The Gender Plan (The Gender Game #6)(55)

Jay hefted Desmond up and carried her across the overgrown yard, stepping onto the sagging collection of boards that made up the shack’s front stoop. Lacey, a young refugee woman, was already holding the door open for him. The room was already lit—a fire burned in the small wood oven to the left of the room, generating enough heat to keep the chill outside from fully permeating the dilapidated one-room building.

Desmond didn’t stir as Jay carried her, or when he settled her on the sagging bed in the corner of the room. Lacey held the door open for Viggo and me as well, then closed it behind us, the hinges creaking. She gave me a warm smile before moving over to a small table with a chair next to it, seating herself primly.

I turned to find Jay and Viggo working together to loop Desmond’s chains through the bedframe. Viggo was doing the weaving, while Jay held her by her free wrist, making sure she didn’t try anything while the chains were off. Still, Desmond remained motionless. It wasn’t until Viggo moved in to pull off her pillowcase that she even started to move. Her hair clung wildly to her face as her eyes snapped open. She looked around groggily, focusing on me. She flexed her jaw as though testing her weapons, narrowing her gaze.

“Welcome to your new, albeit temporary home,” announced Viggo. “Now, don’t let the sparse surroundings fool you—this quaint place holds a lot of charm. There’s curtains and boards on the windows for privacy, and even a bed, for the ultimate comfort.”

Desmond gave the room a onceover and then leaned back into her pillow, the chains that once again draped around her wrists clinking together as the small amount of remaining slack slipped against the mattress. If it had just been her hands, I would have been worried about her using that slack as a weapon, but with the chain hobbled to her ankle shackles as well, there wouldn’t be much she could accomplish within her limited range of motion.

She smiled slowly and arched an eyebrow. “I see I continue to live. How is dear Cody? I hope I didn’t upset him too badly in our discussion yesterday?”

“Don’t get too comfortable yet,” Viggo said, ignoring the question. “We need to go over some rules. First of all, the chains remain on. Obviously, this place doesn’t have an actual bathroom, per se, but upon request, you will be given a bucket. We will not be giving you any privacy, and your guards will be changed every four hours. This is Lacey. She’ll be your first guard of the evening. The guards are in charge; if they say jump, you say nothing and do it.”

“With this leg?” she asked, bemused.

“With that leg,” he confirmed, not batting an eyelid.

Desmond’s eyes studied him closely as he spoke. There was an expectant pause, and then she looked over at Jay. “You are really okay with them treating your mother like this?” she asked.

Jay looked up at her and fidgeted, and I immediately went to grab Jay and separate them, at least visually, from each other. Viggo stopped me, nodding to Jay, who had begun to speak, his face clearing.

“I don’t think I have a mother,” Jay announced softly. “I did once, a long time ago, but she stopped being my mother after all the horrible things she did to me and my brother.”

“I did them for you,” Desmond sniffed at him. “I did them to make you strong. Why can’t you—”

“They killed me,” Jay said flatly, meeting her gaze. “Over and over and over again. I’ve been drowned, suffocated, and electrocuted, all in the name of that science you volunteered me for. I lived in a ten-by-ten box for almost ten years while they pushed me to my limits. And you know what the worst part was? Even from day one, I didn’t have any hope I would ever get out of there.”

His eyes glittered and he shook his head at her, his lips trembling. “That’s not love. That’s not what you do to someone you care about. You don’t know how to love, and I feel sorry for you. So yes, I am okay with them doing this to you. It’s nicer than you deserve, and I am glad that I have found such good people who will still treat someone who has done only terrible things to them with such kindness.”

Desmond stared stonily at her son. “That’s the first time I’ve ever seen you be strong,” she said after a moment. “Such a shame you have it directed at the wrong person.”

“Eventually you’ll realize that what you did to me was not love—it was selfishness. Stop acting like you were doing me any favors, and—”

“I was doing you a favor,” she hissed. “I wanted you to be strong, so you could survive and grow up and be remarkable.”

“Well, I was traumatized. Do you know that when people touch me, it actually hurts me? Not like Tim, just… emotionally… because it means so much to me to feel someone touching me? I cried when Viggo shook my hand when I first met him. Not in front of him, but later, alone… I didn’t realize how long I’d just been waiting for somebody to hug me. Or to touch me at all. I’m sorry if that doesn’t make me strong in your book, but I don’t care. I don’t exist for your approval.”

Desmond stared at her remaining son, and I was surprised to see her eyes beginning to glisten, as if she were tearing up. She blinked it back and sucked in a deep breath, looking tired. “What do you want from me, Jay? I did the best I could. I didn’t even want to be a mother in the first place, and then to have boys on top of it! And still I tried. I could’ve dropped your brother off at the orphanage and never even had you, but I stayed. You may think what I did to you was selfish, but you know nothing about the world I live in, and the people I deal with. You—”