37. The Forsaker
Dinah was silent on our return to the safehouse we have been staying at. The one that the rebels gave us, and no longer feels so safe. Yet I’ve never been so relieved to see the old, decrepit brownstone until that moment when we stepped back inside, shutting the door, and the world outside for a few moments, and I could finally take a deep breath. A breath, knowing that they were both safe, that we were all still alive, at least for one more night. Fuck, that went horribly wrong, but I guess it could have gone worse. Dinah could have attempted to kill David.
My mind keeps replaying all of David and Dinah’s conversation. Word for word, trying to make some sense of it. Everything that happened tonight was beyond fucked. Who is this David guy, and how has he grown so powerful with so much influence, right below the Brotherhood’s noses?
It doesn’t make sense to me. He’s one of the men closest to the top—the Holy Father’s man, inside the inner circle. At any point, he could have killed the Holy Father, cut off the head of the proverbial snake, and thrown the Order into chaos. Why hasn’t he? Why demand Dinah do it?
Why play these games with Dinah? Why bargain with her to do something he could have accomplished at any time? He says he knows where Sammy and the boy are being held, so why not just retrieve them? All of these questions with no direct answers play through my mind, causing a headache to begin pounding at the back of my skull. I rub my hands down my face, weary with all this shit. When will this all be over? When will we have some fucking peace? Never. As long as the world continues to spin on its axis, someone will always want power. Human nature is to corrupt everything around it.
My eyes wander to Dinah, who has been deadly silent on the return trip to our crumbling home. I’m worried about her and the toll all of this is having on her. It wasn’t mere weeks ago that she almost died. She seems entirely consumed by her own ruminations. Is she contemplating some of the same thoughts as I am? Will she give in to his demands to get Sammy and the boy back? Demands that could cost her her life? Dinah is not stupid or naive; she has to see this is a trap.
The question is, why lay a trap in the first place? They say they need her to get the people to fall in line, and give them something to believe in. Why her? Why not someone easier to control?
She could easily cause an uprising and get the people to turn against their new leaders. None of it makes sense to me. There has to be something else going on here that we are missing. Whatever it is, it terrifies me because it could end up taking her life if we’re not careful, and wary. I can’t lose her. I can’t lose any of them.
“Atasi, you can’t trust that fucker! This is a trap, all of it. I don’t believe any of that bullshit he was trying to feed us,” Abe utters the words and sentiments that were rumbling through my own mind. I can see the fury being barely contained inside of him. He’s angry, but he’s also frightened, just like I am. He can sense that her life is in danger, and that this David poses a real risk to her. She is mine, and I refuse to lose her again, even to herself. I have to do everything I can to protect her.
“He’s right, Snow. None of this makes sense. Why play these games? Why dangle Sammy and your nephew’s freedom in front of you, and ask you to be the face of an uprising, when you could easily turn the people against them?” I begin to pace back and forth with a restless energy, all of my emotions in an upheaval. I can’t lose her. I won’t give her up this time if someone tries to take her from me. I will set fire to the whole fucking world, and watch it burn to ashes if they even try. “Why demand that you murder the Holy Father, when he’s had intimate access to him all this time?”
She sits herself in one of the old paisley cushioned sofa chairs, her face weary, and rakes her fingers through her tangled, long, wavy hair. The edge of her oversized black shirt slips down her shoulder, leaving her creamy and inked skin exposed and on display, and my eyes are glued to every inch. My tongue and fingers want desperately to trace every line and curve. To feel her warmth pressed up against me, reassuring me that she’s alive and safe for now, but I know that my touch will most likely be unwanted, and perhaps even rejected.
I force my glance away from her tempting skin and meet her shadowed eyes. The space below them is marred with dark shadows from all the stress, worry, and not sleeping. I get it, because how could she rest while Sammy is still out there at the mercy of my father? I’m barely sleeping with the nightmares that plague me. Ones where I relive the horrific abuse we suffered at the hands of my father’s men. My abuse wasn’t anywhere near as severe as what Sammy had to endure. How much worse is it now that my father is in a rage at having lost me?
A frigid quiver races down my back, just imagining what they’re doing to him. How he must want to die, but they won’t allow that to happen. No, the sadistic sons of bitches will keep him just on the very edge of death, until my father tells them otherwise. I left him behind, when I should have done more to try to save him. I should have tried to find another way to get us out of there. I failed him, and I failed the woman in front of me.
“I have a theory, and you’re not going to like it. Before I tell you what it is, I need both of your promises that you will do whatever is necessary to ensure the child’s safety, and that Sammy gets free.” Her luminous eyes widen and meet mine, and then Abe’s. My objection is already on the tip of my tongue when she continues. “Promise me, if you ever cared about me, you will do this. You will make this promise, and ensure it comes to fruition if the worst happens. Both of you need to utter the words. I need to hear them.”
The look on her face is devastating. It makes every part of me want to rage with the unfairness of this world. I stare at the only woman I have ever cared about. The one I would do anything for, and in the bottom of my stomach, a boulder of dread sinks, knowing I’m about to lose her once again.
