusted himself right before sliding the door open.

  Patience.

  Not yet.

  He stepped inside the cell.

  Not yet.

  Smile. Look innocent and harmless.

  She giggled and ducked her head as he shrugged out of his guard’s jacket halfway across the room.

  NOW.

  She struck while his arms were still half-caught in the jacket, yanking and twisting it to trap his arms at the same time she swept his legs with a low kick.

  Dad would be so proud.

  Right as the guard hit the floor she was on him, yanking the billy club off his belt. Because the other thing Dad taught her?

  Hit first and ask questions later.

  It was something of a family mantra.

  In one swift downward motion, Drea had the billy club extended and she got to work.

  The guard was a screamer, so she went for the throat first. One swift hit to his larynx had him grasping his throat and choking.

  She tut tut tutted at him for being dumb enough to expose himself like that. Because obviously her next hit was going to be to his scrotum.

  That was just female self-defense 101.

  She struck a few other of the best impact points to make sure he was disabled. One hard blow to the solar plexus, then, when he curled in on himself, a couple of strikes to the kidneys from the back.

  He gasped for air and—was he crying?

  She shook her head at him. Pathetic.

  Let it never be said that she ever behaved like one of those clichéd blondes from old horror movies who always celebrated too early without double checking that the monster was really dead. Drea always made sure that her enemy was down.

  She raised the club one last time and put all her weight behind a hit to his knee. He howled like a banshee

  She reached and grabbed his keys off the floor from where the guard had dropped them, then she hurried out of the cell and locked it behind her.

  Only to find the door to the stairs was being pushed open.

  Shit.

  Of course there were probably cameras on the cells. Someone had seen. Or heard. The question was how many they’d sent down to subdue her.

  Screw it. She’d come this far.

  She raised the billy club and ran at the door, knowing surprise was her best weapon.

  “Drea?”

  Wait, what?

  “Eric?”

  She was running so fast she couldn’t stop herself in time and she collided with Eric. He wrapped his arms around her and together they rammed into the door, knocking it shut.

  For a second it was just the two of them, breathing hard, him looking down at her. Wow, his eyes were a really nice gray, weren’t they?

  Wait, wait, wait.

  Record scratch. Back the fuck up.

  She hated Eric, The Commander, Wolford. He’d founded the new community at Jacob’s Well after The Fall and ran the larger territory of Central Texas South.

  Okay, maybe hate was a strong word. But she strongly disliked him. He was a chauvinist pig who’d come up with the most ridiculous, degrading system of treating the women in his territory. Giving them out as fucking raffle prizes, for Christ’s sake. She’d had to lie and say she was a lesbian or else he was gonna try to force that shit on her.

  And he too had refused to help her go back to Nomansland even though it had been men from his community who’d taken her from there in the first place.

  Drea jerked away from Eric. “What are you doing here?”

  He raised his arms in an isn’t it obvious? motion. “Rescuing you.”

  Drea huffed out a laugh and then waved behind her at the guard on the floor of her cell. “Thanks but I can rescue myself just fine.” She pushed the billy club back into its retracted position and shoved as much of it as she could in her pocket.

  Eric crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. “You got out of your cell, but how exactly were you planning to get out of the city in the middle of a coup?”

  Wait, what? She couldn’t have heard that right.

  “A what?”

  “A coup. You know, when someone comes in and tries to take over—”

  “I know what a goddamned coup is.” Drea narrowed her eyes. “What makes you say one is happening here?”

  “Oh you didn’t hear? President Goddard was just assassinated. About…” He looked down at his watch. “Twenty-eight minutes ago.”

  Drea felt her eyebrows all but hit her hairline. Shit.

  “Even better, they think it was someone from our group. I’m surprised your pretty head is still attached to your neck.”

  Despite herself, Drea’s hand lifted to her throat. As soon as she realized what she was doing, she dropped her hand and glared at Eric.

  “And why do they think that?”

  He waved a hand to brush her off. “Shay’s sculpture may have exploded and either someone in her clan or Vanessa’s is most likely working for Arnold. Colonel Travis I mean.”

  Travis.

  The governor of Travis Territory who, according to which rumors you listened to, was either a benevolent leader or a power-hungry slave trader. Drea had seen enough in her life to know the second was more likely the truth.

  And now he’d a
ssassinated the President.

  Fuck. Her. Life.

  Drea blinked, thoughts racing a million miles a minute.

  Because if her instincts were right and he was a slave trader, he’d have dealings with the Black Skulls. Who were holding her women captive.

  And Travis had just become the most powerful man in the country.

  Drea’s head snapped toward Eric. “And you’re so calm about this… why?

  “Well, it’s all finally happening now, isn’t it? I’ve been waiting for the shit to hit the fan for a long time and,” he held out his arms. “Shit, meet fan. Now come on. I know where the President keeps his private helicopter.”

  “Why didn’t you fucking open with that?” Drea growled, pushing past Eric.

  “You’re a very difficult girl to rescue.”

  Drea pulled the billy club out of her pocket. “Call me a girl one more time.”

  Eric lifted his hands in a surrender gesture. “I apologize. You’re a very difficult… er, complex woman.”

  “And I rescued myself, remember?”

  “Ah, but I’m the one with the helicopter, remember?”

  “You were saying?” Drea put a hand on her hip as they looked out the window of the door that led out to the President’s private helicopter pad.

  The helicopter pad currently swarmed by soldiers wearing black and gray fatigues.

  “Shit,” Eric swore. “Those are Travis’s soldiers. I thought they were at Jacob’s W—” Then he shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”