Rider shook his head. His mouth opened to argue, so I stopped the words from flowing with another kiss. Rider tensed beneath me, but it was not long before he relaxed and his lips moved softly against mine. When I withdrew, the affection in Rider’s eyes warmed me like nothing ever had before. “I . . . I like kissing,” I confessed, and I was rewarded with a smile—a true, genuine smile.
The sight stole my heart.
“Cursed” was a title only a woman could hold. But if there was such a title for a man, Rider would have it. Everything about him was beautiful. I could see he did not believe it. In fact, I could see the raw self-hatred in everything he said and did. I could see it in his haunting dark eyes.
But as I laid my head down on his chest, Rider’s strong arms holding me close, I simply let myself feel this. This care from the man who tried to kill his only brother so I could be freed from his abusive hand and spared the public joining.
That was the future that awaited me. I had always known my fate would not be one of joy—it was never in the stars for me. So for right now, I would bask in this feeling, the comforting arms of this man. Before it was too late.
The only man that had ever shown me such affection and honor.
The pure prophet with the conflicted heart.
A heart I believed could be saved.
Even if mine was already damned.
Chapter Nine
Rider
My body wanted to me sleep, but my mind kept me awake. Plus, as I looked down at Harmony sleeping, draped over my chest, I knew I would never close my eyes. I never wanted to move from this spot. The outside world could wait, for all I cared it could fade to oblivion . . . as long as we got to stay here, just like this, undisturbed.
I stroked Harmony’s long blond hair. My heart swelled as her breathing hitched at my touch. I felt my lips spread into a ghost of a smile. Then it disappeared as I thought of what lay ahead of her. Judah. The ceremony. The joining . . . a life of servitude and horror.
The sudden surge of anger I felt was almost too much to contain. I fought to keep my body still as wave after furious wave built in my stomach.
I had no way to stop him.
I didn’t kill him when I had the chance . . . I would never get that chance again. I fucked up my chance at saving her.
She would be taken from me, and I wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. I held Harmony tighter. My mind suddenly drifted to Styx and Mae. I felt sick as I thought of my time with them, months and months ago. This was what Styx must have felt when I took Mae from him and brought her back to the commune. This helpless fucking feeling, the feeling that you might lose the one that resided in your heart.
No wonder he wanted to fucking kill me.
No wonder Mae didn’t want me.
I ran my hand down over Harmony’s cheek. I knew now what this type of connection felt like. And I couldn’t fucking lose it. I wouldn’t cope if I did.
I was still staring at Harmony’s beautiful sleeping face when the cell door began to sneak open. I straightened, preparing to fight whoever was coming through, convinced it was the guards returning. Whoever it was held a candle in their hand, the soft flame illuminating the room better than the bright moon outside, whose rays were spearing through the small window.
I forced my eyes to adjust to the new light. It was the man I often saw out in the hallway. I relaxed some knowing this man was Harmony’s guardian, a man she trusted. A man she seemed to treat almost like a father.
He came closer to us, quietly, so as not to disturb Harmony. He glanced down at Harmony on my lap, and his face softened. He looked to be somewhere in his fifties. He had jet-black hair and brown eyes. He looked familiar to me for some reason, but I was sure I had never seen him before.
The man—Brother Stephen, Harmony had called him—met my eyes. Besides the candle, he held something else in his hand.
I frowned as he crouched down and placed the candle on the floor by my side. He leaned forward and placed a file in my hands. I glanced down at Harmony; she was sleeping soundly.
I opened the file and, in the dim candlelight, looked at the first page. My stomach fell. An old picture of my uncle, Prophet David, stared back at me. It wasn’t the fact that it was his face that shocked me, but the type of picture it was. I had lived amongst the Hangmen for five years. Each one of my former brothers had one of these pictures hanging on the wall in the clubhouse.
A mug shot.
My uncle was staring up at me from the page in a fucking mug shot. I squinted my eyes to study the picture further. He was holding up a board containing his personal information. My face blanched when I read the name.
Lance Carter.
I shook my head, struggling to comprehend what it all meant. A finger landed on the file, and I looked up at Brother Stephen. “Read it,” he mouthed. “All of it.”
“The guards,” I mouthed back.
“Do not worry about them,” he said, and left the cell.
I waited for him to close the door, but he didn’t. Was this a trick? I waited for the guards that should be stationed in the cellblock to burst in and frame me for having this file. But none came.
My pulse sped up in confusion. I had no idea what the fuck was happening. I was too tired to think about it too much. I took a deep breath and opened the file again. I leaned over toward the light of the candle and began to read.
With every sentence, my stomach sank further and further to floor. It was information on my uncle . . . information on his life before his mission.
Lance Carter, born in Little Rock, Arkansas . . . typical life, until he was found guilty of child sexual abuse . . . two counts of rape of eight-year-old girls . . . jailed for twenty years . . . served twelve.
Vomit traveled up my throat. My uncle, the leader of our faith was . . . was motherfucking convicted pedophile . . .
I gripped the paper in my fists as I fought to control my anger. I read on further, each new piece of information slicing its poisonous dagger deeper into my heart, into everything I had ever fucking known, deeper and deeper until there was nothing left.
Lived alone in rural Arkansas with other convicted pedophiles whom he had met in prison . . . quickly drew in more men when Lance Carter, then renamed Prophet David, claimed to have received a revelation on a pilgrimage quest to Israel . . . in truth, he had never left the United States.
The commune, which preached the oncoming End of Days and a free-love doctrine, grew in such vast numbers that it needed to relocate . . . Carter bought land in the rural outskirts of Austin, Texas . . . Carter announced within the coming years that God had ordered him to send his people to other countries to recruit new followers to The Order . . . In truth, he was being investigated by the ATF for arms dealing to finance his commune and needed to store his money and gun stock overseas . . .