15. The Liar
“What are you doing back here, mother?” My mother stands before me, dressed in dark clothing, and I can tell just by her fidgeting stance that something is very wrong. “Won’t you be missed at the capital?”
“Your idiot father thinks he has had me sedated and that I am locked in my quarters, grieving for Dinah, and filled with hysteria over your capture.” A small, snarky smile graces her lips. “He doesn’t know that secret passageways are hidden in the house, and that I am not the only rebel under his roof.”
“Has something happened?”
“Today was Dinah’s mourning day celebration, Abraham. The Brotherhood put on a massive display for the populace to see. Calling for unity against the rebels who would murder such a high-ranking Sacred Wife. The Holy Father himself administered the mass.” Her hands clasp together, the fingers lacing and clenching with her evident agitation.
While I know I should feel something, other than anger that the Brotherhood is perpetuating a farce, and trying to lead the population into a war against the rebels, I know it doesn’t truly matter. Dinah is still here with us, even if she’s trapped in a coma.
She will come back to me, she has to.
She must see the confusion on my face, as her hand reaches out and grabs mine. “You don’t understand; this will break into civil war. Lines are already being chosen, Abraham. The Holy Father has not been fooled by Noah Rothesay’s tale of rebels attacking his son’s house.” Her chilled hand slides up to cradle my jaw. “He believes that Ezekiel killed Dinah with his father’s help, and that you have also been murdered, in order to prevent the secret from getting out.”
“Okay, and that means?” I feel like I’m missing something here. Why is she so frantic and obviously concerned with what the Holy Father believes? He’s a pretentious dick, what does it matter?
“He’s ordered Ezekiel’s death, Abraham. There will be an assassination attempt on Ezekiel’s life in the coming days.” The words are a bomb detonating in my skull. The images they paint have me staggering back, my body crashing against the wall. As much as I hate Zeke, and his betrayal, there is still a part of me that hopes to see him again, even if it is to murder the son of a bitch.
“How can you be so sure that your information is reliable? What if you are wrong?” Different parts of me war with each other. One side is ready to cheer for the death of the man who betrayed, and tried to take Atasi from me, and the other is devastated, and still in love with the asshole I spent my whole life with.
“We have an irrefutable source close to the Holy Father, Abraham. One so well placed that he would never be suspected of being part of the rebellion.”
Is it possible they have someone so high up that they are indeed close to the Holy Father without being suspect? At this point, I don’t know if that truly surprises me. Weeks ago, if you told me my perfectly pious and meek mother was a rebel, I would have suggested you get your head checked, but here I am, hidden in a rebel safehouse with her before me.
“I want to meet this person myself. If there is a way to save Ezekiel and Sammy from the Brotherhood, then we must do it now.”
A bleak smile graces her lips as she meets my eyes. “I thought that you might say that. He’s here waiting to meet you, so that we can come up with a way to get them out of the capital.” She turns away from me and heads towards the room’s door. “What will you do once we have Ezekiel back, Abraham?”
I don’t hesitate to respond, knowing that my words are being ripped out from the very depths of my soul, which screams for retribution. “I’ll slit his fucking throat and watch the light vacate his eyes.”
I’m sitting at Dinah’s bedside, my brain roaming over all I have learned today—things that I never would have imagined were even possible. I’m realizing that up until Dinah reentered my life, I really did live not only a privileged life, but an oblivious one. I had no idea what was happening around me and under my nose.
A memory of a discussion with Gabriel not long before his death rises in my mind. One that I didn’t take seriously at the time, preferring to think it was his idealistic tendencies and wanting to save the world ideals speaking, and that nothing would come of it. Now, sitting here, I realize how very wrong I was. It was all right there in front of me, but I was too stupid and blind to see it.
“Men and women are rising up against the tyranny of the Brotherhood, Abe, and not just spontaneous radicals but well-organized defectors, who can no longer live under the rancorous and self-serving dictatorship of the Order.” Gabriel paces in front of me, dragging his tattooed hands through his thick, dark hair in agitation, as I take another deep drag of the weed I’m toking on.
