Chapter Four
Nick watched as Persephone considered whether to trust him or not, her eyes narrowing as she studied him. He understood her skepticism. Dressed like one of the men who held her hostage, he didn’t exactly look like the kind of guy anyone should believe, especially at that moment as he sat in front of her while she remained bound at her wrists with a rope around her waist tying her to the chair. The fact that he appeared to be a part of the National Equality Militia didn’t add any credibility to his claims.
He knew all that and still hoped she’d believe him. This job would be much harder if she didn’t, and having the person you’re trying to help fight you every step of the way never turned out good.
The bruises on her neck made him cringe in anger. Those fuckers had choked her at some point in addition to hitting her, if that discoloration under her eye was any indication. It wasn’t bad enough they had to smack her around? They had to grab her like that too?
Instantly, that made him wonder what else they’d done to her. She had too much fight in her for them to have raped her. At least he wanted to believe that. The thought of them doing that to her made his stomach turn.
Lowering the bowl to his lap, he reached out to lightly touch the purple bruise just under her left ear. She flinched as his fingertip grazed her skin, wincing like it hurt to merely be touched.
“Does that hurt?” he asked as a way to try to get her to talk about what they’d done to her.
“No,” she answered, obviously lying as she shrank from his touch every time his finger moved against her skin.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he whispered, pulling his hand away. “Have they done anything else other than choke you and hit you?”
Silently, she shook her head, but her frown deepened.
“You can tell me. Honest. You can trust me, Persephone.”
“They haven’t done anything to me other than that. Not that I’d want to tell another human being if they had, but they haven’t. I don’t get the feeling they think of me as a sexual thing so much as goods they can trade for.”
He knew all too well what people like this militia thought of women. He’d seen it time and time again. She was right. To them, women were things to be bought, sold, and traded for, but even worse, they didn’t consider them people with feelings. If the mood came over one of them that made him want to prove his power over her, Nick didn’t doubt for a moment that they’d rape her without a second thought.
“Don’t let yourself get deluded, Persephone. This group has a special hatred for women. That hatred would justify just about anything they wanted to do to you.”
He regretted sharing his inner thoughts because immediately fear filled her eyes. Quickly, he placed his hand on her shoulder to fix his mistake.
“I told you I won’t let them hurt you. You don’t have to worry. Okay?”
The fear in her dark eyes gave way to disbelief he knew it would take time to dissuade her of. He would, though. If it took everything he had inside, he would prove to her that she could believe in him. The job depended on that.
“Where are we?” she asked in a tiny voice so different from the one she used before with him. “Where have they taken me? Are we still in the United States? I know I’ve been held hostage for thirteen days, or at least I think I have, but I have little sense of where I am after the farm they took me to.”
“You’re at a house in a small town in Virginia. Do you know why they took you to the farm?”
She shook her head and sighed. “I don’t know why they kidnapped me at all. What’s this about?”
Nick looked over toward the door to see if anyone was coming in and then turned his attention back to her. “The people who kidnapped you are the National Equality Militia. They seem to have some problems with people who make money, like your father, and the media having any ability to make money, also like your father.”
She sneered at his explanation. “Equality? They call this equality, or is that only for angry white guys like them?”
Persephone had pegged them correctly. Nick continued, “I suspect only people like them are entitled to their brand of equality. They’re angry about everything. From what I read about them, they claim that everyone else but them have been helped in this country and they were left behind. So they formed this group and started picketing news stations that didn’t tell their story the way they wanted it told.”
She frowned and shook her head. “The news is about the truth. Or at least it’s supposed to be. That’s what my father always believed anyway. Ironic that they took me, the daughter of the one man in the news business who demands his media tell the truth.”
Scooping the grey, chunky liquid up into the spoon, Nick let it drop back into the bowl with a plop. “They aren’t interested in anyone telling the truth. They just want people to hear their opinions and give them what they want. There’s very little truth to what they believe. The fact that they can be unemployed and still afford to have all those guns and have the time and money to pull off an operation like this kidnapping shows they have pretty easy lives, comparatively speaking.”
For the first time, Persephone smiled and Nick saw that beautiful woman he’d seen in the picture Marshall Gilmore had shown him. Only now, she sat in green scrubs she’d worn for weeks, her hair hung in a tangled mess down past her shoulders, and her face and neck had bruises that showed the misery she’d endured.
