Chapter 2

Chapter Two

Brandon

T he price for Cassandra was going higher and higher, and his nerves were getting tighter and tighter. The sassy little cow had caught a lot of attention, probably as much for her personality as for the sweetness of her milk, and Leo was starting to give him looks as if to ask how badly he really wanted her for Sweet Cream Farms.

More badly than he wanted to admit.

"We're not going to be able to get a third cow if we keep bidding on Cassandra," Leo murmured. His voice was devoid of emotion, completely bland. It wasn't a judgment or direction, just a comment. Reminding Brandon, in case he'd forgotten.

He hadn't.

Dammit.

It wasn't like they needed a third cow, but they'd planned on buying three if they could. They had room for them. And Margaret, who they'd already purchased, was strictly for Leo. Though she'd be with the herd in the beginning, to help her acclimate to her new life and get into the proper mindset, and also so he could test the waters with her, it was going to be hands-off for everyone else without his express permission.

If the other hucow they brought home was for Brandon… not that he planned on making Cassandra into a pet. A pet on Hathor was akin to being married. There were laws, codes of conduct to protect the hucows, and it was the only time a hucow could ever make demands of their owner. Demands Brandon had no intention of fulfilling.

He'd become a hucow owner because he liked tending to the herd, not settling in with one female.

But he still wanted Cassie.

"Keep bidding," he said with a sigh. "She had the best milk. Better to have superior milk from one cow than to have two cows."

Leo's lips twitched at the excuse. It was true, though. She'd produced exceptionally good milk, the kind that private buyers would go nuts for. And it was incredibly illogical to feel a flash of possessiveness at the idea of a private buyer coveting her milk. Something about Cassandra had his emotions all mixed up. They needed to buy her if only so he could get her on the ranch and see her every day—eventually, the shine would wear off with constant exposure. It always did. But if someone else bought her, he'd probably be constantly thinking about her because it wouldn't have the chance to fade.

Yes, on the ranch, where he could touch and fuck her whenever he wanted. She'd be his favorite cow for a while, which was hardly anything new, then eventually, a new favorite would come along. No big deal.

Leo pressed the button to put in another bid.

And the numbers kept going up, up, up…

They definitely weren't going to be able to buy another cow.

He wasn't able to breathe properly until the screen flashed the countdown numbers after Leo's most recent bid. It meant everyone else was hesitating to put in another bid.

The flavor of her lingered in his mouth, as if he hadn't tasted a single other hucow after her, even though he knew he had. His heart pounded in his chest. The countdown was almost complete. She was almost his.

Three.

Two.

One.

Cassandra now belonged to Sweet Cream Farms.

Brandon grinned. Victory tasted as sweet as her milk.

Cassandra

"But who bought me?"

"Hush." The man leading her smacked her breast hard enough to sting, giving her a stern look. He wasn't wearing the blue uniform of the auction house, so he could be her new owner, but somehow she didn't think so. Maybe the hired hand of her new owner. He couldn't have been much older than her, if he was at all, but he acted as if she was a naughty little girl. Or a naughty little hucow. Cassandra glared at him. As though it wasn't bad enough she was being led around like a herd animal, no one was telling her anything. She wasn't actually a cow, dammit, no matter how much milk her breasts had produced.

Her nipples still ached, and her pussy, and the discomfort made her testy. Which made her mouthy.

"It's a simple question! Just answer me, and I'll stop talking!" Really, that was the easiest solution.

Instead of giving in, the man came to a sudden halt. Rather than saying another word to her, he spun her toward the wall. Staggering a little, Cassandra put her hands out in front of her to keep from falling, which meant her palms ended up flat against the wall. He kept a hold on her hip, though, keeping her lower body in place, which meant her butt ended up sticking out.

Before she could even try to straighten up, his hand smacked against her ass.

"Ow!"

"Hucows…"

Smack!

"Don't…"

Smack!

"Talk."

The swats freaking hurt. He was not holding back, and Cassandra had never been spanked before. She danced in place as much as she could, trying to escape his hand coming down and utterly failing. Tears wet her eyes, and she blinked to keep them from spilling over, a small sob rising up in her throat at the unexpected assault.

And yet, he didn't try to cop a feel, and he wasn't harming her or anything… but the skin of her butt burned where he'd spanked her.

What she did manage to do was bite her tongue against saying anything else. Thankfully. He paused, as if waiting to see if she would, before finally stepping back and letting her straighten up again. Giving her a stern look, he crooked his finger.

