by M. G. Morgan
If David came for me, it would all be over.
And I had no doubt he would come for me, it was what he did. He was the type of man who couldn’t just sit on the sidelines, not when those he cared about needed him.
Curling into a ball I let myself sob until there was nothing left inside me.
Wrapping my arms around the bump I rocked back and forth from my position on the floor. I couldn’t let them take my baby, I wouldn’t let them take it…
My mind played the scene over and over. Taylor had used the word ‘she’, was it a mistake, or did he know something I didn’t?
It wasn’t possible, we didn’t want to know the sex of the baby, David wanted it to be a surprise.
And yet Taylor had seemed so certain?
The sound of the door into the bedroom opening gently stirred me from my line of thought.
Pushing up from my place on the floor, I stared around at the bathroom, there had to be something I could use as a weapon.
Dom was dangerous, they were all dangerous in their own ways but it was him I knew to be the most immediate threat to my existence.
Grabbing a shell shaped soap dish I hefted the weight in my hands before creeping to the door and peering out into the room.
A young woman stood in the middle of the floor, the maid’s uniform she wore and the terrified expression on her face had me relaxing my grip on the soap dish.
Stepping out of the bathroom, I kept it hidden behind my back as she spun around to face me, the look of shock on her face making her look much younger than I’d first assumed. She was little more than a child.
“Please, Miss, I didn’t mean to intrude but they said you…” She trailed off and one lone tear tracked its way down her cheek.
Confusion welled within me as I watched her fingers fidget with the edge of her white shirt.
“What’s the matter?” I asked, doing my best to keep my voice as soft as I could.
She was already frightened, I didn’t want to spook her further.
“I’m supposed to help you dress…” she said, her voice stuttering over the words.
She watched me with wide brown eyes, eyes that seemed far too familiar.
It hit me then, she had Taylor’s eyes. But she couldn’t have been more than fourteen, maybe even younger.
Why would she be working at the house if she was his daughter?
“How old are you?” I asked, taking a small step forward.
Her entire body tensed and I halted my movement. She was on the verge of fleeing and my heart ached to see her so terrified of me. What had they told her about me to leave her so afraid?
Or what had she been threatened with?
“Thirteen and a half,” she said, her bottom lip trembling.
I gave her the widest brightest smile I could muster but she never ceased her frightened fidgeting.
“My name is Carrie, what’s yours?”
“Rosa, my name is Rosa but I’m not supposed to tell you,” she said, her voice dropping to a whisper.
“Your secret is safe with me, Rosa. Why don’t you come and sit on the bed and tell me why you’re so frightened?”
She shook her head, her brown hair flicking back and forth.
“I promise you’re safe with me, Rosa, I won’t hurt you.”
Her bottom lip began to tremble again, this time much worse than before and her black lashes were coated with unshed tears.
“If they catch me…” She trailed off, her voice swallowed by a small frightened sob.
She clamped her hand over her mouth as though that sound alone would be enough to bring Taylor’s wrath down on her head.
I sat on the edge of the bed and gestured for her to come and sit with me.
She glanced over her shoulder at the shut door and then back at the seat I’d offered her.
My heart broke as I watched her. What had happened to make her so utterly afraid?
She had to be Taylor’s daughter, she had his eyes of that I was certain and yet it didn’t fit.
Why would he make her work like this?
Rosa darted across the space and dropped onto the bed, tucking her skinny legs up underneath her body she stared up at me.
“He wants me to help you get dressed, if he knows I was…”
I shook my head and smiled again at her.
“Rosa, it’s all right, here with me you’re safe.”
A small seed of guilt erupted in the pit of my stomach. I couldn’t even guarantee my own safety, how could I promise her that she would be safe with me?
“You’re a prisoner too aren’t you?” She asked, her voice so quiet it was practically a whisper.
I sighed, what was I supposed to tell her? She was far too young to know the truth and yet I could only imagine the horrors she’d already suffered at the hands of the monsters living in the house.
“Rosa, who sent you up here? Was it Taylor?”
She chewed her lip and shook her head. “I’m not allowed to go near him. He doesn’t want anything to do with me…”
“Where’s your mother?”
I knew I’d made a mistake the second I asked the question. I watched her small heart shaped face crumple as her shoulders began to shake and heave.
The sob that tore out of her throat would have been enough to break the stoniest of hearts and without thinking I wrapped my arms around her.
She fought me but I held her close, cradling her fragile body against mine. She was practically skin and bone, I could feel every one of her vertebrae as they jutted out beneath the skin on her back.
“Rosa, it’s all right, you don’t need to be afraid, I can help you.”
I repeated the words over and over until she finally began to relax in my grip, her sobs becoming less violent as her tears soaked through the front of my blouse.
“I’m sorry, I promised myself I wouldn’t keep crying. He doesn’t like it when I cry, he said it reminds me of how young I am.”
Her words sent a shiver of fear up my spine.
