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Chapter Three

    It was like a lover’s embrace and one endless kiss—except more frustrating than pleasurable, Simon reflected, relieved beyond measure when he surfaced with Anna in the pool within the pod he shared with his lieutenants and closest friends. It took Anna several moments to realize they’d surfaced, unfortunately, and his relief was slightly premature. The moment he loosened his hold on her and broke contact, she began struggling to reattach herself. “There’s air here, Anna!” he said tightly, eluding her attempt to press her mouth to his again by turning his head, giving her a light shake to break through her panic.
    She opened her eyes like someone waking from a nightmare and uncertain it was over, gasping, shivering all over.
    “Let me help her out,” Caleb said, his voice roughened with sympathy that irritated the shit out of Simon.
    For a moment, he tensed, but he forced himself to let go of her as Caleb pulled her toward the lip of the pool, caught her waist and hoisted her out.
    It was a view that stopped him in his tracks. Her clothing was plastered to every inch of her skin and nearly transparent, hiding just enough to tease him. Either his reaction was of short duration, or it affected everyone else the same way. When he finally blinked in an instinctive effort to bring the view into focus, he came to himself enough to look around to see if the others had noticed and saw Caleb had just hoisted himself from the water.
    Anna wrapped her arms around herself, shivering, her teeth clattering together hard enough he could hear it. He struggled with the sympathy that coiled in his belly, but he couldn’t shake it. He also couldn’t prevent the rise of resentment inside him when Caleb helped her up and supported her to the dryer.
    “Why did you bring her here?” Ian muttered beside him. “I thought the plan was to take her to the Watch Center and interrogate her.”
    Simon didn’t even glance at his friend. He was fully focused on watching Caleb wrestle with Anna for her clothes. Not surprisingly, Caleb won the battle and stripped her. He swallowed a little convulsively when the ‘veil’ was lifted, allowing him an unrestricted view of her.
    “The governor told me to handle it,” he responded finally, a little absently. “He made it pretty clear that he didn’t want to know the details. We can’t take her there without everyone in the city knowing inside of a day, and if the governor hears, he’ll be forced to do something about it.” Moving to the side of the pool before Ian could question him further, he climbed out and strode to the dryer. Caleb had pulled a robe from the locker next to it and was dressing Anna as if she was a child.
    She looked like a child, he thought, feeling his belly clench—all big, round, frightened eyes.
    Well, unfortunately, not entirely like a child. As slender as she seemed, there was nothing at all childlike about her full breasts and rounded hips. That was all woman and his cock knew it, springing to attention before he even realized his body was working against him.
    The robe swallowed her—no surprise since all the robes were of a size for them and she was at least a foot shorter than he was and probably half his weight.
    He managed to get himself under control when he discovered that she was clutching at Caleb a little frantically, as if trying to shield herself with him.
    “It’s alright, baby,” Caleb murmured. “No one is going to hurt you. I promise.”
    Simon rolled his eyes. He didn’t like it that she was scared anymore than any of the others, but the hard truth was that her fear of them was all they had to work with.
    They couldn’t hurt her. He wouldn’t have even if he wasn’t constrained by law to protect her.
    Glaring a warning at Caleb, he caught her arm, dragged her loose from Caleb in spite of her efforts to cling to him and marched down the main corridor until he reached his room. “Wait inside,” he