Chapter 43 Raw Brutal Thing
raw brutal thing
Sariah
Hands touch me. I hate it.
No. No. No.
I flail and writhe, doing everything I can to make it so I’m not worth the effort. I scream. Regardless, I’m tossed over a shoulder, my ass high in the air for all to see as we move.
“Stop.” The voice is too calm.
I bite.
I punch.
I kick.
Like fuck is anyone dragging me away without me making it hell to do so. I will not be a victim again. I’m good not being a survivor. I’ll die to save my girl, sacrificing myself so she has a happy, free life.
I scream.
“Sariah, please.”
Something in my name has me freezing, but I don’t know why.
I bounce on the shoulder, my ribs screaming against a meaty bone, as my legs are pinned. Nothing fucking works.
We lower damn near to the ground, and I throw all my weight off my perch and onto my shoulder and hip, hitting the dirt floor in the entry cabin.
“Fuck you,” I yell, kicking and punching. Until something is thrown over me and I’m rolled like a burrito and carried, my arms and legs bound too tightly to use them.
It’s when I’m thrown over the shoulder again that I fear I’ll have to admit to defeat.
I won’t. Not while my girl is alive. I’ll never not be there for her.
“Renée,” I whisper, hoping against hope that the wind takes that strength to her.
“He has her.” The voice is gruff and familiar.
My eyes land on the strangest thing… Motorcycle boots. Wait.
“Liam?”
“Yeah.”
“How?”
He doesn’t answer. He just says, “I’m impressed, but I would’ve been okay without the kick to the ’nads.”
“Put me down and go save my daughter.”
He says nothing, but jogs down the long driveway to a car and drops me near the front passenger door before stripping off his jacket to drop over me.
“Get in and do not move.”
“Not making any promises.” As if he can tell me what to do and not do when it’s my family in there.
“You will compromise Cian if you do. His only goal is Renée.”
“That should be yours, too.”
“You were my mission. She was his. Because that’s what you”—he points a meaty finger in my face—“would want. He had to choose, and he chose what he thought you would prioritize. You compromised that with your stunt, and he took his eye off the prize. I don’t want him dead, and I don’t want her hurt. Don’t get in the way.”
He stalks away, pulling a pistol from some unknown place and breaking into a run.
I’ve never heard so many words from him at one time. He’s not that guy, but he said a lot and all of it was bad.
Because I believe him, I climb into the car I’ve never seen, covered in a bitter, stinky robe, left to wonder if my mom and my daughter are safe. And if the man I love was hurt because I did what I did. Not that I wouldn’t do it again.
“Ms. Ocotea?” a small voice questions through sniffles.
“Emma,” the relief of knowing she’s okay is diminished by the knowledge of where my daughter is. “I’m glad you’re safe. We’ll be home soon.”
“Okay.”
I count the stars I see through the windshield to keep my mind from spinning on the horrors I know happen in that circle and on that dais.
I’m a sitting duck, with no way to protect Emma. And there’s no way to know what or who slinks around in the darkness.
More importantly, I can’t help Renée who holds my every thought. There’s no way to know where my daughter is or if she’s safe. Is it better to be here or to be there? The war in my head rages on.
Liam doesn’t return.
My adrenaline burns out to nothingness, my body unable to do anything more than shake or rest.
I am alone with the war in my head.
And in total despair.
The full moon burns brightly in the night sky.
Cian
Pops rend the air. They’re faint. The pound of blood in my ears mixed with wind as I run is only overtaken by the roar of my heart. I run harder than I’ve ever pushed my body, shoving people left and right, running over them, never hearing the cursing or cries.
I’m on the dais in a leap, standing in front of purple toenails.
I yank the robe to cover the sweet girl whose own “father” wants to expose her.
He’s much too much like mine, selfish and not worthy of the children they sired.
In that moment, I also realize finally—fucking finally—that it’s not her blood.
The man at her feet has no face left. It was blown off by a bullet.
One that sliced through her robe. Too fucking close.
She thrashes and fights, and my heart breaks.
She doesn’t know.
She doesn’t know he’s dead.
The fear still has her.
Pulling the hood from her face, I cup her face and call her name. “Née? Renée, look at me.”
It takes two moments too long because the men are on me.
Before I go down, though, I slip her the knife.
I’ll never see a robe without having some kind of post traumatic reaction. I also get why the men don’t wear them.
Aside from the ceremonial aspect. Or the psychological one. Aside from the disparity, since women are subjugated, it’s a visual representation of it. It’s also impractical. They wouldn’t be able to move freely, couldn’t punch or kick or wield knives without getting tangled.
I’m not sure anyone will recall what exactly went down or how or when. But when Renée enters the mêlée and the brown-robed women start fleeing, all hell breaks loose. There are the hollow, wet sounds of flesh hitting flesh, pops, and grunts.
All I know is that at some point I look up to see Renée staring at her hands.
She holds a knife covered in blood. With a grunt, I toss off one of the men, using what little leverage I have.
The dais-to-the-ground fall must be greater than I know because he slinks off, holding his hip, never looking back.
The second takes more effort, but somehow, I manage.
I never see his face. I’m too busy looking at Renée and her shock, her terror, and the blood covering her.
He gets in a solid punch in the exact place I just had a surgeon rebuild my fucking face.
My anger swells at the same time as my cheek.
The anger’s the only thing I can credit with the superhuman strength it takes to get him off me.
When I finally stand and move once again to her side, she’s still staring at the knife and the blood smearing her hands.
I slide it from her palm, close it and pocket it, all without any movement on her part.
I hug her for a quick moment, needing to make sure she’s breathing, and ask low, “Can you run, or do you need me to carry you?”
She never answers. I turn her and take her hand. “Come on. Let’s find your mom.”
She’s rooted to the spot, staring. A dead man lies crumpled at her feet. Her white robe is covered in brainy pulp and blood. The men who trapped the girls have been dispatched, I don’t know how or when.
Five girls laid tied, blinded by hoods, and crying.
One of our crew will help them. I have to trust that. Or I’ll help… after.
My only priority right now is reuniting mother and daughter and knowing that neither has been harmed.
After that, we can figure shit out. After I know my girls are safe.
I’m halfway to the cabin when Renée says her first word. “RoRo?”
“After.”
She tugs my hand to a stop. “Now.”
She’s so her mother. Trauma beyond anyone’s wildest imagining. A birthday celebration gone from delight to disaster, and she’s worried about family.
“Now is after I get you to your mom. I won’t let anything happen to Rosie. I promise you.” I have no right making that promise. I have no clue where her grandmother is or what has happened to her.
“I said—”
“I’m on it.” Liam materializes from some shadow like a specter from fog and disappears equally as fast.
“That work?” I ask the youngest Ocotea, looking down into her face bright in the moonlight.
She shrugs and nods at the same time but squeezes my hand so tightly, I know the real answer.
We move around the building that skirts the front of the property and to the black SUV hidden in a copse of trees.
The front door is thrown open and Sariah flies from the passenger seat to hold her daughter. They fold into one another like a shuffle on a deck of cards. I manage to catch them as they melt onto the ground in a puddle of tears and love.
Survival is a beautiful, raw, brutal thing.