I could not breathe. My lungs were constricting, my chest was growing tight, and I could not breathe!
“Delilah?” Phebe dropped to her knees and felt at my clammy head. “Are you unwell?”
“Yes,” I managed to say. “Please, I must rest. I am tired.”
Phebe sighed and quickly exited the room, leaving me alone. I must have fallen asleep on the bed, for when I heard somebody walk through the door, I jolted awake on a gasp. The room was in dark shadow. I realized I must have slept the day away.
My back faced the door, but when heavy footsteps moved toward me, instinct had me scurrying to the head of the bed.
“Little Rebekah—oops! No, it’s Delilah now, is it not?” a deep voice said, and Brother Micah walked into the dregs of daylight squeezing through the window.
I inhaled a fearful breath. His frame was formidable. His brown hair down his back, a long beard flowing down his chest. His brown eyes were small and narrow, his face seeming to adopt a permanent scowl. He was tall and foreboding… He was the man to save me?
Brother Micah closed in and towered over the bed. “You are beautiful, Delilah, truly a vision.”
I watched him intently, watched his lips tighten. Brother Micah turned his back and began lifting his tunic. I did not dare look away as his skin began to show. Then I could not look away when his entire back was revealed, unable to contain my sharp, shocked gasp.
Micah glanced back. “You see what your whoring temptation did to me, Delilah?”
Wide slashes marred his back. They were everywhere, from the bottom of his neck to the bottom of his spine. He had been flogged, lashed… just as Jesus was.
Micah spun around and glared down at me. “Do you remember that night, Delilah? The night you came into my room and taunted me with your sweet smile. Tempted me with those blue eyes. I was in rapture of your looks. Prophet David had just preached about how to touch and please a girl, about how our caretakers at The Order would begin to touch us to introduce us to the Lord’s love.
“And I had loved you for years, for as long as I could remember. And it was not just a childhood infatuation. You consumed me, my every thought, my dreams, every fiber of my body. I thought about you incessantly, about how you could be like one of those girls in the coloring books.”
Micah’s eyes hooded and I watched as he reached down to his crotch with his hand, revealing his excitement. He took a step forward, then another, until his knees hit the mattress at the end of the bed. His hand began stroking up and down his length, and nausea built in my stomach, vomit edging its way up my throat.
No… please, Lord, please save me… spare me from Micah’s wrath, I prayed.
“I learned to touch myself to your image. Learned how to bring pleasure and transcend to get closer to the Lord… all to those pretty eyes and plump lips.”
Micah’s palms hit the mattress, followed shortly after by his knees. I had nowhere to go; I was trapped. Fear kept me a prisoner on the bed.
But then his eyes glazed with something else, something I could not decipher. “The devil within you spoke to my innocent and God-fearing soul. And you, with your sinfully beautiful face, lured me in. You made me fall from grace. I was tempted and I was weak!”
Micah worked his hand harder against his length, his breath panting, sweat building on his chest. Releasing his grip for but a moment, he crawled forward, forcing me on my back until he hovered above me, fisting his penis again.
“After my father caught us, you were taken away because of the witch that you are. And me, I was punished for not resisting. You had tempted my father and he had prevailed. But not me. I had succumbed to you. I had succumbed to evil. To a harlot of Hades.”
I could not speak, unable to do anything as Micah bent down, his breath washing over my face.
“I was taken to the hill of perdition, my arms roped between two trees and my tunic ripped down the center. My father took a lash and awarded me with thirty-nine stripes, just like Jesus Christ.”
“I am… I am so sorry,” I whispered, my terror creeping into my voice.
Micah paused in his self-gratification. A bead of salty sweat dropped on my cheek. “Sorry? I do not want nor do I need your apology, whore. With every whip of that lash, I rid my enchanted mind of your spell. With every burst of pain, I promised the Lord I would never fall again. I committed every strike to memory and promised myself if the Lord should see fit to put me in your depraved path again, I would become a solider of Christ and fight Satan for your soul.”
A scream tore from my chest as Brother Micah’s hand began lifting up my long dress. His fingers did not stop crawling up my thigh until they hooked around my undergarments and pulled them down my legs, discarding them on the floor.
