“ARRGGHHH!” I open my mouth and scream out loud. Gawain jumps back, and I scream again, the sound echoing around the silent clearing we’re in. Bors jumps out of his car, his brows furrowed together in concern. Getting to my feet, I scream a third time, and this time, it feels freeing. I spin around in a circle shouting at the top of my voice.
“Ok?” Gawain tentatively asks when I finally silence.
“Argh!” I scream again.
“Ok, if you need to let off a bit more steam, then go for it.” He waves his hand, gesturing for me to continue screaming.
I let my arms fall down at my sides, and my head circles around and around as I continue screaming.
“Argh!.” A masculine voice joins mine. I look up and realize Gawain has started screaming as well.
“It looked fun.” He shrugs.
We both look over to Bors who’s got out of the truck and is now staring at us like we’ve gone insane. Maybe we have.
“Come on,” Gawain shouts at him. “Let it all out.”
“I ain’t getting anything out for you,” Bors replies and heads to the truck. He lifts a foot up to climb in but then stops and lets out a loud, deep scream. Then he turns and winks at me before getting back into the vehicle and turning his music up louder.
“That was fun,” Gawain says and returns to the table where he moves the mayo and replaces it with the hot sauce.
“It was different.” I reply and resume my seat. When Gawain isn’t looking, I take a deep breath, and reaching out to the two condiments, I swap them around again. I’m breathing fast. My hands are shaking, but I want to do this. I want to play and be normal. It’s a little thing, but if I can do this without freaking out again, then it shows me I can be ordinary. Gawain turns back and instantly notices what I’ve done. He slowly comes around to my side of the table. This time, he lowers to his knees in front of me. He reaches up and puts a hand on my cheek. I don’t flinch or move even a muscle. I’m rooted to the seat, terrified of what happens next but knowing I need to trust him not to hurt me.
“I’m seeing the real you, and it’s beautiful. Someone I’ve never met before: brave, powerful, kind, and with a sense of humor to match my own. I’m here to protect you.” He pauses and looks down at the ground. The warmth of his hand pressed against my cheek sends a searing surge of heat through my body. I don’t know what it is I’m feeling at the moment. It’s scaring the life out of me, but I’m sure it’s normal. This is the person I should be, not a slave, but a human with feelings and emotions.
“Kiss me.” My plea is an almost silent whisper in the air.
Gawain pushes up a little and brings his lips to mine. They’re warm and soft but masculine at the same time. The little prickles of hair around his face tickle me. Neither of us move, it’s not a kiss of exploration or want. It’s just skin on skin, but it’s what I need…what we both need.
Eventually, he pulls back.
“I shouldn’t have done that.”
“I asked you to.”
“I’m not the right sort of man for you.”
“I don’t think I have a sort. Up until this morning, I thought I hated all men.” I reach out and take his hand in mine. “Be my friend, Gawain. Slowly, help me learn how to behave like a girl my age should.”
Gawain pushes back up to his feet and reluctantly let’s go of my hand.
“I made a promise to you. You’re with me for as long as you need. I’ll do whatever it takes for you. I’ll give you a life back even if it kills me.”
Gawain
“Come on. Hurry up.” My father stamps his feet impatiently at me. Apparently, this is a rite of passage in my family to spend a day out with my dad. It’s not one I’m looking forward to. I’d rather be at home playing computer games with my brother Mordred. He’s my youngest brother. At thirteen, he’s three years my junior. It was my birthday yesterday, and this is my present from my father. He stinks of alcohol and stale cigarette smoke, as usual.
“Please, sir, I can’t walk that fast,” I protest weakly. I’m strong and as tall as my father already. He knows it as well. He’s also aware my mother instilled respect into me, insisting I pay deference to my elders, so he knows I won’t answer him back.
“Well, you need to learn. There are some things in life that only a father can teach you and walking fast is one of them.” He grabs my hand and tugs me toward the side door of a darkly painted building.
“Open up, Alwyn,” my father shouts loudly and bangs on the door.
