23. The Conflict
The Conflict
Gabriel
The weeks have been a slow poison.
I've been watching her. I've been watching him. I've been watching the way they move around each other like planets caught in a decaying orbit, and I've been telling myself to be patient.
Be patient, Gabriel. She has a plan. She told you she has a plan.
But the plan is killing me.
I see the way she looks at him now. Not with love—she's too smart for that—but with something worse. Tolerance. Acceptance. The way you look at a disease you've learned to live with because you've forgotten what it feels like to be healthy.
I see the way he touches her. The casual possessiveness of his hand on her lower back. The way he pulls her into rooms without asking. The way she lets him.
She lets him.
That's what I can't forgive. Not the touching. Not the taking. The letting.
She lets him use her. She lets him hurt her. She lets him fuck her in warehouses and offices and God knows where else, and she doesn't fight back because she thinks she's saving him.
She's not saving him.
She's drowning with him.
I find her in the greenhouse.
She doesn't hear me come in. She's lost in thought, lost in whatever world she's built inside her head to survive this place. I watch her for a long moment—the slope of her shoulders, the way her hair falls across her face, the small furrow between her brows.
She's beautiful. She's always been beautiful. But she's fading. I can see it in the hollows under her eyes, the pallor of her skin, the way her hands tremble when she thinks no one is watching.
"You're up late," I say.
She doesn't startle. She doesn't even turn around. "So are you."
"I couldn't sleep."
"Neither could I."
I walk toward her. I sit beside her on the bench. I don't touch her—I've learned not to touch her unless she invites it—but I feel the warmth of her body next to mine, and I feel something in my chest tighten.
"I've been thinking," I say.
"About what?"
"About you. About us. About everything that's happened since you came here."
She finally looks at me. Her eyes are brown, steady, unreadable. "Gabriel..."
"I know you have a plan. I know you're trying to stop him. I know you think you're saving him." I pause. "But you're not saving anyone, Monika. You're just surviving. And surviving isn't the same thing as living."
She doesn't respond. She just looks at me with those steady brown eyes, and I feel something inside me crack.
"I love you," I say. "I've loved you since the first moment I saw you. And I've been patient. I've been waiting. I've been letting you do this your way because I thought—I thought you knew what you were doing."
"Gabriel—"
"But I can't do it anymore." My voice breaks. "I can't watch you destroy yourself. I can't watch you let him use you. I can't watch you pretend that any of this is okay."
"I'm not pretending."
"Yes, you are." I reach for her hand. She doesn't pull away. "You're pretending you're fine. You're pretending you're in control. You're pretending that the plan is working when we both know it's not."
She's quiet for a long moment. The orchids rustle in the ventilation. The grow lights hum. The world outside the glass is dark and cold.
"What do you want me to do?" she asks.
"I want you to let me save you."
"You can't save me."
"Then let me try."
She looks at me. Her eyes are wet, but she's not crying. She's past crying.
"Gabriel," she says. "I don't need to be saved. I need to save them."
I don't sleep that night.
I lie in my bed, staring at the ceiling, and I think about what she said. I need to save them. The children. The ones in the cages. The ones who are being sold and traded and destroyed while I lie here in my comfortable room in my comfortable house and pretend that I'm not part of it.
I'm part of it.
I've always been part of it.
I've been telling myself that I'm different. That I'm the good one. That I've been trying to escape, trying to become something other than what I was born to be.
But I haven't escaped. I'm still here. I'm still living in this house, eating this food, wearing these clothes. I'm still benefiting from the empire my father built and my brother is expanding.
I'm complicit.
Just like her.
Just like all of us.
I get out of bed. I walk to the window. I look out at the garden, at the frozen pond, at the snow covering everything like a shroud.
I think about Nathan. About the way he looked at me when I confronted him in the greenhouse. About the way he said, "She's mine."
She's not his. She's not anyone's.
She's her own person.
And I'm going to help her become that again.
I find him in his office.
It's early—too early for business, too early for the endless parade of men who come to this house with their ledgers and their lies. He's sitting at his desk, a cup of coffee in his hand, the map of the city spread out in front of him.
He looks up when I enter. His eyes are dark, unreadable.
"Gabriel." His voice is flat. "How joyful."
"I need to talk to you."
"About what?"
"About Monika."
He sets down his coffee. He leans back in his chair. He smiles—that sharp, predatory smile that makes my skin crawl.
