29. Daisy
Chapter twenty-nine
Daisy
Fear coils around me like a python that slowly squeezes its prey until the breath is gone from its lungs, leaving only a lifeless body to be devoured whole.
Tears stream down my cheeks as I realize that I’m in Hell, only instead of flames licking my body and causing immeasurable and eternal pain, it’s despair.
Then there’s a dim glow that gets brighter as a man moves through a tunnel toward me, and hope fills my chest. He’s holding up a lantern, and when he crouches down next to me, his face is obscured by a mask.
The light doesn’t pierce his black, soulless eyes, and the hope I had only a second ago is gone as quickly as it came.
“Ah, you’re awake. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Sadie.”
He rips the duct tape from my mouth, and the scream I let loose is not only from the pain of having a layer of skin ripped from my face but is also a plea for help.
“Go ahead, let it all out. There’s no one around to hear you.”
The man puts in earplugs as he waits patiently for me to believe the truth of his words. By the time I’m done, my throat is raw and my voice is all but gone.
“Who are you?” I eventually ask, even as it burns and stings my vocal cords to do so.
“A savior. A rescuer. A giver of life,” he says.
“You are not God.”
He laughs. “No, I’m not. I am just a man who will change your life, and for the better.
You know, even from where I’m sitting, I can tell that you have a warrior spirit.
That’s good, Sadie. You’re already strong, so when you’re broken down into the tiniest bits of yourself, you can be remade into something unbreakable.
You can help shape the world into something good. Something perfect.”
“I’ve already been made into something unbreakable.”
“Your tears say otherwise,” he says as he comes over and squats down next to me.
I flinch when he touches the mustard-seed pendant around my neck.
“You remind me so much of my sister, Emily. She had faith and believed in a higher power, but God didn’t save her just like He won’t save you.
It will be interesting to see what you will become when you understand that your power doesn’t come from some divine mystical being, but from within. ”
My voice betrays me as I barely manage to utter the words, “I’m already saved.” I’d always thought I’d stand tall and proud in my convictions, but when faced with evil, I find myself cowering under the looming shadow of malicious intent.
I’m certainly no David facing this Goliath in front of me.
Then a voice whispers in my ear, “You are not alone. For the Lord God is with you always. Today is not the day you will fight the battle, but it will soon be upon you.”
I’m not sure what the voice is trying to tell me, or if I’m making it up in my mind, but the moment I hear it, fear and dread leave my body. In their place, there is hope.
My eyes harden with resolve as I gaze into the dark depths of the man in front of me. “One day, justice will be served. I pray that I’m the one who gets to deliver it.”
The man cackles, and his image warbles as the memory shifts into something more like a dream. He holds up the lantern, which suddenly gets brighter, illuminating the entire cavern I’m in. My restraints suddenly disappear, and I’m no longer the teenager who had the tiniest spark of faith.
“Look around you, Sadie. Look at all the faces of the girls you couldn’t save.”
I scan the faces of the young women who came both before and after me, each one peering at me with a vacant and lifeless expression.
Maniacal laughter echoes off the stone walls, filling the space with an ominous sense of doom.
“Each of them died, Sadie. Not physically, mind you, but the essence of who they once were and who they aspired to be. Now, they’ve been molded, shaped, and turned into something magnificent, don’t you think? ”
“You took away their choice by feeding them lies.”
“Because their minds were weak,” he says. “Eventually, you would have broken, too. You would have become the greatest of them all.”
Movement to my left captures my attention as Eva stands up and walks over to me. As she comes closer, the soft ember of life that had been snuffed out begins to burn brightly. Her image morphs from the teenage girl to the woman she has become.
“We are not lost, nor are we dead. Each of us lives to serve a greater purpose than ourselves. We have chosen that course, but it was the wrong one. My eyes have been opened so that I can see that we are not serving the right master, but the rest still believe the lies. You need to show them the truth. It is not too late for them to be saved.”