“Code?” comes the reply from a deep voice behind the door. A latch slides across, and an eye appears at the opening, surveying us.
“Fuck you,” my father replies.
“You know the rules, Uri.”
“For fuck’s sake! Nine, four, three, three, seven, two, one,” my father replies through gritted teeth.
“Correct, you may enter.” The door opens and my father walks into the building and immediately punches Alywn straight in the face. The man who’d prevented my father from entering as quickly as he wanted stumbles backward against a wall. My father delivers another quick punch to the stricken man who falls down onto the floor, no longer moving. I jump back in shock at the violence. I know my father isn’t a good man but to see him beating someone up other than my mother, my brothers, or myself, makes me realize how evil he truly is.
“Don’t you ever do that to me again. I’m above your stupid rules and don’t forget it.” My father kicks the man for good measure, grabs my hand, and pulls me along a darkly lit corridor. “You’ll soon learn, son, there are two types of people in this world. People like your father who rule this world, and then those like Alwyn who’ll forever be getting a fist in their face. Make sure you’re the former. I’m not having any son of mine being pushed around. You’re destined for great things.”
“Yes, sir,” I reply really quickly, scared that the next place his fist might land is my face if I disappoint him. I force my legs to walk quickly behind him. Whatever happens from now on, I’ll do whatever he wants me to do. It’s the only way I’ll get out of here in one piece.
My father kicks open a door in front of us. My eyes go wide with shock when I see a couple on a bed. A man is on top of a woman, and it’s obvious they are having sex although the woman doesn’t look like she’s enjoying it. I’m still a virgin. Just surviving each day has been my priority in life, not women. Porn mags and my hand are good enough for me.
“Out and take that bitch with you,” my father orders, and the couple scramble to their feet and make for the door. Before the man can leave, my father grabs him by the arm. “Bring me two to break in.”
“Yes, sir.” The man lowers his head in deference to my father.
“Is this your business?” I ask him, instantly regretting opening my mouth when his face sours, and then a loud laugh bellows from him.
“Finally, one of my kids is smart. Your older brothers aren’t the smartest in the box. I might’ve just found my successor.”
I try not to flinch at his words. Never show fear.
The door opens, and two women are thrown into the room. They are naked, huddled together, and both of them are crying.
“Hello, ladies.” My father stalks over to them. He pulls one toward him and rubs his hand over her breast, grabbing harshly at the sensitive flesh. “Aren’t they beautiful, son?”
I nod quickly, not wanting to disappoint him by telling him the truth, which is that I think they’re beautiful but also absolutely terrified, and this all seems wrong.
“You’ve already learned about the types of men in the world. Well, let me teach you about the women. Women like your mother are the ones we take care of. After all, they feed us, clean our clothes, look after our house, and breed our children from us. You have to show them a minimal amount of respect. Not too much, though. You don’t want them to get illusions of grandeur and think they are better than us because their pussies are only good for sticking a kid in, understand?”
Out of fear,
I nod again.
“Now these women, they are slaves. Women who’ve been bought just for us to fuck. We don’t have to show them any respect. We can tear them up as much as we want. Take out our deepest, darkest fantasies on them. Beat them, fuck them in any hole we want, and they’ll take it,” my father informs me with a malicious grin on his face. He pushes the girl he grabbed down onto the bed and while holding her in place with one hand, he lowers his pants with the other. Suddenly, the other girl who’s not being held by him makes a bolt for the door.
“Stop her,” my father orders.
I don’t move. My body is rooted to the spot not believing what I’m seeing. The girl makes it to the door, but the man who was in here earlier is waiting outside. He grabs her and drags her kicking and screaming back into the room.
“Hold her down,” my father orders the other man, and he bends her over the bed.
“It’s time to be a man, son. Time to show me you’re not as weak as your brothers. Another man enters the room and drags me over to the girl presented for me to fuck. I watch my father as he pushes inside his girl, and her ear-splitting scream brings bile to my throat. The man holding me lowers my pants.
