Chapter 8
CHAPTER
EIGHT
We aren’t going back to the farm. Troy makes a turn onto an unfamiliar road and my stomach sinks. Where’s he taking me?
“Troy.” His name slips out as a whisper. “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere we can talk.”
My heart hammers harder when he steers us under a metal arch that bears a rusty sign.
Gentle Plains Cemetery
He stops the truck and raises his hand. I flinch away, then realize he’s pointing, not trying to grab or hit me.
“Sybil.” The soft way he says my name holds a tinge of sadness. “I would never hurt you. It’s okay.” He raises his hand to point again. “See that stone bench? We’re just going to take a break there. I have some stuff to tell you. You aren’t in any trouble.”
I’m not sure what to believe but it’s not like I have a choice except to go along. The clouds have moved, and a full moon illuminates the weathered stones and manicured grass.
Troy leads the way, stopping at a flat gravestone that reads Marlene Rawles Loving Wife and Mother. He kneels down to pull some weeds from around the stone and then looks over at me.
“Is this your mom?” I ask softly. I know she died when he was young.
He nods and takes a few steps back to sit on the stone bench, gesturing for me to join him. “She died when I was eleven.”
Only two years before I first met him. I always assumed she died when he was too young to remember and that’s why he doesn’t talk about her. “I’m so sorry. What happened to her?” Despite my fear, my heart goes out to him.
“Pancreatic cancer. She only lived a couple of months after she got sick.”
“That must’ve been terrible for you and your dad.”
“Governor Thomas isn’t my dad. I call him that because he insists, but it’s just for show. He married my mom when I was six and brought us to the cult. I’ve never met my real dad.”
A sharp shock jolts me, not at the fact that he’s a stepchild, but at the word cult. I whisper it under my breath, but he hears me.
Troy grins at me. “Don’t repeat that word or tell anyone you heard me use it. They’ll lock us both up, and that’s if we’re lucky.”
That’s a warning I didn’t need. I’m shocked to hear he views the Guardians of His Natural Order the way I do, but I don’t understand. Stewards, and especially a governor’s son, even a stepson, don’t get punished. They’re in charge. Troy will likely be a governor someday. “But…you’re a steward.”
He shakes his head. “Not really. Not like the rest of them. Giving me the title was a compromise. Dad never liked me, and after Mom died, he didn’t even want to look at me.
I’d lived in the same house as them up until then because Mom insisted, but he sent me to the sons’ dorm two weeks after her funeral. ”
A sad smile flashes on his face. “Out of sight, out of mind, he probably hoped, but once I got older, he didn’t know what to do with me. He remarried, had sons of his own, but on her deathbed, Mom had made him promise to take care of me. He couldn’t just put me out of the place.”
He looks so broken as he talks about it, and I instinctively scoot closer to him as he continues.
“He planned to have me marry young, stick me in one of the trailers and keep me as a steward, not connected to his new family. He told me so when I turned sixteen, but I refused. He was so pissed, I thought he might bury me out here with her.” He looks me in the eye.
“I would’ve chosen that over being assigned a wife and producing more victims for the cult. But he offered a compromise.”
Hearing anyone speak against the collective puts a pit in my stomach. For years, I’ve worried one of my similar thoughts might show on my face and here he is, openly calling it a cult. “Why didn’t he just let you leave? Put you with other family or in the foster system?”
“I don’t have other family. None I’ve met anyway, but it wouldn’t have mattered.
By then, I’d already been working with the other stewards and I knew too much.
You have no idea how much illegal shit they’re involved in, Sybil.
The things they’ve done. They’d all be locked up if they didn’t have the cops in their pocket.
” He shakes his head. “No, they’ll never let me leave. I’m stuck like everyone else.”
I’m trying to process everything he’s telling me. “The deal was you didn’t have to marry but you’d keep their secrets?”
“The compromise was I would be called a steward but wouldn’t have to marry or be any real part of things outside of the work.
I do what they ask me to, breaking laws without complaining.
I’m just a glorified servant with a title.
So, the rest of the people won’t know I defied a governor and got away with it.
I get left alone and they get someone to do the grunt work like dumpster diving and helping at the flea market. ”
It’s quiet for a moment while I consider what he’s told me. “You’re saying you’re like me but with different duties and more respect?”
The way I view Troy shifts in an instant and I wonder how I missed it before. I’ve always known he was smarter than the others, kinder, funnier. Someone I feel safe around even though he has authority over me. Now I can see he’s not Steward Troy, but another trapped person.
A grin brightens his face. “Believe me, they don’t respect me. The women do maybe. The other stewards assume I get away with not marrying because I’m a governor’s son or that I might be gay.”
