Chapter 4 – Genevieve
GENEVIEVE
Islip the key into my pocket, gather my breath, then head downstairs to greet my mother.
She’s early. I wasn’t expecting her for another two hours.
The busted remote is on the kitchen floor, and I pick up the pieces, dispose of them in the trash, and busy myself by setting things out to make cassoulet.
“Genevieve,” she calls out as she reaches the door.
“Coming, Mother.” I open it for her even though I never locked it again after I dragged Rhys inside.
“Well, well,” she says, giving me a once-over. “Not quite dressed, I see.”
I grit my teeth. I’m in a tank top and shorts because it’s hot as hell outside. I was planning to change before she got here. I have no idea why she cares what I wear when I’m the only one here, but for some reason she does.
“Sorry. You’re early.”
Her lips purse to the side as she enters, dropping her overnight bag to the floor. I gather it up and walk it down the hall to her room. I set it on her bed and return to make her a drink.
“The perimeter alarm triggered.”
Crap. That’s why she came early. She got the alert. “Yes. Uh, it was another deer. I cut him free.” I point to the shears still by the door. “How was your journey?” I ask, steering her away from the alert.
She waves me away. “Horrible as always. I managed to get you duck and sausage for the cassoulet.” I never know where she comes from, only that wherever she was, it was awful and harrowing. “Be thankful you’re here. I won’t tell you of the bloodshed I witnessed today.”
I frown and tuck my head to hide it, picking up the large bags filled with food so I can put them away. She takes a seat at the table, but I can feel her eyes on the back of me.
“Why are you jittery?”
Oh, you know, because I have a man locked in my bathroom and I think you may have been lying to me my entire life for reasons I can’t figure out. “Jittery?” I parrot. “I’m not jittery.”
“You are. Tell me why.”
I finish putting everything away and take out her lemonade that I made fresh this morning. I pour her a glass over ice and hand it to her. “My birthday is in five days.”
She scowls and rolls her eyes. “Not this again. It’s not your birthday.”
She says that every year, and yet every year she celebrates it with me. “I’m twenty-three, Mother. I’m a grown woman. You live in the world. Why can’t I?”
She sits up straighter and brushes her hair back from her face. I can see the anger building behind her eyes. “Because I have no choice. It’s not safe for you out there. You know this.”
“Mother, the people who took me as a child—”
“Will do it again, given the chance. The moment you leave here, they’ll find you.”
I knot my fingers in front of me, nerves skirting up my spine as her voice rises. “But why would they? What value am I to them?”
“They took you for a reason. They stole you from me. Young women are bought and sold every day to murderers, rapists, and traffickers. A girl like you would fetch a very pretty price. I keep you here to save you. Because I love you. Don’t you understand that?
I can’t lose you again. I can’t even fathom risking it. This is how it has to be.”
I swallow and push forward. “I know. But it’s the festival—”
“The one I saved you from?” she yells incredulously, ire blossoming on her cheeks as her hands wave in the air before they slash in front of me. “No. Don’t ask.”
“But if I’m with you—”
She stands and pounds her fist on the table, knocking over her lemonade and spilling it all over the floor. “Genevieve, you are not leaving this cottage. Ever!”
Tears burn my eyes as bitter hopelessness and crushing despair sink deeper into my bones. She’s planning to keep me here forever.
No other people. No experiences. No life.
Bile rises up the back of my throat, and I swallow and swallow, forcing air into my lungs when my fucking lungs no longer have the will to breathe. I’m so defeated, I can’t even argue with her. She just took my heart and ground it under the sole of her shoe.
She heaves an exhausted sigh, clearly noting what she did to me. “Wonderful. I’m not here even five minutes, and we’re already fighting over nonsense.”
Nonsense. She called the one thing keeping me going nonsense.
“I’m sorry,” I manage, keeping myself glued to the yellow stream puddling on the floor from the table.
“I just…” I’m having trouble holding in my despair.
What does it matter? Nothing matters. It never did.
“Never mind. You’re right. It’s too dangerous for me to leave.
It was a silly idea.” I force my gaze up at her.
I can’t attempt a smile. My lips won’t comply.
“Genevieve,” she starts, calm and collected as if none of that had happened.
“Not even three months ago, my best friend was poisoned. Before that, her son was murdered, and before the woman he loved, who was pregnant with his child, died. Years ago, the only man I ever loved betrayed me, as did my sister.”
I gasp, and she gives me a yes, that actually happened, and you’re proving my point, look.