“Do it,” my father roars.
The girl before me turns her head, her eyes as blue as the azure ocean. She’s crying, her cheeks blotchy. “Please don’t,” she mouths, but I know I have no choice when a gun is pointed at my head.
I sit up in the bed gasping to get air into my aching lungs. My heart pumps furiously, and my whole body is drenched in sweat. I’ve not had that dream for years. I thought I’d suppressed it to the point where I’d never have to remember it again. The night my father tried to teach me women were not worthy of my respect. It’s why I’ve worshipped them with my body ever since, hoping I’ll find some redemption for what I did. That was also the night I joined the Cavalieri Della Morte. I walked out of that building and straight to my uncle. I made my first kill a few weeks later, and it soothed some of the ache from what I’d done. What is happening with Megan is bringing too many bad memories to the surface. And then there’s her eyes…the blue in them.
Sliding from my bed, I pull on track pants and head to the lounge. I need a drink to wash away the memories if I’m to have any hope of sleeping again. I pad down the hallway in darkness and notice a light on in the lounge. I have no weapons with me, so I grab a vase from a table close by. Moving silently around the corner, I find Megan curled up on one of the large leather chairs with a book in her hand. She startles and looks up at me holding the vase above my head, ready to smash it down on any intruder.
“What the fuck?” I exclaim, lowering the vase. She scrambles to get off the chair, and I swallow down my temper at finding her out here when all I wanted was a bottle of whiskey.
“I-I’m s-sorry,” she stutters, but I notice she doesn’t fall to the floor. “I couldn’t sleep. I had a bad dream. I came out here to read, so I didn’t disturb you with the light.” She holds a book up to me, ‘Pride and Prejudice’ by Jane Austen. Where the fuck did she get that from? It’s not my sort of reading material.
“It’s ok. You just startled me. I wasn’t expecting anyone to be in here.” I place the vase down on a table and going to my drink’s cupboard, I pull out a bottle of whiskey and two glasses and pour a finger full for her and a lot more for me. I offer the glass to her, and she tentatively reaches out to take it.
“Want to talk about your dream?” I ask, sitting down on the sofa. I take a large mouthful of the amber nectar and allow it to burn the bad memories away.
“Just the usual.” Megan takes a sip and coughs a little at the shock of the heat of it.
“When was the last time you had a drink?” I question.
“The night I was taken. I was in a club with my friend.”
“This is proper Welsh whiskey. None of that southern stuff for me.”
“Are you Welsh?” Megan takes another mouthful, and this time she lets out a soft murmur of approval.
“My ancestry is Welsh on my father’s side. Hence the name Gawain. I’ve been over there a few times. I can’t afford to go too often, because I end up eating too many Welsh cakes and have to spend months in the gym afterward working them off.”
She laughs at me.
“I’ve never had one.”
“I’ll have to take you there, one day.”
We both fall silent.
“What’s with the book?” I tilt my head toward it.
“It was the one thing that gave me comfort. I used to imagine my handsome hero rescuing me and treating me like a lady.” She looks down at the pages. “I guess part of it came true. I’m rescued,” she says, closing the book and placing it on the table in front of her.
“Did you get up for a reason?” she asks. I notice the change of subject and don’t push her any further on the book. It’s obviously a link to her past she’s not willing to let go of, just yet.
So instead, I reply, “It seems it’s a night for bad dreams.”
“You want to talk about it?”
I take another large mouthful of the whiskey. It’s already soothed the most tangled of my nerves.
“My family life growing up wasn’t exactly the best. My father was an evil man. I didn’t agree with his views on a lot of things, including hitting me when I did something wrong. He wouldn’t have been a hero in a Jane Austen novel. His views on women weren’t exactly the same as Mr. Darcy’s.”
“I don’t know—Darcy’s views were archaic in many ways.” Megan says and shifts so she’s facing me better. I get up from my seat and reaching for a blanket, I place it over her and then pour myself another glass of whiskey.