“Are you?” The words escape before I can stop them. “I mean, it’s okay if you are. I wouldn’t tell anyone or anything.”
His laugh sounds loud in the silent night. “No, I’m not.” He turns to look me in the eye, his tone suddenly serious. “I just have no intention of playing their game. I won’t be staying much longer.”
His words hang in the air, and I grab onto them for dear life, with more hope than I’ve dared to feel for years. “You’re going to leave?” I whisper, as if the dead around us might run back and tell Keeper.
His silent nod sends a burst of adrenaline through me.
“Take me with you! We could go now. They wouldn’t know for hours and if we can get to my grandma in Florida, I know she’d let us stay. Please.” He shakes his head, cutting off my frantic plea, while tears fill my eyes and despair pulls me down.
“We wouldn’t get far in the truck. Town cops would recognize the logo on the side.”
I swallow hard and stare at the grave in front of us, trying to get control of myself again. Hope can be an awful thing, the way it dangles above us only to be withdrawn when we dare to reach for it. You’d think I’d learn to stop grasping at it.
“I can’t stay here forever,” I whisper. “I can’t.”
“You won’t.” A soft hand slips into mine and my eyes fall closed. When was the last time someone touched me? I can’t remember. A hug from Jane, maybe, when we were still kids. The feeling is so overwhelming, it takes a second for me to realize what he said.
“What?”
Dark eyes gaze into mine as he squeezes my hand. “We’re going to get out of here, but not yet. It’s not as easy as making a run for it. We have to be careful and plan ahead.”
“We just have to get out of town,” I argue. “Like Georgia. If she can do it, we can.”
I’m shocked to see his eyes fill with tears.
I’ve never seen a man cry. None of the boys would dare by the time they’re eleven or twelve.
Men are leaders and can’t show weakness.
“She didn’t get away, Sybil. Do you remember Officer Douglas, the one you met at the donut shop?
He caught her and brought her back the same night. ”
I shift to face him. “She’s been in the reflection hall all this time?”
“No, unlike Mindy, her husband didn’t want to forgive her. He strangled her.”
It feels like my entire body is dipped in cold cement. “She’s dead?”
“Steward Nolan and I buried her out in the woods.”
Jane’s husband knows too?
He squeezes my hand again as it trembles with the news. “They’re more dangerous than you can imagine. We’ll be risking our lives when we go. It can’t be an impulsive decision.”
My stomach churns with fear. He’s right, but it doesn’t change my mind about trying. “What’s your plan?”
“We have to get far away, not just out of town. I don’t know how far their reach goes.
They bribe a lot of people. The flea market and fruit farming are a front, a cover.
They make far more money from drugs and guns.
They don’t pay too much attention to the exact amounts the flea market and roadside stands bring in.
I’ve been skimming the profits for a long time and saving. I don’t have enough yet, but I will.”
“You’ve been stealing from them?”
He nods and gives me a little grin. “Right under their noses. Even if we manage to get far enough away, we’ll need money for a place to stay. Food and everything until we can find real jobs. I don’t want to run and end up living on the street.”
“My grandma lives in Florida. I mean, last I heard. I don’t know her address. It’s been over six years, but I’m sure she’d help.”
“If we can find her,” he agrees. “But we have to be smart. Keep doing what we’re doing and save money while we act like everything’s fine.
Then when we have enough, we’ll run and never look back.
” He pinches my chin and turns my head so I can’t look away.
“Promise me you won’t try to run again before then. ”
The lump in my throat is hard to swallow. “Swear you won’t go without me.”
“I swear.”
For years I’ve imagined escaping this place.
So many impossible fantasies, most with Troy at the center of them.
A normal life in a little house somewhere, maybe some friends and a pet.
It always felt unreachable because I have nothing.
No money or family or home. All I had was fear and daydreams until now.
Until Troy.
“Okay. I won’t go until we’re ready.”
Troy breathes a sigh of relief that feels like a hug. He was worried about me. No one worries about me. It’s been so long since anyone really cared that I don’t know how to feel or respond.
“I’m sorry about your mom. Do you have pictures of her at least?”
He nods. “A few, back at my place. I wish I could get my hands on her necklace, but Dad wouldn’t let me have it.”
“Was it special to her?”
“Yes, my real dad gave it to her when I was born. She never took it off. Whenever I picture her, she’s wearing that little opal heart. Of course, Dad always hated it, but he’s too spiteful to give it to me. I saw his new wife wearing it once.”
He clears his throat and stands up, tugging me to my feet. “Enough of the sad stuff. We should get started on our plan. Step one. Let’s teach you how to drive.”
“What?”
“These little roads are perfect to practice, and you can’t kill anyone.” He gestures around the dark cemetery with a teasing smile. “They’re already dead.”