One of Many

by Marata Eros

  Words spill from Kiev’s mouth, begging Anna not to shoot. They are some of the best words I have ever heard, because those words let me know that Kiev is still alive. There is still time.

  I sneak into the hall, my fist closed around the hilt of the knife. My only plan is to put the pointy end in some part of Father Weston.

  I wonder if it’s hard to stab someone and if I’m strong enough to push the blade past any bones.

  I creep along, holding my breath. Father Weston stands behind Anna, who is holding a gun. A gun that is pointed at Kiev. I raise my arm, my fingers tight on the knife.

  Kiev sees me but doesn’t indicate my presence. I’m right behind Father Weston, looking at the center of his back, the place I plan to bury the blade.

  Then he turns, and everything happens so fast. The gun goes off.

  Kiev falls back, and the smell of blood fills the air.

  I bring my arm down, and the knife hits Father Weston in the chest. The tip of the knife or bone breaks—maybe both—and I drag the blade down his torso before letting go.

  Blood splatters as the knife clangs to the ground.

  Father Weston stumbles back, hits the wall, and slides down, leaving a streak of red on the wall behind him.

  “Don't leave me, Kiev!” I dive on the floor.

  “Good girl, Little Bride.” His voice comes out ragged, as though every word is hard to form.

  “Kiev!” Oh my God, he’s bleeding!

  My hands tremble; the metallic smell of blood is strong. I have to stop the bleeding now, or I’ll lose Kiev forever.

  Sirens grow louder and louder. Police. Ambulances. Hospitals.

  The real world.

  Real help. Real justice. Hang on.

  “I love you, Kiev. Don't you desert me.” My tears fall, mixing with the blood on Kiev’s chest.

  The red runs over his tattoos, masking them.

  I pull back, evaluating the damage. Blood seeps from a hole in Kiev’s shoulder and comes slower from his leg. How much blood can he lose before he dies? His eyes are fluttering shut.

  No! I’m losing him. Just hang on... keep hanging on!

  There’s a knock at the door. The police are here, thank God.

  “Help me!” I yell. Suddenly someone is on me, someone big and heavy, and I realize it’s Father Weston.

  He died and went to hell and was resurrected by the Devil himself. Blood has soaked through the front of his white dress shirt, and his skin has paled.

  His wraps my throat with his strong fingers, and I can’t breathe.

  Weston wants to watch the life go out of my eyes as it goes out of him. He’s bleeding badly and doesn’t have much time left.

  I push against him, and his body slumps forward, weak from blood loss. Darkness threatens to take over. Desperation fuels me, and I bring my leg up, kneeing Weston in the balls. He sucks in air and goes rigid.

  I shove him and scramble out, needing to go back to Kiev.

  “Look what you did!” Ginny screams. “No, no, no!” She drops to the ground and takes Father Weston in her arms. His eyes are glazing over. The false prophet is dying. Maybe God does answer prayers.

  My heart in my throat, I scramble to Kiev’s side. He’s trying to open his eyes. Trying and failing.

  “It’s okay,” I whisper and press my hand over the hole in his shoulder. Blood still freely seeps out, though not as fast. Is the wound clotting? Or is he running out of blood?

  The cops knock at the door again. Hurry and get in!

  “Don’t you even think about opening the door!” Ginny bellows to Rachel and Caroline, who must still be in the foyer. “The law doesn’t belong in God’s house.”

  “I’m hurt!” I cry.

  They won’t help Kiev, but they might open the door to help me. “Rachel, please! I need help!” My hands are slick with blood. “Hang on, Kiev. Hang on!”

  Someone moves behind me. Scared it’s Ginny coming to take revenge, I look behind me and see Anna scurrying away.

  “Don’t open the door!” Ginny calls after her. “God doesn’t want you to!” She lets go of Father Weston’s body, and he slumps to the floor, his eyes wide open, and grabs Anna’s ankle.

  Anna trips and lands hard on her knees. Her hands slap the wooden floor as she crawls forward, yanking her leg out of Ginny’s grip.

  My chest heaves, and I can’t breathe—can’t get in air. There's so much blood, and Kiev’s eyes are closed. He parts his lips and tries to mumble.

  “Shhhh,” I soothe, tears running down my face. “It’s going to be okay, Just hang on.”

  Someone shrieks, and a light turns on in the front of the house. The floor vibrates under what sounds like combat boots.