“I guess. Mr. Darcy had morals, though. He respected women and their decisions. Ok, like most men of his time, he expected them to act a certain way and probably to keep a house to a high standard, but he would never use them just for his own pleasure. That was my father’s opinion, and the one he taught me on my sixteenth birthday.” I look down into the whiskey, its colorful liquid patterns drawing me back into my darkest thoughts, and I continue speaking, “I lost my virginity in a way I’ll always regret until the day I die. But I’ll never see a woman and her pussy as being there just for my pleasure, which is the message my father hoped to instill in me.”
When I look up from my drink, I can see tears have pooled in Megan’s eyes.
“Oh god, I’m sorry. Not a subject we should be discussing.”
“No, it’s ok. You regret the way you lost your virginity, and I’m the same. It’s odd how it sounds so familiar. M as he took me, said the same sort of thing. My body, and my pussy were for his pleasure until the day I die.”
I place my glass down and push up off the sofa. My need to protect Megan overwhelming the commonsense telling me to return to bed alone.
“It seems we both have regrets that plague us at night.” I reach out a hand to her. “How about we keep each other company in the hopes we can get some sleep?”
Megan takes my hand.
“I’d like that.”
Megan
The sun peeking through a gap in the dark curtains, wakes me. Where my room’s décor is more feminine in nature, Gawain’s is completely masculine: sleek lines, wooden surfaces with dark colors in the fabrics, and a soft gray on the walls. This house has definitely been purposely built for the man, and so far, I’ve not found anything I’d change. It matches his personality or what I’ve learned about it so far. There’s a sadness behind his eyes…as though he must atone for something in his past. I’m willing to bet it relates to how he lost his virginity.
I roll over in the bed and see Gawain is no longer beside me. Reaching out, I feel the sheets and find them cold. He must have been up early this morning. When I sit up and look at the clock, I realize it’s almost midday. I’ve finally managed to get some decent uninterrupted hours of sleep. Going back to my own room, I jump in the shower and wash my hair. The operation on my arm is in two days, and I can’t wait as I’m stil
l finding it awkward to do simple tasks such as lathering up shampoo because the kink in it causes me pain. I get out of the shower and manage to wrap a towel around my damp hair until I can dry it.
I don’t know why, but I feel lighter today than I have in a while. My mood has lifted, and I feel like skipping. It’s amazing what a good night’s sleep can do for you.
Being careful not to slip on the wet floor, I pad into my bedroom but stop dead when I see a large bag on my bed. It’s the sort that clothes are put in to protect them and prevent them getting moth-eaten.
“Gawain?” I shout tentatively but don’t receive an answer. Hesitantly, I make my way closer to the bed, telling myself that only those with retina access can get into the house. This will be a present from Evelyn or something. On top of the bag I see a note. My hand shakes as I reach out and pick it up.
Mr. Gawain Vincent requests the pleasure of Miss Megan Ragnell’s company for afternoon tea. A dress is provided for this auspicious occasion, here within.
I can’t help but let out a little giggle at the formal use of language in the note. Gawain’s more likely to say to me, ‘Get out here, now’. Especially if he’s on his male period which often happens. I’m happy to go with whatever he has planned, though, especially when I undo the zipper on the bag and find a beautiful Georgian style dress, just the sort Miss Elizabeth Bennett would wear.
“Oh my god!” I exclaim to no one in particular and pull the dress out. Twirling around with it, I settle in front of the mirror. How in the hell did he get a dress like this for me? It’s stunning. The fine lace over the bodice is exquisite and even a pair of silk gloves and matching slipper shoes are provided. I’m still not the biggest fan of clothes, but I’m so eager to get into these that I drop the towel and start dressing. I’m struggling with the corset when there is a soft knock at the door.
“Megan, it’s Evelyn. Can I come in?”
“Of course.” I’ve never been so grateful for a visitor. She opens the door and gasps when she sees me.
Redemption: Cavalieri Della Morte Page 6