19. Emory
EMORY
I'm startled awake in the middle of the night, when it's so dark and consuming I can't see my hand in front of my face.
Everything is quiet now, so it might've been a dream, but my heart is pounding like it was real. I haven't gotten more than twenty minutes of sleep at a time because every time I doze off I dream of Gusev's men hurting my father.
I'm soaked in sweat, trembling where I lie. I don't know what Rashid did to my father or where he's keeping him.
And I'm not foolish enough to believe a man like him will keep his word and not harm him.
Rashid might be good at making my body come alive to sing his sexual praises, but he is the villain of this story.
My body aches and my mind won't shut off. If I could just get Lex away from here I could alert the authorities to what's going on with Batya.
Then maybe someone could help us, and get him out of these evil men's hands.
It's late, and the house is sleeping. If I get Lex now and sneak out, maybe there's a chance this could all be over before dawn.
I slip out of bed quietly, very aware that there's a guard in the hallway if I try to leave my bedroom.
I walk over to the connecting door to the nursery, which opens without a sound.
Marta is sleeping in the rocking chair beside the window with her head tipped back, snoring deeply.
The small lamp on the dresser provides just enough light to see the crib.
Lex is lying on his back with his arms above his head and his mouth open.
Rashid had this whole place set up so quickly you'd think he was expecting the boy for nine months.
It's all brand new furniture too—the crib, a changing table, tons of toys, and even a baby monitor.
Not at all like the shabby used pieces I've been able to afford with my waitressing tips. I feel ashamed at what I’ve been able provide, but I was determined to do it myself.
I scoop Lex out of the bed gently, wrapping his blanket around him as he softly mewls in his sleep.
It's so quiet that whoever is listening on the baby monitor probably just thinks he's turning over in his sleep, but Marta shifts. Her head turns and a long breath escapes her mouth, but her eyes stay shut.
I pause for a moment, waiting to make sure things settle before I start toward the door, which stands open still.
This is too easy.
It feels like I'm just going to walk out the door, though I know the window is the only option.
But for a woman attempting escape from her captor, my hands are strangely calm.
"I'm getting you out of here, baby, okay?" I whisper, kissing Lex's forehead as I tiptoe to the window. It's not a far drop, being on the first story, and if I'm careful I can do this quietly.
My eyes sweep over the landscape outside the window. There's a row of hedges that I can see but no fence, and in the distance I see the lights of the city, maybe six or seven blocks out. I can run for it, and hopefully no one will even hear me.
Hope blooms in my chest, making adrenaline surge as I unlock the window and pull it open. It squeaks on the hinges quietly, but not so loudly to even wake the sleeping baby, let alone alert guards. When I fling one leg out and straddle the windowsill I can almost taste freedom.
Until I drop to the ground and Lex lets out a loud wail.
"Shhh, baby, not now," I whisper against his hair, but there's no time to stop.
The jarring landing shoots pain into my leg, but the row of hedges beckons me as I take off, racing for it.
My ankle throbs with every stride but the adrenaline pushes through it until my feet find the frozen grass, and I'm within a few strides of my goal.
But the floodlights flare before I reach the hedge, and the whole yard turns white as boots pound the gravel behind me.
Voices start shouting as I'm running, but Lex's screaming drowns them out.
My feet slide on a patch of ice, and a hand catches the back of my shirt and yanks me backward so hard my body spins and I almost drop him.
Air bursts out of my lungs, and for a second all I can see is the black sky wheeling above me before the guards close in on either side.
One of them reaches for Lex, prying him from my grasp as I fight them, kicking and clawing, but they're so strong.
"Don't touch him," I scream, twisting away from his hand. "Get your hands off my son!”
"Ma'am, come back inside," the taller one says. His grip tightens on my arm when I try to pull free. "Nobody's going to hurt you. Come back inside."
"Let go of me," I snarl, "I'm not going back in there."
"We have orders, ma'am." I don't care if he has orders. I'm terrified and I want to leave.
"I don't care about your orders. That is my son and you have no right to stop me from leaving with him.
" My chest is heaving and the cold is starting to sink into my bones.
I notice the wind now, biting at my exposed skin, and realize how stupid I am for thinking I could run barefoot six blocks in the middle of February.
The second guard takes my other arm. Between the two of them my feet barely touch the ground as they drag me back across the yard.
I kick at their legs and my voice goes raw from screaming, but my protests are pointless.
Lex's cries mix with mine, and the noise is our constant escort until the door swallows all of it and the warmth of the house wraps around us.
Rashid stands at the end of the hall in a robe, his hair pushed back and a glare on his face. The guards stop in front of him, dropping me at his feet. He flicks a glance at Lex who's still sobbing, now reaching for me, and he runs a hand over his face in exasperation.
"Give the boy to my mother," he says.
"You're not taking him from me again," I start, lurching to my feet, but Rashid wraps an arm around my waist and pins me to his body as Anna appears from a doorway behind him in her housecoat. She glares at me with a stony cold expression as she takes Lex from the guards, and my tears well up.
"Please don't do this," I tell her. "He's scared and he needs me right now."