“We have to join them somehow. We must be prepared to help them take down the Order and free the people. Stop what they are doing to the women in our society, women like my mother and Dinah who have no power.” His gray-blue eyes meet mine frantically, and I pull back from the weed, wondering if he’s on a bad trip. Maybe this shit is defective, and it’s pushing him to the edge, or perhaps it was the coke we did hours before, off the breasts of those two willing maids.
I adjust my cock at the memory of watching Gabriel getting his cock sucked nice and deep, while he snorted coke off the other maid’s breasts, and I fucked her ass hard and without mercy. She screamed like a little bitch before I held a pillow over her face to shut her up. The cunt is lucky I didn’t stop her from breathing permanently. She can thank Gabriel for her life being spared, fucking killjoy. Zeke would have let me murder her.
Jesus fuck, maybe we should get them back in here and have another round with them. The only problem I see with that, is one of them was barely breathing when the other one dragged her out of here with terror in her eyes. Eh, maybe I shouldn’t have squeezed my hands around her throat quite so tightly? Who knew the bitch was so fragile?
“Are you listening to a word I’m saying, Abe? Why the fuck are you stroking your cock right now?” Gabe’s voice breaks through my musings and brings me back to his concerned face, as his eyes track the movement of my fist along my length behind the cloth of my pants.
I should feel guilty that I wasn’t really listening to what he was rambling on about. The truth is I don’t really care what happens to our society as a whole. I’m a privileged fuck who enjoys his actual privilege.
Do I believe in what the Brotherhood stands for? Fuck no. Am I upset that Gabe’s mom, mine, and Dinah are trapped in a world where they have no bodily autonomy, and are treated as less than second-class citizens? Sure, but what the fuck am I supposed to do about it? It’s not like this uprising that Gabe is speaking about will carry any weight; none of them have before. The Brotherhood is too strong and powerful to be brought down by mere rebels, no matter how well-organized they are.
“I was thinking that maybe we should find two new maids to calm you down a bit. You seem all riled up again, and a tight, wet pussy could help relax you. That is unless you want to bend over that table and let me fuck you raw?” My balls tighten at the very thought of doing just that. It’s been too long since Gabe let me slip inside of him, unlike Zeke, who never denies me.
Gabe shakes his head, sadness crossing his features. “One day, you will have to stand up and fight for something, Abe, and for your sake, I hope you don’t end up on the wrong side of history.”
A rustling sound and a small moan pull me away from my thoughts. My eyes immediately land on the dark-haired beauty lying on the bed, covered by pristine linens, and fighting to stay alive.
Panic and excitement fill my body as I watch her legs move restlessly under the blankets, and her right arm lift entirely off the bed towards her face, before it drops down and attempts the movement again. Her chest rises and falls, the beating of the machines rising, and her head moves side to side across the pillow.
Holy fuck! She’s starting to wake up!She’s finally coming back to me. After weeks of watching her body breathing with assistance, and my hope starting to wane that she would ever return to me, she’s waking up from her coma.
I spring to my feet and rush for the door, opening it wide and yelling into the corridor for the rebel nurses and doctors who have been overseeing her care, before rushing back to her side and grasping her hand tightly in mine.
“Come back to me, Atasi. I’m here, baby. Wake up. Open those beautiful eyes and come back to me, please.”
Nurses and doctors storm the room, yanking on equipment and trying to push me out of their way to assess Dinah, but I lace my fingers with hers, refusing to be moved from her side as she continues to struggle on the bed, her eyes fluttering and her body moving restlessly.
I’m here, baby. I’m waiting for you. Please just open those beautiful eyes and look at me.
I’m vaguely aware that my mother has entered the room, her voice low as she questions one of the nurses, and her hand makes its way to my shoulder in support. “She’s strong, Abraham. She will wake. I am certain of it.”
