Page 15 of Severed Rivalry
“I told you about the women and the girls where I grew up. And a little about the men. The sons, though, were a different story. Boys were given choices. They could stay and become men on the compound. Men were educated—though I use that term loosely—and worked, but they worked for the good of the commune. ‘For the good’”—I mimic air quotes—“is a thing. Women cook. Women clean. Women procreate. Girls are raised the same. Men till the soil and build the homes. They’re the teachers. Labor is for men. Barefoot and pregnant is for women.”
Cian’s fist clench and unclench as his jaw does the same.
“It’s disgusting. Boys, though… if they don’t want to be laborers, they’re expelled. Girls can’t leave. Boys must. It’s fucked up. One of those boys who was cast out from the compound came into the bar I was working at. He recognized me instantly.”
“Your eyes.”
“My eyes.” I drop them closed as I confirm what he knows. Now’s the hard part. Or one of the hard parts. “I panicked. Girls don’t escape. They can’t leave. We can’t leave. They haul us back. They punish us for trying.”
5
rigor mortis
Cian
Sariah has gone from past tense to present tense, as if she’s stuck in the wrong timeline of her story. Her small frame is huddled in on itself in the corner of the sofa. The blanket bunches around her neck and is tucked over her feet and under her body.
I can barely stand to look at her with the pain this is obviously causing. “Do you need to stop?”
Her head whips side to side, but the sadness in her eyes when they meet mine tells a different story. “No. You deserve to know. And I’m strong enough to tell it.”
I take a deep breath and hold it before exhaling slowly. Why do I dread what’s coming next? It’s not like I don’t know the ending already.
“I left work and packed up everything I owned. I called Rosie and Randy and told them what happened and that I was coming home. Then I went to your place. I didn’t know how much time I had. There was no technology on the compound, remember? I wasn’t worried that a quick text would result in a windowless van showing up outside my apartment. We weren’t in a mafia movie. I had time. Or so I thought.”
She adjusts the blanket even higher, and I fight every instinct to pull her feet my way. Or her body onto my lap so I can hold her.
“You know what happened. I hated lying. It was never me notloving you or not trusting you. I was a kid. You were too. I mean you were an adult, but we weren’t adult-adults. I couldn’t risk you getting involved. I couldn’t risk them hurting you.”
“Youhurt me.” It comes out with more accusation than I want. I know better, but the sting of her loss slices nearly as sharply as it did at the time. She was my everything.
“I hurt you and I’m sorry. I crushed my own soul leaving, if it makes it any better.” Her sorrowful look breaks me.
“I can’t take it anymore. Come here.” I extend a hand, and she looks at it as if weighing her options. It takes longer than I like but finally she leans forward, dropping the blanket. I reach under her arms and haul her to me, planting her on my lap, her back to the arm of the sofa. She’s safe. I’ll make sure of it. “And, no, it doesn’t make it better. Both of us hurting was never the goal.”
She takes a tentative finger and strokes my jawline. “I didn’t get far. I was almost to Nebraska when I got caught. I was heading to Wisconsin. In retrospect, I should’ve headed south, gotten as far away from South Dakota as I could have instead.” She looks away, as if into the past.
“The punishment was swift and brutal. That’s all I’ll say on that for now.” She darts her gaze down the hall.
Beatings?
Torture?
What is she saying? What did my sweetAngel have to endure?
“I was barely twenty. It took a while to be healed enough to be able to run. When I was well enough, I did just that. I knew way more by that time than the last. I knew the world and how it worked. I had tactics.” She sighs. “And I had Rosie and Randy, who saved me once again.”
I’m holding my breath trying to piece together what she’s saying.
And what she’s not.
I rub her back, my hand taking a path down her spine from the nape of her neck to just above her pert ass, before returning the way it came, only to make the trek again and again. It’s for her, but it’s for me too. My mind is a dust devil in an Arizona summer, kicking up shit and whirling my thoughts.
“I’m sorry, Angel. I’m so sorry.”
She melts into me as if the last decade and a half hadn’t happened. As if we were still in my apartment at CSU with our futures ahead of us, wild and free and able to take on the world.
“Me too.” Her fingers fidget at my collar. She used to do this all the time. It wasn’t sexual or her trying to undress me. It was texture under her fingers, something to play with.