"He needs to sleep," Anna says quietly. "And so do you. Whatever is going on between you and my son can wait until morning." She turns, walking off, and I pound my fists into Rashid's arm, trying to get him to let me go.
"This is not between me and your son. This is about my child and my right to leave this house with him," I shout after her. It doesn't make her turn toward me again, so I turn on him, clawing at his skin to make him let me go.
"Fuck's sake," Rashid grumbles, lifting me effortlessly with one arm. He balances me on his hip as I continue clawing and kicking, and he marches back up the hallway into a part of the house I've never been in.
"Where are you taking me?" I snarl, not quite ready to give up fighting.
"To bed."
"I'm not going to your room, Rashid." I'm frantic now, thrashing in hopes he'll drop me. "Take me to my room."
"You climbed out a window with my son in the middle of the night," he says. "You're not going back to your room."
The door to his bedroom opens and he carries me through it.
My feet plant hard and both hands shove against his chest, but he absorbs it and kicks the door shut behind us.
He walks me backward until my legs catch the edge of the bed.
"Let go of me," I say through my teeth. "I swear to God if you don't let go of me right now I will scream this house down."
"You've been screaming since you got here, and nobody has come to save you," he says. "Lie down."
Rashid pushes me until I'm prone, and then he climbs onto the mattress and pulls me into his body where I'm trapped and I can't move. When his leg drapes over mine, I can't even kick him.
"You can't keep me in your bed like some kind of prisoner."
"I'd like to sleep now," he says, yawning.
His arms drapes across my waist to hold me still, but I twist and fight, trying to drive an elbow into his ribs. But he holds me against his chest effortlessly.
Every name I can think of comes out of my mouth in a string of insults, but my body gives out before my anger does.
The fight drains away and leaves me limp and breathing hard. It's useless to continue struggling when he's so much stronger than me.
I lie there trying to calm myself, but the emotion of the past thirty minutes overwhelms me.
I need to get out of here, because I need to make sure my father is safe.
When I agreed to stay forever I did so thinking they wouldn't harm him.
But when I saw him on that security feed, I saw blood. I know they hit him.
"Is my father alive?" I ask quietly, much more subdued than a few minutes ago.
"I told you I would keep my promise and I did," he says. "He's alive and nobody has touched him since this afternoon." Well that's a lie. I saw the blood.
"Where is he?" I ask, wanting more information. If no one touched him since this afternoon then where did they put him? Why was he bleeding?
"He's in the house. He's safe."
"I want to see him." My mind is spinning, pulling threads together on how to get out of this hell I'm currently living. Rashid isn't going to keep me here permanently no matter what I agreed to.
"I know you do."
I growl in frustration and pound his arm again, but he doesn't loosen his grip. He is heartless. Can’t he see this is affecting me?
"Why are you doing all of this?" I ask him. "You could've taken Lex and sent me away. You could have killed my father and never thought about either of us again. Why are you keeping us here?"
A few seconds pass before he answers. "Because family is all I have," he says quietly.
There's no edge to his tone this time. "There isn't anything in this world I wouldn't do for my blood.
I learned that from my father and his father before him.
Whatever else you think of me, Emory, that part you can believe. "
His words make my whole body relax a notch as I think about what he's saying. He's not good at reassurances or comfort, but it feels like he's trying. He's saying he'd never hurt Lex. But I'm not his blood and neither is Batya.
"You didn't even know Lex existed two weeks ago," I say blankly. How can a man go from not even knowing about someone to suddenly doing anything in the world for them?
"But now I do," he says. "And nothing will change that. He's my son and he'll be raised as my son. I won't apologize for taking what belongs to me."
I lie with that for a moment, still fearing the worst. I'm Lex's blood, and Rashid has given me this promise to keep me around, but I don't trust it, or when he says he won't hurt my father.
"And my father?" I ask.
"I want to sleep, woman. I have work to do tomorrow." Rashid sounds grumpy, but not in the "angry criminal" way. He just sounds like a tired man, annoyed by a woman with too many questions.
"Promise me you won't hurt Batya again." My bottom lip quivers as I ask him, and he sighs hard.
"I promise—if you just let me sleep now." His grip loosens a little as he fluffs his pillow and lies back down.
"And I can see him?" I'm not trying to push his buttons, but I need reassurance.
"Yes, just shut up and let me sleep." I feel him settle in and pull me closer, but it doesn’t feel like restraint this time. It feels like he's holding me, protecting me even.
I close my mouth and let some of the tension out of my body. Maybe I've gotten him wrong a little. Right now he doesn’t seem like the monster who's caged me. He seems like he genuinely just wants to make me happy, so I'll relax a little.
And I find sleep tugging at my eyes now too, as if I'll finally be able to rest instead of jolting awake to nightmares.
I close my eyes and sigh, thinking about what I'll say to Batya when I see him. He doesn't know Lex is Rashid's son, unless Rashid told him. And when he finds out he may never want anything to do with me, or maybe he won't care and he will want to plan an escape for both of us.
But that's a tomorrow problem, because it's obvious I’m not leaving tonight.