Eva’s image disappears, leaving the rest of the girls leaning lifelessly against the wall. I notice there’s one missing.
“Where is Genevieve?” I ask.
“Genevieve isn’t the prize. You are, Sadie. When Emily died, I died right along with her. I was a shell of the man I once was, and the only way to continue living was to become someone else. I became a person filled with vengeance.”
“That vengeance destroyed your soul. Not the loss of Emily.”
“Maybe you’re right.” Though he’s still hiding behind the mask, I can hear the pain in his voice when he says, “Then you came along. I told you that you were just a payday to me, but that too was a lie. You were meant to one day work by my side, just like Emily promised me she would. I had such noble plans for you.”
I gesture to the girls. “This isn’t noble.”
“You would have eventually thought that it was. But then you had to escape, and once again, the loss upended my life. I was forced to change the one thing that could identify me just in case you hadn’t truly died in those mountains.”
“Your voice.”
Suddenly, his voice changes from the one in my memories to the one he uses today. His mask fades away, and it all becomes clear. He extends his hand. “Join me, and I’ll spare Genevieve.”
When Uri appears beside me, the man who uses vengeance disguised as noble intent disappears, as do the girls one by one until it’s just the two of us left alone in my mind.
“What do I do, Uri? I won’t join him, but I can’t stand by and let another girl lose her soul; her future; her dreams.”
He nods solemnly. “Play the fool, but don’t let the fool play you.”
“What does that mean?”
“Just as I say. The Lord has revealed all you need to know, and it’s time for you to wake up. You’ve been asleep for long enough.”
This time when my eyes open, I’m surrounded by the walls of the cabin and not held captive in a memory. I’m covered in a layer of warm heat, with muscular arms banded around my waist. Soft snoring and light breaths tickle the back of my neck.
“He loves you, Daisy,” Faith says when she notices me stirring.
Not quite awake, I’m confused by the comment that seems to come out of nowhere. “Who loves me? God?”
Faith smiles and giggles. “Well, that is certainly true. And if you having nine lives isn’t proof of that, then I don’t know what is. But no, I was referring to my brother who hasn’t left your side.”
I slowly shift out of Angel’s hold and sit up, not sure what to say to that. “He can’t possibly love me. It’s too soon.”
Faith snorts as she pours hot water from a kettle into a mug and then places a tea bag inside to steep. She hands it to me, the heat seeping into my palms and the scent of cinnamon filling the air.
“Angel waded through water that was shoulder-deep and just above freezing. He went hypothermic in seconds, but none of that stopped him from reaching you. By the time Jaxon and I arrived, Angel was shivering violently and his lips were blue. Still, we couldn’t pry his hands off you.
If that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.
What really happened between the two of you in the mines? ”
I reach for Angel’s hand under the electric blanket they covered us with so that his body would heat slowly.
Since his skin feels warm to the touch, I can only assume that his sleeping is because exhaustion has taken hold.
Both of us have been running on fumes for the last week, and when this is over, I’ll sleep for a month.
“Honestly, nothing happened other than us taking care of one another and deciding that life is too short to waste by waiting until the right time to pursue a relationship. For six months, I allowed my pride to get in the way of Angel making amends for his apologetic words regarding our kiss down in Colombia. We all make mistakes, and his wasn’t unforgivable. I treated it as such.”
Faith smiles. “I knew you’d eventually come around. You just had to do it on your terms.”
“Well, Angel did earn the right by taking a sim round to the thigh,” I tease.
Faith’s smile fades. “My brother would do anything for you, Daisy. The agony on his face when he thought you’d been shot and left for dead was nothing short of the kind that comes from losing a soulmate.
It was only when Owen told him that there was no blood on your body that Angel finally found the strength to move.
He carried you down the trail until he collapsed. ”
“I’d do the same for him if the roles were reversed.” It’s as close to admitting that I love Angel as I’ll get; at least until I tell him first.