But still, she was beautiful.
“You don’t sound much like a revolutionary, or whatever they think they are. You better work on that.”
“Oh, don’t worry. When you see me around any of them, you won’t even recognize me. It’ll be pretty damn horrifying, so brace yourself. And not like I was with that guy a few minutes ago. I just need you to remember that whatever I do, I’m doing it to save you. Don’t forget that.”
The smile slid from her expression at his promise that he’d be just as evil as the men outside the room. For Nick, he knew what he had to do and he knew why he had to do it. He just didn’t like how that truth made her look at him.
“I better get going before they think something is going on in here. I’ll be back later to feed you dinner. Do you need to go to the bathroom?”
“No. But how do you know it will be you who has to feed me again?” she asked.
As he placed the bowl of slop on the table nearby, he smiled. “Because I’m the new guy and they think that’s giving me the dirty job. Up is down in these people’s world, I guess.”
Turning back to face her, he knew he had to put the gag back on her, even if he didn’t want to. The pretense had to be kept up or her captors might figure out he wasn’t who he claimed he was and they’d both pay the price for that mistake.
He crouched down next to her to pick up the rag they’d used on her and stood up to stuff it into her mouth again. Holding the cloth in his hand, he looked at her and tried to soften the news the best he could.
“I have to put this back on you. I’m sorry,” he said, hanging his head.
“Why? Couldn’t you just forget? I’ve had that thing in my mouth every day and night. I have to breathe through my nose the whole time, which starts to really hurt after a while. Can’t you just leave it off for now, and if someone comes in and sees, then you can just say you forgot to do it?” she pleaded.
He hated the answer he had to give her. He truly did, but neither of them could afford any slip up that might endanger them getting away from there alive.
Clutching the gag in his hand, he frowned. “I’m sorry. I am. But I have to do this.”
She shook her head violently as he attempted to gently push it into her mouth, so he took hold of her head to stop her. Looking up at him with those deep brown eyes filled with complete and utter fear now, she begged one more time for him not to do it in a voice that made his chest hurt.
“Please. Nick, please. Don’t do this. You want me to trust you, but how can I when you insist on sticking that thing back in my mouth?”
Damnit, he hated who he had to be sometimes.
“I have to. We can’t afford for them to think that I’m treating you any better than they are. I promise that I’ll come back before dinner, if I can, and remove it for as long as possible. I promise.”
He held her head still as she tried to push back against his palm to escape what he had to do. The more she fought him, the more he wanted to stop and do as she so desperately wanted, but he didn’t have a choice.
No matter how much he wished he did.
As gently as he could, he pushed the cloth into her mouth as she tried to push it out with her lips and then clamped down on his fingers with her teeth. She caught his forefinger and bit down hard, nearly drawing blood. Yanking his hand away, he shook it to ease the sting as she stared at him with hurt in her dark eyes that caused him more pain than any bite ever could.
“I’ll be back. Remember what I said. Don’t fight them. They’ll hurt you if you do.”
As he walked toward the door, he heard her say something that sounded like, “Like you just did.”
In her eyes, he was no better than those bastards who’d hit her and choked her. Hopefully, gagging her would be the worst he’d have to do to her. But he wouldn’t count on that.
The men of the National Equality Militia spent most of their time playing video games as far as Nick could tell in the day he’d been with them. When he left the room where they were holding Persephone, he walked directly into the group of five grown men arguing about whose turn it was to do whatever they did in the game that seemed to revolve around some kind of zombies taking over the world.
Or at least that’s what it looked like as he moved through the room toward the kitchen with the bowl of food he hadn’t gotten Persephone to take even a bite of in all his time with her. He hurried toward the sink to wash down the evidence of his failure to force her to eat. Dishes from at least two days of meals piled up on one side, while on the other side beer bottles sat soaking in water. He had no idea why any of them would be doing that, but he didn’t care.
He just needed to get this grey shit down the drain before any of them saw how much was left in the bowl.
As he pushed aside the dirty plates crusted with egg from breakfast, he hurried to turn the water on and wash away everything in the bowl. Behind him, the heavy sound of footsteps told him someone planned to join him, so he pushed the spoon faster to get rid of it all into the drain.
