His jaw tightened.
“Agk made us. We had no choice,” I said.
When we’d cleaned up the fighting ring, disposing of the bodies, not everyone had been dead when we’d put them in the incinerator. I didn’t know if the screams would ever leave me for as long as I lived, but I didn’t feel guilty about it per se. I felt horrible those people had died and we’d had a hand in it, but in the end, it had been us or them. If we said no, Agk would’vekilled us. Each time, Teddy had insisted on closing the bolt to the furnace, locking them inside.
I took his hand, swallowing at the feel of his skin on mine. Every instinct in me screamed to let him go and hide, but I held on. Teddy needed this. Needed me. I had to protect him.
“It was not your fault,” I said. Teddy refused to look at me, so I tugged on him. “But thanks for protecting me. You’re my big, brave hero.” I batted my eyelashes at him. “Oh what, oh what would I do without this strong man to protect me?”
“Asshole,” he breathed, then laughed.
Pulling him closer, I ignored the unease that settled in my stomach and the sweat that gathered in between my shoulder blades—Teddy needed this. I whispered, “It wasn’t your fault. Alright?”
He nodded.
“Let it go. Let all the shit go,” I said. “It’s the only way we’re going to survive.”
Teddy slid away from me slightly, staring at me with drawn eyebrows.
Klars returned, interrupting us with a kind smile plastered on his face. “Bartholomew, would you allow me to speak to Vince alone?”
Teddy glanced at me, and I said, “Go. We both know your husband is outside.”
He flushed, shrugging.
“I’ll be fine,” I said. There was no way in hell I wanted Teddy to overhear whatever Klars had found. It couldn’t be good.
After the door had closed with a low whoosh, Klars sat down on the other side of the bed. “You were forced to work in a brothel.”
I crossed my arms and looked across the medbay, but there was no one around. Klars had dispersed the staff without menoticing. Unease coiled in my stomach, and I shifted further away from the man.
“You’re safe,” he said in a soft voice. “I noticed some issues in your blood work.”
“Which were?”
“Diseases that are transmitted sexually. That plus the finger breaks, starvation, and the anal fissures… I made an educated guess.”
I fought the urge to vomit or curl into a ball. Life would be so much easier if I never had to move again. “I don’t want anyone to know.”
“You have nothing to be ashamed of,” Klars said.
My jaw clenched. What the fuck did he know?
“I can treat you. There will be no issues in the future, and you don’t have to worry about passing anything on once the treatment is complete.”
Who would fuck me right now, anyway? I swallowed a sudden rush of bile at the thought.
“You also need to start a high calorie diet as well as nutrition supplements.”
Teddy had mentioned that possibility. Who cared if I was skin and bones?
He stood. “I want you to know, what happens here is completely private. No one will know.”
I stiffly nodded.
Klars disappeared for a few moments, then returned with a series of injections. As he administered one after another, I stared blankly at the wall, flinching with each injection. None of this mattered. None of it. All of it was going to disappear. I would force it down and pretend that nothing happened.
Once he was done, he told me to come back in a few days for another round.