Cassandra followed after him, seething a little but also fairly certain another attempt at getting answers would net her nothing but a redder, sorer butt. Not worth it. She supposed that she'd be finding out soon enough—it wasn't like she'd recognize whoever it was, thanks to the blindfold. But she might recognize their voice. There had been one man…

Shaking off the thought, Cassandra refocused. It didn't matter anyway, did it?

Led out into the bright sun, she blinked as her eyes adjusted. There were trucks lined up, open in the back so she couldn't see a logo or anything. Why does it matter? But it did. She hated not knowing things. Even if the name meant nothing to her, she still wanted to know. It was a personal failing.

The bossy worker led her to an open truck door, and she could see another woman sitting inside on one of the padded benches, her feet in the hay that lined the floor. It wasn't huge, but there was more than enough for the two of them and even additional women if there were more coming. The walls were ventilated, letting the fresh air waft through.

It was noticing the ventilation that made Cassandra realize how nice the air smelled. Very different from being packed in with a bunch of women and body odor on the ship.

She recognized the other woman, of course. With her bright red hair, she'd been hard to miss. Totally naked, her breasts were tipped with dark pink nipples. Much darker pink than they'd been the last time Cassandra had seen her. Then again, so were her own. The buyers had been very thorough with their inspections.

She wanted to say hi, but she clenched her jaw against it. As much as she wanted to, she didn't want to get a spanking with an audience even more.

The shy redhead looked a little scared, so Cassandra did her best to smile at her. There. The redhead smiled back, appearing relieved. Good.

Cassandra got onto the bench across from the redhead, ignoring as much as she could the way it felt to sit down on her freshly spanked butt. She didn't want bossy man to see her flinch. Once she was seated, he put a collar with a little bell around her neck before fastening her in place the same way he had the redhead with a strap around her middle to keep her from moving around.

What was the redhead's name… it started with an M…

M… M…

Margaret! That was it.

Finished settling Cassie into place, bossy man stepped back.

"You can talk to each other… quietly," he said, to her surprise. "But if you see any men, no sounds. Unless you feel like mooing. Auction's almost over, so we should be leaving soon." He chuckled to himself, apparently finding something about his statement humorous, before hopping down from the truck and heading back to the building.

Cassandra waited until she couldn't see him anymore before she finally spoke. And then she still whispered. Just in case.

"Do you know who bought us?" She doubted it, but hey, she couldn't know for sure until she asked. As she expected, Margaret shook her head, frowning.

With a sigh, Cassandra looked around the interior of the truck to see if there were any clues inside. None that she could see. The small bell on her collar jingled as she moved.

"Huh." Cassandra tried to look down, but of course, she couldn't see her own bell. The collar was too tight around her neck for her to be able to see the bell hanging from it. She flicked it so she could hear it again, slightly amused. "Cowbell."

Margaret giggled and relaxed even more, which made her smile. However, the redhead still remained otherwise silent.

"You don't talk much, do you? What are you here for? Not talking? I bet the Allied Worlds would consider that unproductive." Unfortunately, her joke fell completely flat as Margaret's expression dropped to the unhappy one she'd often worn on the ship. Of course, the Allied Worlds didn't actually ship people off to the prison planets just for being unproductive—they just didn't allow their criminals to be unproductive. Hence, the choice between the prison planets, where they'd be useful to society in some capacity or the colonies.

Sure, the colonies meant almost certain death but a productive death. Huzzah. She was perfectly happy to be on a prison planet instead.

"I killed a bunch of toddlers," Margaret said harshly. Her gaze dropped away, the self-hatred practically emanating from her.

Holy shit.

Cassandra's eyes widened. That was…

Wait.

That was an immediate colony sentence.

Unless there was something Margaret wasn't telling her. Still… toddlers… but…

"There's more to it than that. The Allied Worlds would have sent you straight to the colonies otherwise. You wouldn't be here." She waved her hand. The prison planets weren't for murderers or violent criminals. "This is definitely not a place for murderesses. Which means that it probably wasn't murder, it was probably manslaughter, and you must have shown a hell of a lot of guilt at trial."

Like she was showing right now. She looked so remorseful, so genuinely distraught, Cassandra almost felt sorry for her. But toddlers? No, she felt sorrier for Margaret's victims and their families. Margaret was lucky she'd ended up on a prison planet rather than the colonies, no matter how bad she obviously felt.

