Shades of Ménage : A Dystopian Romance Ménage & Post Catastrophic Romance Ménage Boxed Set Series - Ultimate Four-Book Collection by Jan Springer Page B

subservient to men in every aspect. The bastards had released the X-virus into an unsuspecting women’s rights convention. The virus had targeted estrogen-rich women, turning them into virtual zombies. Mindless women who did whatever they were told to do by men.
    The X-virus had spread like wildfire. Unfortunately, while it had spread, it had mutated into many forms. Most of them deadly to women.
    Callie had been exposed over and over. When her mother and half-sisters had gotten sick, she’d taken care of them. When his mother and sister had gotten sick, she’d taken care of them, too.
    He’d been pissed off at her for exposing herself.
    She’d done it anyway.
    They’d fought about it all the time.
    In the end both their mothers and his sister had died.
    Her sisters had lived and now required the daily doses of expensive medicines to keep them alive.
    Nothing had happened to Callie.
    She was immune, as were a minority of other women around the world.
    Then the government had created the experimental labs, looking for unaffected women to volunteer themselves as guinea pigs in the name of womankind.
    Callie had come to him telling him she’d wanted to volunteer to give them some blood samples. He’d vehemently told her no.
    Then she’d disappeared without a trace.
    Luke’s guts crunched as he recalled waiting anxiously on their newly built porch for her to return from grocery shopping.
    He never should have let her go alone.
    Men were already getting crazy at the prospect of so few women available to them.
    He’d waited until he could wait no more then he’d hopped into the truck and rode into town. He hadn’t been able to find her and no one, not even the grocery cashiers or the mall’s security video had seen her inside.
    Immediately he’d gone to the cops. A day later, they’d located her car at a shopping mall in Bangor, Maine. She’d disappeared without a trace.
    Deep inside he’d known the government had taken her. He’d heard horror stories of what happened to the X-virus-resistant women in those labs. About how they eventually snapped under the loss of their freedom as the government scientists housed them in isolation units for weeks even years in a mad attempt to find a vaccine to help the girls who would ultimately turn into women and get the deadly virus.
    “ Are you hungry?”
    She was changing the subject. He’d let her. For now.
    He took a moment to see if maybe he had an appetite and to his surprise discovered his stomach felt quite empty.
    “ I think I could manage something,” he admitted.
    He watched her ladle more of that chicken broth from the steaming pot she had on the stove into a tin cup.
    A concerned frown marred her luscious lips and fear for her safety rammed into his stomach.
    “ Maybe you should go to the Outlaw farm. See what happened. It might be better if you don’t stay here. Someone might see the smoke from the stove…” and come here to claim you , he added silently.
    Her head snapped up. A look of insult twisted her face. Her blue eyes flashed with anger.
    “ I don’t need anyone to protect me. I can take care of myself.”
    Her confidence was unnerving. It angered him.
    “ You didn’t do so good when I showed up.”
    “ You surprised me, that’s all.”
    “ And you think a group of sex-starved men, won’t?”
    “ If it hadn’t been you, I would have handled the situation.”
    “ Oh, yeah? How?”
    Her eyes strayed to the kitchen area where he noted the long gleaming knife on the counter.
    “ I don’t think a knife against a horde of men would do much damage.”
    “ It wouldn’t be for them.”
    Shock sucker-punched him.
    Sweet shit ! She would have killed herself?
    She came toward him, a grim smile on her face confirming that yes indeed she would have committed suicide. “Like I said—I would have handled the situation.”
    He nodded numbly and comprehended exactly how close he’d been to losing her yet again.
    * * * * *
    It was a full bladder