“So how was your first time dealing with her?” the one everyone called Drist asked. “She’s a real bitch, isn’t she? I had to show her who’s boss once or twice.”
Nick took a deep breath of relief as all the grey oatmeal stuff disappeared and then turned around to see the man talking to him. Drist had light hair cut short to his head and far too many tattoos for any person to have on his neck and face. Any world that let this guy have control over anything was a world with serious problems since he obviously had made some extremely poor choices concerning his appearance.
Worst of all, though, was his obsession with that gun he waved around so much. Nick had been with them for just under a day, and in that time, Drist had used the handgun for everything from scratching his balls to punctuating his thoughts by pointing it at the person he was speaking to. Assuming he kept it loaded, Drist was definitely the most dangerous of all the militia men Nick had met so far.
He suspected Drist had been one of the men who had hurt Persephone. Any guy who needed to show off a gun as much as he did definitely had power issues with women. And other men. Hell, he probably had power issues with animals.
Before he could get lost in the horrific images forming in his head about what Drist had likely done to some poor kid’s pets growing up, Nick forced himself to answer his questions.
“You know how bitches like her are. They’re used to having everything given to them on a silver platter. She probably likes the idea that men are feeding her. I was thinking next time I might just put the bowl on the ground and let her eat like a fucking dog.”
Drist’s eyes lit up like he just heard the best thing all day. “Do it! You’d just have to make sure her ankles stay tied so she couldn’t get away, but I’d pay to see that bitch feeding like a dog.”
Thankfully, he turned around to tell the rest of the men playing video games about the fantastic idea, leaving Nick alone. Either that guy had the tiniest dick in the world, or some woman had wrecked him bad in the past. Maybe he had some traumatic thing with his mother. Nick could see the guy having mommy issues. He didn’t know what his problem was, but he silently vowed to keep him and the rest of the men away from Persephone as much as possible.
He couldn’t avoid dealing with them, unfortunately, though. For him to get her out of there any time soon, he needed to know what they planned. That meant he had to strike up a conversation with at least one of them.
The ones he’d met at the bar who brought him there had left, probably to go recruit more willing volunteers to the militia’s cause. That left Drist, who Nick never wanted to have to deal with, if he could help it, and four others who had done nothing but play on that X-Box since he got there earlier in the day.
Scanning the room, he tried to pick the one who looked the most civilized. It wasn’t an easy choice. None of them looked like they’d win any prizes for being very bright or even decent. As he considered which one to speak to, the guy with the ponytail threw the game controller in his hands across the room toward the guy on the couch.
“Fuck this! Let those damn zombies eat you if you don’t want to help me!” he barked before storming away toward the room where Persephone stayed.
Nick’s body immediately went on red alert. He couldn’t let that maniac go in there and terrorize her, so he quickly followed him. But instead of heading to that room, he marched down the hallway toward another bedroom all of them shared.
Relieved, Nick followed and saw him sitting on one of the old stained mattresses on the floor still stewing about how his buddy hadn’t supported his zombie killing in the game. He mumbled something about the guy being a motherfucker or some other kind of fucker, and when he turned to see someone else coming into the room, he jumped up like he’d been startled.
“What the fuck do you want?” he snapped.
Christ, the anger came off him in waves. Maybe video game zombie hunting wasn’t the best thing for him. Maybe some needlepoint might be better for this guy.
Nick held his hands up in front of him to let him know he meant no harm. “It’s cool, man. I just came in here to get away from those fucking zombies.”
For a moment, the ponytail guy stared like he didn’t know whether or not to believe him, but then he nodded his agreement. “I know, right? Who needs that shit? Fucking zombies. It’s not like they actually exist. Killing people is much easier anyway. That’s the kind of game I want. A people killing game.”
“Exactly. What the fuck do I care about killing creatures that eat fucking brains? Brains aren’t for eating, crazy fuckers,” Nick said with a chuckle.
Ponytail laughed a little too hard for his comfort, but at least he had him doing something other than throwing things and cursing out the living dead. Now he just needed to get him to talk about what the group’s plans were.
Assuming he knew one damn thing about what those plans might be.