"How would you know?" Margaret asked defiantly, crossing her arms over her chest. She immediately dropped them down to under her breasts, making a face as she did so. Obviously, it hadn't been very comfortable.

"Because I've committed manslaughter, too," Cassandra replied cheerfully. It actually wasn't something she liked to think about it, even though the jerk had deserved it. "I accidentally killed a guy who was trying to rape me when I fought back. Unfortunately, I'd already been arrested for stealing, and apparently killing rapist containment officers doesn't get your sentence reduced. But it didn't increase it either."

Even the Allied Worlds weren't going to punish her for killing a rapist in self-defense. Historically, that hadn't always been true, but now it was felt that he'd gotten what he deserved, and she hadn't even been charged since she was already headed for a prison planet. The officials had just chalked it up to an unfortunate incident, apologized for hiring him, and sent her on her way.

"That's a little different from causing the deaths of children."

It was. Cassandra couldn't help that little well of sympathy again. Unlike her, Margaret had clearly done it as an accident and was hating herself for it. She clearly felt awful. Cassandra hadn't exactly purposefully killed him, but she sure as hell wasn't spending her nights regretting it, either. She'd not only saved herself, she'd saved every woman that came after her, and the Allied Worlds government agreed. Margaret had done something terrible, but she didn't seem like she was actually a bad person, even though she clearly thought she was.

"Yeah," she said softly. "I don't feel guilty about it at all. If you were a bad person, you wouldn't feel guilty, either."

There didn't seem to be much to say after that. She figured she'd let Margaret think it over. Plus, there wasn't really a good segue to a different topic.

Besides, now that she knew Margaret's story, she didn't really want to compare notes on how they'd both gotten there. Yes, she got caught stealing. Three separate times, in fact. All from companies who had shitty track records with their employees and not enough protection against hackers.

Too bad, so sad, they hadn't been able to get back the money she'd sent on to charity organizations.

And now, she was here.

Was it worth it?

She liked to think she'd done some good before she was sent here. Now, she was never going to be allowed near a computer again, so she'd need to find something else to do. Maybe that was really her problem with not knowing information. She was used to having all the information she wanted at her fingertips, and now she had… nothing.

Shadows in the truck made her jump as she realized there were suddenly two men standing there, looking in at her and Margaret. Good thing they hadn't been talking.

One of them was Leo, the Hathor representative who had introduced himself on the shuttle between the prison ship and Hathor. He'd been the one to choose who actually got to come to Hathor rather than one of the other planets. He was tall, dark-haired, and handsome, but the man next to him was the one who drew her eye and not just because of the way he was looking at her.

His sun-streaked, light brown hair and tanned skin made it clear he spent a lot of time in the sun. Light brown eyes lingered on her, looking her over intimately, and her skin tingled in response.

"Ah," Leo said, as though he was pleased to find them there. As if he hadn't been the one to order them being put there. "Little Cassie and little Meggie, our two newest additions. I'm Leo and this is Brandon, and you'll be joining our herd at Sweet Cream Farm."

Information! Finally! Not that it meant anything to her, but at least it was something. She wasn't sure how she felt about her name being changed to Cassie. She'd always insisted on being called Cassandra, but hey… new life, new name. Maybe it wasn't the worse thing in the world. Cassandra had been an IT specialist and an occasional hacker. Cassie was… a hucow.

"Luckily for us, it's a short trip to the farm," Leo continued. "About two hours by truck, so no need for flying or anything more complicated. If you need anything while we're driving, shake your head to make your bell ring. We'll hear it. But you had better really need something if you do that, or you'll regret making us stop. You have permission to talk to each other while we're driving, although not to us unless we ask you a question, and you are to call both of us Master."

Oh, as if.

She bit her lip against responding. The sting of her earlier spanking had faded—it really hadn't been that bad—and the idea of actually calling someone ‘Master'? No, thank you. Being milked, being suckled, being fucked… all of that she could get on board with, especially after what the serum had done to her body, but that didn't mean she was going to call some guy ‘Master.'

When neither of them said anything, Leo nodded in satisfaction and shut the door. Brandon gave Cassie one last lingering look before it closed, and she pressed her thighs together. Damn. That serum really was effective.

The truck engine started up and she and Margaret—Meggie—looked at each other.

Their new life was about to start.