“Stand,” Micah ordered.
I did as requested. I was no stranger to this situation. In fact, it could have been Brother Noah above me; I had lived this moment a thousand times over.
Standing on unsure feet, I bowed my head in obedience.
“Remove the dress.”
Trembling, I lifted my arms and pulled down the zipper, my gray dress falling to a heap on the floor.
I was bare.
I was naked.
I was back.
After a rustle of the sheets, Micah stood in front of me, ducking his head so he could look into my eyes.
“Look at me, Delilah,” he said, and as natural as breathing, I did as commanded.
Micah ran his hand through my hair, then spoke the words that were all too familiar to me. “I am to take you, Delilah. Purify you. And you must not fight it. For fighting will only delay your salvation. You want to be set free, do you not? You want to be with the Lord when the Day of Judgment comes?”
Flashbacks of being a child and hearing those exact words slip from Brother Noah’s lips invaded my conscious mind, rendering me immobile.
I had become that eight-year-old girl again. I was that lonely lost soul again.
Nodding, I found myself saying, “Yes, sir, it is my utmost dream.” It was rote.
“Then do not fight,” Brother Micah ordered. “For I have the power to save you. I am blessed by the Lord to bring you into his embrace.”
Brother Micah moved to the side and gestured to the bed. I walked forward three steps, kneeled down, pressed my forehead to the mattress, and clasped my hands behind my back.
As the mattress dipped. Brother Micah braced at my entrance and began pushing his length inside. I closed my eyes and pictured the only man I loved. The man I loved that would never take me like this. He condemned those that would… The man that made love to me…
“Baby, listen to me and listen good.”
Ky’s eyes softened and he tucked my hair behind my ear with his finger, his blond beard tickling the skin on my chest. “I ain’t like them. Yeah, I’m a whore. That ain’t no shock. And I’ve fucked around with a long fuckin’ line of sluts. But I ain’t ever done one thing. I’ve never given two shits about a bitch like I do you. I ain’t ever held out for one piece’a pussy like I’ve held out for yours. I’d kill for you. Anyone even comes close to trying to take you away from me and I’ll slit their motherfuckin’ throat. You belong to me, you’re mine, and right now, in this bed, I’m gonna do something else for the very first time. We both are…”
I held my breath, too afraid that if I exhaled I would ruin the moment.
“I’m gonna make love to you, Lilah. I’m gonna take you as mine, bind you to me, ‘cause there ain’t no one out there, no one else meant for me in this world but you.”
“Ky…” I hushed out and this time embraced the tears as they tumbled down my cheeks. They were the proof Ky should receive that I wanted everything with him too.
Ky sighed and kissed a salty droplet away from each cheek. Pressing his forehead against mine, he inhaled a ragged breath and murmured, “I fuckin’ love you, Lilah. This, us, babe, it’s more than just fucking. You get that, yeah?”
Any inhibitions I had fled at that mome
nt and, clutching my hands onto his face, I crushed my lips to his and confessed, “I love you too, so very much… You make me feel safe… I am unafraid when I am with you. You do not know how special that is to me.”
A blinding smile pulled on his beautiful face…
I held on to the image of that face.
Kyler Willis, my beautiful true love…
I love you, Ky… You will forever hold my heart…
*****
Ky
“We’re gonna have to do recon. We’re fuckin’ stupid if we go in this place blind,” AK said. Smiler and Tanner backed him up.
The Nazi fucker had pulled through and made it back with blueprints in hand. And yeah, the new commune was a fucking fortress. A thousand acres of concealed and top-grade military protection. It was like cracking Fort Knox.
We had no idea how many freaks were in there, but from what Tanner could get intel on, it could be thousands.
The Hangmen could take weeks to get those kinda numbers together, so Styx had agreed to let the AK and Smiler go in and scope the place out, see if we could pull off an under-the-radar retrieval. That was a day ago. I didn’t have those stealth kinda skills to be of use, so I found it more productive to sit at the bar, nursing a fuck-off bottle of Jack.