Fuck, I hope with desperation that she’s right, that this is Atasi coming back to me, instead of another episode of her body trying to fight against the life-saving measures keeping her breathing. I clue back in to the doctor speaking to Dinah, even as her thick, dark lashes continue to flutter against her pale cheeks. She’s so beautiful, even in this moment. Hope rises within me that this might be when she returns to the world of the living, after being trapped in darkness for so long. My breath feels like it’s strangling me, and my body is filled with adrenaline, even as my mind tries to prepare me for this not being what I want.
“Dinah, we need you to try to stay calm. Do you hear me? You have a breathing tube inserted, and it is helping you get much-needed oxygen to your lungs. Don’t try to dislodge it. Can you hear me, Dinah? Do you understand me? If you can, try to open your eyes.”
Her eyelids move rapidly as if she is struggling against some great force. Finally, her lashes lift, and we are treated to her dark gray irises with hints of blue in their midst, staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. Her whole body tenses before a massive, ragged gasp attempts to leave her lips, and the hand I hold tightly tries to pry away from me to grasp at the tube inside of her mouth.
“No, baby, please don’t hurt yourself. You’re okay, Dinah. I promise, baby, you’re safe. We are safe.” I try to stop her from ripping out the tube, leaning forward to grasp both her hands and meeting her eyes. They blink up at me in confusion, blinking over and over as if to clear the fog from her mind. My heart pounds in my chest with happiness. She’s back. She has finally come back to me.
“We are going to remove the tube now we believe she may be able to breathe independently.” The doctor motions to the nurses, and the gray-haired one, who I have learned is named Beth, dislodges my hold of Dinah’s hands and pushes me back a few steps, where my mother grasps onto my bicep to hold me still. Panic at being parted from her fills me, and causes me to want to lurch forward.
“Let us work, Abraham. The sooner we remove the tube and make sure she’s alright, the less agitated she will be.”
I allow them to work around my Atasi like a swarm of bees moving in all different directions, testing her responses to light and pain, and trying to calm her down. The doctor speaks in a calm, authoritative manner to her that grates on my nerves because she’s mine. I want to be the one to talk to and question her. An overwhelming sense of possessiveness takes me over, and I can’t wait for another second once they have the tube out, and she’s stopped her restless movements on the bed. I return to her sightline, her dazed and frightened eyes meeting mine as a crystal teardrop slides down her cheek.
“I’m here, baby. I’m here. Please don’t cry, Atasi.” I grasp her chilled fingers, stroking the top of her hand in a calm and soothing motion with my fingers, as her chin trembles and more tears slide down her face.
Her lips open and close, a sob escaping from their depth as she struggles to speak, and my heart clenches painfully with how wretched the sound is. I move my body closer, leaning across her frame even as I can see the disapproval on the nurse’s faces. “What is it, baby? What are you trying to say? You’re safe now. I promise I will take care of you.”
Whatever she is trying to say is too low and raspy for me to hear, so I lean further until my face is close to hers, and I can drown in the depths of her terrified eyes. Her pink chapped lips open once more, and I can see she is putting everything she has into it, making her voice come out with a wheeze.
“Saaammmmmyyyy.”
Fuck. She’s finally awake, here with me, and the one person she’s calling for isn’t. He’s still trapped behind enemy lines with the fucker who almost took her life. How do I tell her that he never made it out? That he’s still a prisoner of the Brotherhood and, as of this moment, may already be dead, if either the Holy Father or Noah Rothesay has his way.
“Saaammmmmyyyy.” She repeats the name, this time with more strength behind the word, while watching my features actively.
I close my eyes, knowing that I am about to hurt her but refusing to lie to her. When I reopen them, I let her see all of my love for her in their depths, so that she knows somehow that she is not alone, that I’m here with her, and that I will always be by her side. “He never made it out, Atasi. He’s a prisoner of the Brotherhood.”