“Who said that, Rosa?”
She shook her head, her brown eyes wide and frightened.
“I can’t tell you, he’ll…” she trailed off but I could see from the flinching around her eyes that whoever he was he would hurt her for speaking to me.
“I didn’t mean to upset you when I asked you about your mother…”
Rosa sucked in a deep breath, her fragile frame trembling as she stared down at her hands.
She suddenly seemed much older than her thirteen years. It wasn’t right that a child should have to grow up faster than they were supposed to but something had happened to give her a maturity that most thirteen year olds didn’t have.
“My mother is a prisoner too, she doesn’t want anything to do with me…” she cut off, her voice breaking over the words.
“Rosa, I’m so sorry,” I said, drawing her back into my arms.
She let me hold her but she was withdrawn and rigid, some of the fear she’d held earlier had dissipated but it had been replaced by an emotion I couldn’t place.
“Who’s your mother?”
She shook her head, her brown hair falling across her face. “It doesn’t matter, I’m here to help you dress,” she said, her voice quietly determined.
“You don’t have to, I can dress myself.”
Her bottom lip began to tremble again and her eyes widened in fear once again.
“Please, he’s going to…”
“Rosa, I told you, I can help you. This can be our secret, you can stay here and as far as anyone knows you did exactly as you were told.”
She nodded slowly and bit down on her lip hard enough to leave little indentations.
Henry was a bad man, cruel and unforgiving, the pain he had caused wasn’t something that could ever be forgotten but he’d tried to protect his children including the other Melissa. I could suddenly understand why he didn’t want her to fall back into Taylor’s grip.
Chapter 6
Standing in fro
nt of the bathroom mirror I stared at my reflection and tears filled my eyes.
How was I supposed to do this?
How was I supposed to calmly go downstairs for dinner, sit with these monsters and pretend I wasn’t equal measures terrified of them and plotting their painful demise?
But what choice did I have? I could only imagine what Dom would do if I refused Taylor’s dinner invitation.
He was just looking for the opportunity to hurt me and I couldn’t give it to him. At all costs I needed to protect the baby and survive the ordeal.
David and Jenson needed me and I would do whatever it took to get back to them.
Scrubbing aside the tears I pushed away from the sink. I was stronger than they were, I wouldn’t allow myself to be taken down by them. I would fight and I was going to win.
I had to win.
Failure simply wasn’t an option because it wasn’t just my life on the line anymore.
* * *
Making my way down the staircase Dom had dragged me up earlier, I stayed alert.
Whoever had brought Rosa to the room had left the door unlocked.
The house seemed empty, as though everyone had decided to play a joke on me and deserted me on the island.
But I wasn’t going to be that lucky, part of me wondered if perhaps they were waiting for me to make a mistake, awaiting their opportunity to really put me in my place.
I was after all their prisoner and yet I had full range of the house and the island in general… It didn’t make much sense.
“Ah, there you are, I was just coming up to look for you.” Andy said, the sound of his voice breaking the silence in the house and making me jump.
He appeared at the bottom of the staircase and smiled up at me, his expression of delight at my discomfort making the nervous flutterings in my stomach worse.
He held his arm out to me, pretending to be a gentleman.
“What? You’re not going to restrain me and drag me around the house like the prisoner I am.”
“Of course not, Carrie, you’re a guest here, a guest of my father. I would never do something like that to you.”
“It’d be easier if you did. I’m not a guest in this house, I didn’t come here willingly.”
“I seem to remember you coming very willingly, you weren’t restrained or drugged. In fact you were extremely cooperative.”
Reaching the bottom step I paused, with the heels I wore and the step beneath me it gave me just enough of a boost so I could stare directly into Andy’s eyes.
“I had no choice, you would have killed David. You’d have hurt my child,” I brushed my hands protectively across my bump.
The red dress they’d left out for me to wear seemed to emphasise the bump far more than any other outfit I’d ever worn and it only served to make me feel more vulnerable.
I didn’t want to draw attention to the fact that I was pregnant, that there was a part of me far more fragile than any other aspect of who I was.
They could beat me, restrain me, try and break me and none of it would matter as long as I could find a way to get back to David and Jenson. But there was one thing they could do that I couldn’t abide.
If they hurt my unborn child I would burn their world to the ground and I would enjoy it.
In fact nothing would bring me greater pleasure than to crush their very existence into dust.
“There is always a choice, Carrie. It may not be a pleasant or an enjoyable one but it is still a choice and you made yours.”
“Stop trying to pin this all on me, we both know who’s at fault.”
He smiled at me, the one a shark shares right before it rips into its prey.
“Yes, we do and it’ll all be over as soon as David learns to cooperate and does what’s asked of him.”
“You want him to kill for you, why?”
“To prove loyalty. If we all have blood on our hands then there’s not one among us who can turn on the others. We all have something to lose.”