Two days my bitch had been gone, two miserable and fuckin’ long days, and I wasn’t an idiot. Mae had said what those asswipes would be doing, but I couldn’t let myself go there, couldn’t picture some sadistic pedo raping my woman. Fuck, she’d be so scared. My old lady was a timid, brainwashed, scarred-by-life bitch.
Mae and Maddie were a damn train wreck, holed up in Styx’s apartment, numb as fuck, and staring off into space most of the fuckin’ time.
“How’s it hangin’, brother?” Hush sat beside me, pulling me from my dark thoughts, and as always, Cowboy weren’t far behind. They were like each other’s damn shadows.
“Ky,” Cowboy greeted, tipping his Stetson, and signaled for a beer from prospect, taking a seat next to Hush.
The three of us didn’t talk. What the fuck was there to say?
Hours passed and one by one the brothers entered the bar: Tank, Bull, Vike, Flame, Tanner showed his face, and eventually Styx. We were all waiting on intel, the old ladies upstairs with Maddie and Mae.
Someone nudged my arm and Styx sat beside me. He didn’t say fuck all either.
The roar of Harleys sounded outside, and I jumped off my barstool, ready to run for the door, but Styx held me back.
Minutes later, AK and Smiler entered the bar, looking tired and disheveled, Smiler’s long hair greasy and tied back, dirt all over their leathers and skin. I pounded in their direction as they slumped on the sofas and stood before them.
I heard Styx whistle for everyone to gather around.
“Well?” I prompted.
AK lifted his head and ran his hands down his face. “They have a motherfuckin’ army.”
Releasing a long sigh, I crossed my arms over my chest, and Hush asked, “What we dealing with?”
“Guards patrolling with AK-47s ‘round every perimeter, and not just any guard. These guys know what they’re doing. Have two shifts, day and night,” Smiler revealed.
“Any weak areas?” Tank asked.
“Not many. But they weren’t thorough enough when they secured the outer perimeter and we found a way in on the southwest of the property. Not much but hills and fields there, scrubland. It’s the weakest spot, anywhere else and we’re looking at four-deep electrical fencing, cameras, and patrols every hour.” AK then looked up at Styx and me; the prez had moved beside me. “Don’t know where the fuck they’ve all come from, but I can tell y’all now, those fuckers we killed months back—the elders, prophet cunt-face, those brothers who had Mae, Li, and Madds—they were nothing. This place ain’t like nothing I’ve seen before. And the ammo they were strapped with, real top-grade Israeli shit. And I gotta say, prez, that shit’s better than what we’re hauling.”
Styx nudged me, and I automatically watched his hand sign and translated. “What the hell is this place? What’re they doing there?”
Smiler actually motherfuckin’ smiled, without humor, though. “Looks like the fuckin’ crusade, like a fortified Jerusalem or some shit. Those religious freaks look like they’re prepping for fuckin’ Armageddon.”
Styx threw his head back and groaned, then looked at Bull. “Any word about new gun dealers on our turf?”
Bull shook his head. “Nothing. Everything’s all good.”
“They’re biding their time,” I said and met Styx’s eyes. “We all know Rider. He’s new. He’ll need to get things in order before he strikes. But after that… well. he’s pissed and he’s gonna bring the fuckin’ rain.”
“We got in, scoped the outskirts, but never went too deep,” Smiler said.
“And Lilah? Did you see my woman?” I asked, a fuckin’ pit in my stomach.
AK and Smiler glanced to each other, seeming to debate on what the hell to share. I stepped forward, drawing their attention, and said, “Whatever you gotta say, brothers, you better start talking.”
AK sat back on the sofa and said, “We saw something, but no, we never saw Lilah.”
“What did you see?” Hush asked. “We gotta know everything if we’re going in.”
Smiler’s brows furrowed and he said, “We were well back, but we heard some crazy Bible shit being piped through huge speakers.” They glanced to each other again and that only served to piss me off.
“Stop fuckin’ staring into each other’s eyes and tell me what the fuck you saw!” I shouted, catching AK gritting his teeth
“You wanna know what we saw? We saw a motherfuckin’ orgy. A shitload of folk fuckin’ on a huge patch of grass, pussies and cocks everywhere, fuckin’ each other in every hole they could find, while shouting some crazy language we didn’t understand.”