I’ve already failed her once, and I will never do it again. I can’t ever put her through that misery of believing I betrayed her. I meet and hold her intense gaze, knowing with my words that I’m sealing my fate, and my heart is shattering into pieces inside of my chest. No matter what happens next, I will ensure her wishes are followed, even if I end up losing her. “I promise, Snow. You have my word and my loyalty, always.”
“NO! Fuck, no! Atasi, don’t make me do this! I almost lost you already once, how the fuck can you ask this of me?”
Abe storms across the room, slams his hands on the cherry wood mantle of the old fireplace, and whips everything off the surface until it crashes to the floor in a fit of rage. His head hangs low between his shoulder blades as he tries to calm himself down, his breathing harsh and loud in the silent room. Every vein in his hands and forearms stands rigid against all the beautiful artwork on his skin, as he holds on for dear life to the wood, as if it could save him in this deep, shark-infested water we are swimming in. As if his anger could save the woman we both love.
Dinah stands up and goes to him, laying her hands on his lower back as her face presses up against the middle of his back. His whole body tenses and his breathing becomes labored and ragged. I don’t think I have ever seen him so distraught, except that day I almost took her life, and the day we found out Gabriel had died. Now, here she is, asking us to promise to let her go to her death. Let her leave this world with us still in it. I want to rage against the insanity and unfairness of the world that could demand so much from her. That could ask us to keep having to give each other up.
“You will do it because it’s me asking you, no, demanding it of you. You will do it because, Abraham Mercier, you are mine. My creature to command, your soul lives inside of me just like mine lives inside of you. I demand this of you, and you will comply if you truly care for me.”
A sob rips through the air, followed by another, as Abe’s large, muscular body shakes. The woman that the two of us have always loved kisses his back, and tries to comfort him. “I promise, Atasi, but just know it won’t be long after I complete my promise to you that I will follow you to hell’s gate. I refuse to live without you. I won’t.”
“Oh, Abe.” She forces him to turn around and then goes up her toes, dragging his face down to hers and wrapping her arms tightly around his neck. Her lips meet his in a breathtaking display of tenderness that has pain and longing shooting through me. I watch enthralled as they kiss, both of them utterly lost to each other, and the passion and sadness of their embrace. Beautiful. Their love is beautiful.
I couldn’t look away even if I wanted to, and I don’t. As much as I desire both of them, and yearn for their forgiveness and to be included in their love, I know I still have amends to make, and it won’t be that easy. I force myself to turn away and start making my way to the room’s entrance, only to have Dinah’s voice halt my steps.
“Stay, please.”
I shut my eyes, my back still turned away from them as I try to compose all my emotions. My throat starts to close, with the sobs that threaten to choke me. “I think it would be best, Snow, if I wasn’t here right now.” The pained words leave my throat, even as each syllable slices me open on its way out.
“Better for whom, Zeke? You, me, or Abe? Whose feelings are you trying to spare, because if you walk away from me again, it’s not mine.” Shock has me turning around and meeting her stormy gaze. How could she even think that I would want to walk away from her? That I would want to hurt her ever again? Doesn’t she realize how much I feel for her, for them?
“I… I… would never want to hurt you, Dinah. Don’t you understand that by now? Neither of you, you both mean the whole fucking world to me. I’m lost without you.”
“Then where are you running off to, Zeke?” Abe questions, with a flush across his face and swollen red lips from kissing our girl.
My glance goes from one to the other, trying to understand if this is some fucked up joke. Are they genuinely asking me to stay here with them? Maybe they just want to punish me again and force me to watch them enjoy each other, while I remain on the outside, lost and dejected. My fists tighten at my sides, and my jaw clenches. I can’t fucking go through that again; it was the most agony I have ever felt. Worse than any beating I took at the hands of my father’s men.
“Come here, Zeke,” Dinah beckons to me with her fingers outstretched, sadness and desire mingling on her stunning features. Her pouty pink lips are swollen from Abe devouring her, and the need to taste her after she’s tasted him almost overwhelms me.
Every nerve ending inside my body is alert and filled with electricity. I hope that this is not a game they are playing with me. I can’t survive the pain of being discarded a second time. I can’t survive both of their rejections over and over. My heart is already shattered, and it would decimate what little is left. “I forgive you, Zeke. As much as my heart can. Don’t walk away from me, from us.”
Dinah’s soft words, no louder than a whisper, make their way inside of my broken heart and have me striding across the old wood floors without hesitation, and pulling her into my arms. My lips crash down on hers before she can change her mind and deny me. Mine. She has always been mine. Right from the moment she took her first breath in this world, she was mine then and is mine now.
Home. She tastes like home. One that I never want to leave behind, and although I have promised to do her bidding, when the time comes, after her nephew is safe, I, too, will follow her to hell’s gate, and I have no doubt that Sammy will join us. There is no way any of us will be able to keep going, to keep living if she is gone.
She is the glue that binds us all together; without her, we would all be lost. I can’t and won’t live without my Snow.