“Then you were stolen from me. It took me years to find you. I have nothing left but you, and I will never let anyone take you from me again. This world is not the sort of place one wants to be a part of. It’s what people wish they could escape from.”
I nod. “I understand.” Though I don’t at all.
Not one part of me understands, and that’s my struggle.
Maybe all of that happened to her. Maybe the world is cruel and awful.
But so is living here by myself. The endless solitude and loneliness are just as violent and deadly.
It’s eaten away at my soul, and now all I feel is pervasive emptiness.
“Good. Now clean up this mess you caused. I’m going to rest for a bit before dinner.”
“Yes, Mother.”
She comes over and kisses my cheek. “I’ll buy you more paints for your birthday.”
I smile. “A new book would be lovely too.”
She makes a dismissive noise. “Another one of your unrealistic romances?”
“Please.”
An eye roll, and she leaves the kitchen, the door to her bedroom closing a moment later. Scalding hot tears burn the backs of my eyes and the tip of my nose. I shove my fists into my eyes, pushing the tears back.
Damn her.
Is what she’s saying true? Is Rhys lying? Or… is she lying and he’s telling me the truth?
Argh! It doesn’t matter. I can’t do this anymore, and if she won’t let me go, I have no choice.
I clean up the spilled lemonade, finish putting away my week’s worth of groceries, and start the cassoulet.
It’s mindless, tedious work, and with that, I can’t shut off my thoughts.
They won’t be quieted. Once it’s simmering, I creep through the house and listen by her door. No sound. She’s napping.
On silent steps, I jog upstairs. I grab Rhys’s knife from his knapsack before I hide it at the bottom of my laundry hamper, pull the key from my pocket, and open the bathroom. He’s sitting on the closed toilet with his phone in his hand, and dammit, why didn’t I keep his phone?
“How’s Mother dearest?”
Nerves skitter through me, but I push them aside as I shut the door behind me and advance on him. He notes the knife in my hand before he slowly draws his attention up to my face.
“Not letting me go then?”
I shake my head. “We have to make a deal first.”
“A deal?” he echoes. “I don’t make deals.”
“If I let you go, you have to take me with you.”
“No,” he answers quickly, hitting a button on the side of his phone and standing so he can slip it into his back pocket. Only he doesn’t sit back down. He advances on me, coming straight for me until the tip of the blade touches the center of his chest.
“Yes,” I demand, refusing to cower. I dig the tip in enough that I meet a little resistance and see a small ring of blood stain his white shirt around it. A strange, dark thrill rushes through me, and I continue. “There’s a festival in Carona every year—”
“The lantern celebration for the stolen princess, you mean?”
Stolen princess? Whatever. “Yes. That one. It also happens to be my birthday. You’ll take me there, keep me safe, then bring me back here.”
“Why there?”
Because that’s my last memory before I came here.
Because I have to know it was real. All the memories of before that swirl through my dreams and rip at my thoughts when I search for them.
Because I have to see what this world actually is.
Or I’ll die. I will. If it’s everything she says it is, then fine, I’ll manage through knowing the truth.
But, if there’s a chance it’s more than that… oh god, I have to do this.
“You’ll keep me safe and make sure nothing happens to me,” I continue without answering him. “If you do that, I’ll let you have your knapsack with your gun and necklace and pretend like I never saw you.”
He stares me down with a cold intensity that makes my heart beat faster. “No.”
“Yes!” I cry only to temper my voice. “You have to. I’m holding a knife to your chest and drawing blood. I will kill you if you don’t. I think that’s about as serious as it gets.”
He takes a step, forcing me back one. He smiles triumphantly, but I can’t exactly stab him to prove my point. Unfortunately, I need him.
“Not quite ready to kill me yet, though. Why don’t you go yourself? It’s only about forty-five kilometers from here.”
“Then it shouldn’t be too difficult for you to take me,” I parry, my heart racing so hard and fast I’m lightheaded from it. He has to say yes. He has to.
“You’re not part of my agenda. I have plans and places to be that don’t include you or your little girl drama.”
He’s mocking me, and it shouldn’t sting, but it does. My life isn’t drama, and I’m not a little girl.
“Tough shit, considering I’m holding you captive and I have your necklace. You’re at my mercy. All I have to do is scream, and my mother will come up here and kill you. She won’t hesitate either.”
“I take it Mommy said no to you going to the festival, and I’m your last hope?”
“The details don’t concern you. You have no choice but to say yes. It’s yes and your necklace or no and you die.”