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I flexed my arm, hugging it to my chest, straining my muscles to keep it there. He lifted the wrist and my whole upper body with it, but I held the arm, fingers closed into a fist.

“Do not make me hurt you, Anita.”

“I’m not making you do anything. Whatever you do, it’s your choice to do it, not mine.”

He laid me back down, gently. “I could crush your hand.” It sounded like a threat, but his voice was still gentle.

“I won’t touch you again, not like that, not voluntarily.”

“But lay your hand upon my chest, above my heart. That is not a hard thing, Anita.”

“No.”

“You are a very stubborn woman.”

“You’re not the first one to say it,” I said.

“I will not force you.”

The skinned man moved forward until he was directly against the stone, mirroring his “god.” He drew an obsidian blade and bent over me. I tensed, but I didn’t say anything. I could not touch him again and promise I’d come out the other side. If I was going to die anyway, I’d die whole, not possessed by some would-be god.

But he didn’t stab me. He slipped the tip of the blade under the shoulder of the Kevlar vest. Kevlar isn’t meant to stop a stabbing motion, but it’s not an easy thing to cut through, especially with a stone knife. The empty skin hand that decorated his wrist wobbled back and forth, back and forth, as he sawed. I stared past him at the far wall, but my peripheral vision just couldn’t get rid of that flopping hand. I finally had to stare up at the ceiling, but it was just darkness. It’s hard to stare into the dark when there are other things to look at, but I tried.

I almost asked them if they knew what Velcro was, but didn’t. It would take them awhile to cut the vest off with an obsidian blade. Hell, I might not have to do anything else to delay them. It’d be morning by the time the obsidian cut through the material. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one who figured that out.

The skin man put the blade back in his sheath and pulled a second knife out from a sheath behind his back, the way you’d carry a backup gun. When he raised it into the firelight, it glimmered silver, steel. With or without high silver content, it would still cut through the vest a lot quicker than the obsidian.

He slipped the tip under the shoulder seam of the vest. I finally had to say something. “You just planning to cut my heart out?”

“Your heart will remain in your chest where it belongs,” the “god” said.

“Then why do you want the vest off?” I finally turned my head and looked at him, though not at any of his eyes.

“If you will not touch my chest with your hand, there are other parts of your body that can feel,” he said.

It was almost enough to make me give him my hand, almost. I didn’t trust what he might consider other parts of my body that could feel. But it would take time to get the vest off, and if I just gave up my hand, that wouldn’t take any time at all. I needed the time.

The vest came off quicker than you’d think. It was not designed to stand up to a sawing blade. They pulled the pieces of the vest off me, tugging the last from under my back.

The Red Woman’s Husband climbed up beside me. He knelt, staring down at me, and he wasn’t staring at my face. He traced the outline of my bra with the tip of one finger. Trailing, oh, so lightly, along my skin. “What is this?” He traced under the bra back and forth, back and forth.

“Underwire,” I said.

He traced the black lace at the top of the bra. “So many new things to learn.”

“Glad you like it,” I said. He didn’t get the sarcasm. Maybe he was immune to it.

He did what I’d thought he’d do. He climbed on top of me. But he didn’t get into a standard missionary position. He scooted lower until his chest was pressed against mine. With our height differences, that put his groin safely below mine. So it wasn’t rape that we were doing. Maybe it was just me that worried so much about that. But somehow the knowledge that it wasn’t sex he was after scared me more. There were worse things he could take from me than sex, like my mind.

His chest pressed against mine, smooth, warm, very human. Nothing bad