Faith seems to grasp the implication. “I believe that you would. While I would pay good money to see you lift a 185-pound man cradled in your arms, I pray I never have to. Especially if it’s my brother.” There’s a brief pause as she shifts in the chair. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“Why haven’t you asked about Genevieve? I thought she would be the first person you asked about.”
I sip from the mug of hot tea, using the moment to come up with an answer that doesn’t make me sound like a loon. “It’s hard to explain.”
Faith laughs at that, loud enough that Angel rolls over and instinctually covers his head with a pillow. Only when he starts snoring does she say, “It can’t be any stranger than an angel rescuing you by causing a mountain to shake. Something no one else felt.”
“You don’t believe us?”
“Quite the contrary,” Faith replies. “While I’ve never experienced divine intervention of that magnitude, it would be hypocritical for me to believe the Word of God and the stories contained in the Bible, but not believe He still has the power to perform such miracles.”
“I know who has Genevieve, so there was no need to ask.”
Faith leans forward with interest. “Did you see who took her?”
“No, as always, his face was hidden under a ski mask. And this time, he was wearing riding goggles. The last thing I remember is seeing him point a tranquilizer gun at me and then me telling Genevieve to run. When I was knocked out, I was pulled into a memory that turned into a dream. It started out with me on my first day in captivity. When I looked into his eyes, dark as night, I saw something that my teenage mind hadn’t seen before.
My captor was wearing contact lenses. Black ones. ”
“Okay,” Faith says, unsure of where I’m going with this.
“There was only one way I would have been able to identify him, which would have been his voice. In my memory, it was the same as all those years ago. But when the memory shifted to a dream, he spoke to me as he speaks today.”
Faith thinks about this. “It’s not out of the realm of possibility.
When Jaxon assumed a new identity, he had to undergo thyroplasty to lower the pitch of his voice so it would filter through audible recognition software.
Granted, he also had to change just about every feature on his face so that he could hide from the cartel while still living a normal life.
It’s why, even after years of loving him when he was Jacob, I didn’t recognize him.
My heart did, but my mind couldn’t connect the dots. ”
“Exactly. Like Jaxon, my captor has been hiding in plain sight!”
My volume wakes Angel, and he rolls back over to reach for me in the spot where I’d been sleeping. When he finds it empty, his eyes open wide, searching until they find mine. “You’re here,” he whispers.
“And you’re here,” I say just as softly. “From what I’ve been told, I almost lost you too. Don’t ever do anything like that again, okay?”
“I can honestly say after that experience, I’ll never do a polar plunge,” he jokes. “Been there. Done that. Got the T-shirt.”
Faith snorts. “The T-shirt you’re wearing says FBI on the back. Not ‘Idiot.’”
Angel shrugs. “Same. Same.”
I burst out laughing. “Don’t let Owen hear you say that. I’m pretty sure that it’s his T-shirt you’re wearing. And for my brother to choose that one and let you wear it means that he respects you. Consider it high praise for your valiant deeds. You are deemed worthy.”
“You’re practically a Southern Knight like me! By the way, Mom, Dad, and our brothers already consider themselves honorary members,” Faith tells him. “Daisy was just telling me about her dream. She knows who took Genevieve!”
“You do?” Angel asks.
I dip my chin once, then turn toward Faith. “Do you mind if I talk to Angel alone first? I promise I’ll share everything, but I need you to do me a favor before I do.”
“Of course,” Faith says.
“I need you to ensure Owen isn’t around to hear it.”
Faith heads toward the door. “That shouldn’t be too difficult.
He’s down at the campground processing the scene.
Jordan is helping to collect evidence at the FBI’s request. It may not seem like a silver lining, but the FBI now has full jurisdictional oversight.
Soon, there will be federal agents swarming the area.
Might I ask why you want to keep your brother out of the loop? ”
My heart both hurts and warms at the thought of what my brother will do.
“When Owen finds out who it is, he’ll shoot first and not bother to ask questions.”