“Never seen anything like it,” Smiler added.
Every part of me froze, and AK stood, putting his hand on my shoulder. “It was like some crazy sex cult, brother. Neither of us caught Lilah, but that don’t mean she weren’t there.”
Flame visibly shook and looked to Styx. “When we going in?”
Styx looked to Smiler and AK and raised his eyebrows, silently asking the question.
“We were thinking nightfall,” Smiler answered. “We got a pretty good idea what we’ll get for the first couple of miles, but it’ll be all surprises from then. Darkness will give us the extra coverage we’ll need to track down Lilah. And brother…” Smiler turned to me. “We will fuckin’ get her… at any cost. Even if I didn’t like the bitch, her staying in that fucked-up place wouldn’t sit right with me.”
“And the guns,” Bull said. “We gotta try and know what they’re stocking. Those fuckers are still just outside’a Austin. They’re gonna be making a play for our turf in no time at all. This could mean a fuckin’ all-out war with the cunts. And now they’re in with the KKK? Shit’s not looking good.”
“Everyone good with going in at nightfall?” Styx signed, nodding at what Bull had said.
A round of ayes sounded, and I said, “Who’s going in? ‘Cause I’m going and I don’t wanna hear no shit about it.”
Styx nodded and pointed to AK, Smiler, Cowboy, Hush, him, and me. “We six go, but, Ky?” I watched my best friend’s hands. “It’s AK and Smiler’s lead, right?”
My jaw clenched so hard it fuckin’ ached, but I replied, “Right.”
“Tank, Bull, Flame, Vike, you guys protect the club. No fucker comes in.” They all jerked their chin in agreement, but Flame growled.
“I’m coming,” Flame spat, looking as crazy as shit in his leathers, no shirt, and only his cut on top. “Don’t dare leave me outta this shit. I’m coming.”
AK walked to Flame. “Brother, this is an in-and-out mission. No fuckin’ drama or those nut jobs’ll catch us all and crucify our asses. This isn’t some pussy-ass hippy shit we’re dealing with. This version of the cult is fuckin’ locked and l
oaded to take any fucker out that crosses their turf.”
Flame stared at AK like he weren’t even listening, but he said, “I’m still coming. I’ll shut the fuck up.” Flame smiled and it just looked fuckin’ creepy on the freak. “The ways I can kill don’t need to have sound.”
I saw the apprehension on all the brothers’ faces, but I for one would feel better knowing that murdering bastard had my back.
“Then we go in tonight,” Styx signed. “Get rest. Y’all are gonna need it.”
Each brother tapped me on the shoulder as they left the bar to go to their rooms, leaving me with Styx. I threw him a jerk of my chin and went to hit the sack, when he stopped me with a grip on my arm. He let go to sign, “If this cult under Rider’s got worse than the fucked-up one our bitches were brought up in, then you need to prepare yourself, brother.”
“She’s only been gone a couple’a days. We’re gonna be back before those assholes hurt her,” I replied, but I knew I was fooling myself, as did Styx if his fucking pitiful expression was anything to go by. As soon as Lilah walked back into that commune, she was gonna be hauled into seclusion for those bastards to “save her.” She’d told me so herself.
“Go be with Mae,” I said and almost ran to my room. Slamming the door, my back hit the wood, and I slid to the floor, my head dropping into my hands.
Fuck, Li… please be fuckin’ okay.
Chapter Nineteen
Lilah
Leaves from a tree outside the window danced as shadows cast against the bedroom wall. It was dark outside and a deathly silence overpowered the night. It was not a pleasant sight, those leaves. The dark shapes joining together, crisscrossing, and shaking almost looked like demons crawling along the wall, stalking me… taunting me. I squeezed my eyes shut to escape the haunting sight.
My legs were numb. I tried to move them to a different position but winced when a pain jolted through my body from my core. I was sore. Micah was rough, causing blood to stain my thighs, his seed dried down my legs.