Free Microsoft Word - OneGoodWoman by test Page A

gone and never recaptured.

    “I feel most alive when I get to kill Savages. My hate gives me life.”

    She fell silent. He gave into his need to fill it. “Many of us hate them and find no regret in killing them.”

    “I think Juston understands my hate more than anyone, even more than my mother or any other woman.”

    She swallowed, the sound loud in the night. This time he waited.

    “Perhaps if you were to really know me, you would realize that I do trust you. More than you can know.”

    “I’ve wanted to know you better since I first met you.”

    Her mouth twisted into a bitter smile. “There is no me. Cara died almost two years ago.
    My body was rescued, but all the things that made me a person died on a mountainside. Died slowly and painfully over a period of endless days after the Savages captured me.”
    ONE GOOD WOMAN SUSAN KELLEY 37

Chapter Six
    Cara told it all to him, even some things she’d never confided to Juston or her mother.
    Her virgin body raped, beaten, assaulted in unnatural ways over and over and again. Her wish for a death that would not come. Helpless beneath the stinking, muscular bodies of the Savages as they took her time and time again.

    Then against all hope, Juston Steele led a rescue to save her. He’d carried her brutalized body back to Solonia where the Deomo and Katerina healed her physical being.

    Juston taught her to fight and use her puny strength against the physically superior Savages. He trusted her with the protection of his family and allowed her opportunities to kill the beasts that had destroyed her life. And Steele understood the nightmares would never leave.
    “I would give my life for Juston Steele.”

    Brady said nothing for a long moment. Was he disgusted by the degradation she carried with her? The Savages’ filthy intimate taking of her body would never be cleansed. No one’s touch could ever give her pleasure. Even though her mind knew the difference between a human’s friendly contact, her mind still conjured up the thick, punishing hands of the Savages.
    No matter her body’s wishes, her mind worked without regard to her wishes.

    His blue eyes looked nearly clear in the silvery moonlight. He leaned up on one elbow but there was nothing relaxed in his posture. He lifted his hand slowly and touched her cheek so lightly she felt only the rough brush of his swordsman’s calluses.

    “I’m sorry, Cara.”

    She shrugged and pushed his hand away as much from habit as discomfort. “Since we’re stuck with only each other, I thought you should know. After what happened with Mia last year, I took an honest look at myself.”

    “With Mia? What did that have to do with you? Those Parlanian bastards killed her.”

    The image of Brady, blood-covered and furious with grief, standing beside Mia’s grave was another brick on the load of guilt she carried about her friend’s death. Mia, who’d been with Juston and helped rescue her from the Savages.

    “It should have been me.” She met his gaze. “I was supposed to go on that scouting mission with you, Claudia and Roth. But Juston wouldn’t let me go because I was so prejudiced against Roth. He didn’t trust me to do my part.”

    “Hell, Cara. The Parlanians killed Mia. It could have been any of us.”

    “But it should have been me. Mia had so much to live for, so many things yet to do. She wanted a husband and children.”

    “She wouldn’t have wanted you to die in her place.”

    “I know. But I should have. She had more to give the world.”

    “No more than you do.”

    “I have nothing to give for the betterment of Solonia or for anything or anybody else.”
    She wasn’t feeling sorry for herself. She was being totally honest.

    “How can you say that? You jumped in that damned river and saved my life.”

    “Saved your life? All I did was mess up again. I wasn’t even thinking. I can barely swim.”
    ONE GOOD WOMAN SUSAN KELLEY 38

    “How would I have fixed my shoulder if you