“You said Henry’s daughter was still alive? Why would you think that when we both know she died years ago? Is it for the benefit of your father? I know he’s dying.”
“She was never Henry’s daughter, she has Bank’s blood coursing through her veins, he stole her from us because of that simpering bitch.”
“Gertrude, what has she got to do with this?” I lied, knowing full well the role she had played in everything.
I had a feeling that if Andy or any of the others found out the truth about Gertrude’s role in the death of their mother or the way she’d taken Erica they wouldn’t hesitate in killing her too.
As much as I disliked her, I wouldn’t ever let them know her secret.
“She couldn’t carry her own brat to term, father says at the time she was inconsolable. Henry stole and used Erica as a means of keeping her happy. My father found his proof, he knows Erica is still alive but he needs a way to get to her.”
I swallowed hard. He had no clue how close he was to the truth and that frightened me.
Henry at least was safe from the wrath of these nut jobs but the same couldn’t be said for the rest of us.
“I’ve just never been able to quite wrap my head around how he allowed my mother to get murdered, for all appearances they loved one another and then one day…” Andy trailed off and stared into space.
“Shouldn’t we go down to dinner, you did say your father dislikes tardiness…” I said changing the subject.
I didn’t want him thinking about it all too hard, the truth was far too dangerous.
He returned his attention to me, his eyes studying me and it took all of my courage not to let my gaze waver from his.
Finally he nodded and smiled, “I did say that didn’t I?”
He held his arm out to me once more as though he was nothing more than the perfect gentleman.
I stepped down off the last step and stalked past him. He wasn’t a gentleman and there was no way in hell I was going to go along with the sick game he was playing of pretending I was nothing more than his guest.
Andy paused and then laughed, the sound bouncing off the walls around us.
“You know, I can see what David sees in you. You’re fiery and headstrong, a true protector of those you love. Those are normally all qualities to be admired in a woman…”
He caught up to me and stalked down the next flight of steps alongside me.
“But you don’t think so?” I said, stopping on the stairs and staring at him.
“In this house it’s a mistake, there are predators who live here, Carrie, predators who would take far more pleasure than they deserve in trying to break a woman like that. Even if that meant taking everything she held dear away from her.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Not a threat, a warning. Start playing the game and you’ll survive all of this. Carry on with your tough facade and they will eat you up and spit you back out.”
His words surprised me and I studied his face, searching for a sign that he was deceiving me.
He was a monster just like the rest of them, but if that were true then why was he warning me?
Why bother?
He could leave me to dig my own grave and it wouldn’t ever matter to him. I knew that for certain. And yet here he was advising me on how I could survive on an island with his brother and father.
“Why are you telling me this?” I asked, my voice soft, practically a whisper.
“Because not all of us want this life, some of us just want to put our family back together but it shouldn’t be at the expense of some one else’s.”
He took a step towards me and I could see the concern in his eyes, it was a genuine emotion and it shone in his eyes.
He wasn’t like them, he could be reached!
Perhaps I could persuade him to help me, to help me escape…
“I’m sorry…” I said, reaching out to brush my fingers against the edge of his arm.
He stared down at where I’d touched
him as though I’d burned him and I slowly withdrew.
“You don’t need to be sorry, Carrie, you just need to be smart and no who to trust.” He glanced up at me, his gaze boring into mine.
“I don’t mean to break up whatever this is, when you both look so cozy,” Naomi said, her voice bitter and filled with emotion.
Jumping I stared down at her, she stood at the bottom of the stairs, the expression she wore was murderous as she glared up at Andy and me.
“This?” Andy said, dropping the serious tone he had shared with me just seconds before. “Is nothing at all, I was just giving Carrie, here some helpful advice on how best to get along with everyone here.”
Naomi folded her arms across her chest, her blue eyes narrowing as she studied Andy’s face carefully.
“That’s not what it looked like.”
Andy had started down the stairs towards her when she spoke, her words made his shoulders tense and from my position behind him I couldn’t read his expression but I could see Naomi’s face.
Her eyes widened a little and if I wasn’t mistaken, filled with fear as she stared up at him.
“What exactly did it look like, sweetheart?” Andy said, but there was no warmth in his voice, no tenderness in his tone as he continued down the stairs.
His pace was slower, almost taunting as he closed in on her.
Naomi swallowed hard and shook her head, the downturn of her quivering bottom lip unmistakable.
“Nothing, it looked like nothing. You know what I’m like, Andy, I love you and seeing with someone else, anyone else…” She trailed off as he reached her and paused in front of her.
“I know what you’re like,” he said, his voice dropping to a whisper as he leaned in against her.
I couldn’t hear his words but Naomi nodded rapidly at whatever he was telling her and when he pulled away she shot him a watery smile.
From my vantage point I watched them both with interest. She’d seemed so sure and cocky but he’d very easily shut her insecurity down.
But one thing I was certain of was that he hadn’t done it with reassurances of his fidelity and love.
She was afraid of him.