Free Anew: Book One: Awakened by Josie Litton

standing. Instead, I’m draped over one of Ian’s broad shoulders. His
arm is wrapped firmly around my upper thighs. When I cry out in mingled
surprise and outrage, I feel a sudden, sharp sting on my posterior.
    He didn’t! He wouldn’t…!
    “I don’t know what the hell
Susannah was thinking,” he says as he strides into and through the soaring
entry hall. “Or maybe I shouldn’t blame her. The whole replica process is so
new. Maybe something went wrong. What was supposed to produce a nice, compliant
female produced you instead.”
    Apparently for no better reason
than his own frustration with this possibility, he delivers another stinging
slap to my bottom.
    I cry out and kick at him but
before I can land a blow, we’re in the library and he’s dropped me
unceremoniously onto the large leather couch.
    Standing over me, he says, “My
men aren’t goons.” He sounds truly offended on their behalf. “They’re an elite
security force and you’re damn lucky they were available to find you. What were
you thinking of, running like that?”
    I straighten up quickly and
glare at him. No way is he going to put this on me.
    “What did you expect me to do?
No matter what you want to believe, I’m a human being. I have a mind and a will
of my own.” With all the scorn I can muster, I add, “This idea you have that
I’m a piece of property is nothing short of repellant. You do not own me. No
one can. Not ever.”
    He frowns, prompting a flicker
of hope that he might just possibly understand. It’s dashed a moment later when
he says, “We can debate the finer points of the law at another time. Lift up
your hair.”
    “What?”
    He reaches into a drawer of his
desk and pulls out what looks like a metal collar about two inches wide and set
with multi-colored diodes. At a press of his thumb, it springs open.
    Instinctively, I recoil. “What
is that?”
    “It’s a tracking device. I was
advised to use it for the first few days after you woke but I decided not to.
Clearly, that was a mistake.”
    He comes closer, carrying the thing. I stare at it in horror.
    “It will also monitor your
physical well-being. If you’re hurt, I’ll know and I won’t be left to wonder
how to find you.” He pauses a moment, then adds, “I could accomplish the same
with an implant which, with the benefit of hindsight, I should have done. But
this has an added feature. If you try to leave the grounds, you’ll be
temporarily disabled by an electrical shock.”
    His gaze hardens. Quietly, he says,
“You’ll want to avoid that.”
    A wave of nausea moves through
me. Without taking my eyes from what instantly becomes the gleaming metal
symbol of the helplessness that I am determined to never experience again, I
say, “You aren’t putting that on me.”
    Weighing the collar in his hand,
he says with lethal softness, “You must know that you can’t stop me.”
    I do know and because I do, I shudder.
He’s far bigger and stronger than I am. Worse yet, whatever imprinting or
conditioning I received predisposes me to want to accept his control over my
body, to yield everything to him. But I’m more than the sum of all that, as he
is about to discover.
    “Perhaps I can't,” I acknowledge.
My mouth curls in disgust. “But you should know that I won’t make it easy.
Before I give in, you’ll have to seriously damage what you think of as your
property.”
    I spit the last word, leaving no
doubt as to how profoundly wrong he is to regard me in any such way.
    I tell myself that I’m prepared
for any reaction from him but that turns out not to be the case. A shadow moves
behind his eyes and as it does, he transforms. The ruthless anger and
determination that truly frighten me vanish. In their place, I see a man who
looks genuinely appalled, even horrified by the prospect that he will have to
hurt me in order to get what he wants.
    I can’t help but gape. The
change is as dramatic as it is inexplicable but there is no doubting that it