"What about her?"
"You're destroying her."
He laughs. It's a terrible sound. "I'm destroying her? I'm not the one who's been following her around like a lovesick puppy for a year. I'm not the one who asked her to run away with me and then left when she said no."
"I left because she needed to find her own path."
"No." He stands. He walks around the desk. He stops in front of me, close enough that I can smell his cologne. "You left because you're a coward. You left because you couldn't stand to watch her choose me."
"She didn't choose you."
"She didn't choose you either." His eyes are cold. "She chose survival. She chose the devil she knew. And the devil she knew was me."
I feel something snap inside me.
I don't think. I don't plan. I just swing.
My fist connects with his jaw with a satisfying crack. His head snaps to the side. He stumbles back, catching himself on the desk, and when he looks at me again, there's something in his eyes I've never seen before.
Respect.
"Finally," he says. "I was beginning to think you didn't have it in you."
He hits me back.
His fist catches me in the stomach, driving the air from my lungs. I double over, gasping, and he follows with a punch to my face that sends me sprawling to the floor.
"Get up," he says. "Get up and fight me like a man."
I get up.
I swing again. He blocks it. He hits me again—my ribs, my face, my ribs. I feel blood in my mouth. I feel pain everywhere.
But I don't stop.
I keep swinging. I keep hitting. I keep fighting because I'm tired of being the good one, tired of being the passive one, tired of watching him take everything I love.
He hits me harder. I hit him back.
We're not fighting anymore. We're just two animals, tearing at each other, trying to prove something neither of us can name.
I don't know how long it goes on.
I don't know who's winning.
I just know that I'm not stopping. I'm never stopping. Not until one of us is dead.
"Stop!"
Her voice cuts through the chaos like a blade.
We both freeze. We both turn. She's standing in the doorway, her face pale, her eyes wide. She looks at me—at the blood on my face, the way I'm holding my ribs—and then at Nathan, at the blood on his knuckles, the bruise already forming on his jaw.
"Stop," she says again. "Both of you."
We stop.
We stand there, panting, bleeding, staring at her like she's the only thing in the world that matters.
Because she is.
"What are you doing?" she asks. Her voice is shaking. "What the hell are you doing?"
"He started it," Nathan says.
"I don't care who started it." She walks toward us—toward me, I realize, she's walking toward me. "Gabriel, are you okay?"
I don't answer. I can't. I just look at her—at the concern in her eyes, the way her hands reach for my face, the way she touches me like I'm something precious.
"I'm fine," I manage.
"You're bleeding."
"It's nothing."
"It's not nothing." She turns to Nathan. "And you. What the hell were you thinking?"
"I was thinking he needed to learn his place."
"His place?" She laughs. It's a bitter sound, hollow and raw. "His place is here. In this family. With me."
Nathan's jaw tightens. "With you?"
"Yes." She looks at him. She looks at me. She looks at both of us, and I see something in her eyes I've never seen before. "I'm not choosing. I told you that. I told both of you that. I'm not choosing."
"Then what are you doing?" Nathan asks.
"I'm surviving." She steps back. She looks at us—at the blood, the bruises, the broken furniture. "I'm surviving this family. I'm surviving you. And I'm going to keep surviving until I figure out how to save all of us."
She turns and walks out of the room.
We watch her go.
We don't say anything.
We just stand there, bleeding, and wonder how we got here.
I find her in my room.
She's sitting on my bed, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes fixed on the wall. She doesn't look up when I enter.
"You shouldn't have done that," she says.
"I know."
"You could have been hurt."
"I know."
"You could have hurt him."
"I know."
She finally looks at me. Her eyes are brown, steady, unreadable.
"Why did you do it?" she asks.
"Because I'm tired." I walk toward her. I stop in front of her. "I'm tired of watching him touch you. I'm tired of watching you let him. I'm tired of pretending that everything is okay when it's not."
"Gabriel—"
"I love you." The words come out before I can stop them. "I love you, Monika. I've loved you since the first moment I saw you. And I'm tired of waiting for you to love me back."
She doesn't respond. She just looks at me with those steady brown eyes, and I feel something inside me break.
"I'm not asking you to choose me," I say. "I'm not asking you to leave him. I'm just asking you to let me be with you. Even if it's only for tonight."
She's quiet for a long moment. Then she reaches for me.
I don't make love to her.
I fuck her.