  The police.

  Ginny screams, long and agonizing. Something is pushed across the floor, bumping into my bent legs.

  “Help! Help me!” Ginny falls back while pretending fear. “She’s crazy! She did this!” Her finger is pointed at me. “Arrest her!”

  My body is folded over Kiev’s. I don’t look up, don’t move away.

  “She’s got a gun.” Someone moves over. “Put your hands up.”

  Shaking, I move off Kiev’s body and raise my hands. Officer Langley meets my gaze. He lowers his weapon.

  Help me, I mouth, and he gives the tiniest nod.

  Tears stream down my face. More officers swarm in, and everything happens so fast. Handcuffs. Screaming. Crying.

  So much blood.

  Paramedics surround Kiev, checking vitals, sticking him with needles, and hooking him up to IVs.

  “Audrey,” Officer Langley says, and I tear my eyes away from the medics. I wrap my arms around myself. “Audrey, are you all right?”

  My teeth are chattering, and I feel cold, as if I were dunked in the baptism tub again and left to drown.

  “I will be.” I take in a breath. “Is it over? Can I leave this place?”

  “Yes. You’re safe.”

  *

  Harsh lights spill down on me, highlighting every bruise, every scrape in my skin. I twist a strand of hair between my fingers and watch the monitors connected to Kiev. We’re at the hospital, three hours after we made our escape.

  Kiev is in rough shape. He lost a lot of blood from being shot twice. But he’s going to recover. He’s going to be okay.

  I’m dressed in a hospital gown, gray sweatpants, and slippers. A nice nurse and a soft-spoken female officer questioned me, took pictures of my injuries, and treated my wounds—took a rape kit.

  Kiev and I are free from Father Weston’s web of lies, but things are far from over. We left The Community, leaving hundreds of people behind, my parents included. No one knew what was going on when a brigade of flashing lights sped down the lone gravel road that leads to the big house on the hill. And no one knew that only one of the two people taken away on stretchers was alive.

  I wonder what is going to happen to them. Will the people of The Community stay there, carrying on as they did before?

  Father Weston didn’t provide anything… other than false hope.

  My eyelids are heavy, but I resist sleep. I want to be awake when Kiev wakes up, and I don’t plan to leave his bedside until then. I keep my hand on top of his, gently stroking his skin. An hour later, I lose my battle against sleep, slumping forward against the bed.

  “Audrey.”

  I startle, forgetting where I am for a moment.

  “Sorry, honey.”

  I blink, look around. Oh, right. I’m at the hospital. My heart skips a beat, and I look at Kiev; he’s still sleeping peacefully next to me.

  “Your parents are here,” the nurse says.

  “Oh, thanks,” I mumble and give Kiev’s hand a squeeze before standing stiffly and stepping out of his room.

  My parents look shell-shocked, and it hits me that this is the first time in five years they have been anywhere other than The Community. My mother clutches my dad’s arm, letting go only when she sees me.

  “Oh, Audrey,” she c
ries and throws her arms around me.

  I melt into her embrace, tears leaking from my eyes.

  It’s the first time I’ve felt my mother’s touch since the wedding. In some ways, I still feel like the little girl that I was before that night, living a sheltered life, totally oblivious to the world around me.

  But I also feel changed. Grown up? Maybe. I’m not innocent anymore, that’s for sure. I’ve broken several Commandments, though this time I feel they can be forgiven.

  “What happened?” Mom asks, pulling back enough to look me in the eyes. I blink, considering each word carefully. There’s no need to tell her the whole truth. Being away from the small house is enough of a change for her to handle right now.

  “Father Weston lied.”

  Three words. Three powerful little words. Powerful enough to change everything.

  *

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Kiev asks me, putting the black SUV in park in front of the big house on the hill. “You don’t have to come back inside.”

  My heart lurches from looking at the large white house. It’s been over a week since The Reckoning—the real Reckoning—took place. The events surrounding that night reminded me of how sheltered I was and how little I still don’t know.

  I don’t understand how inheritance works or why Kiev is coming back to this hell. He said the house is his now, and he needs a place to stay while recovering. It’s all too much, and I can’t wrap my head around how anyone is going to proceed, how anyone can recover from this.

  Kiev has half brothers and sisters. They need a place to stay, and for the first time since they were infants, they will be allowed to stay with their mothers.

  “I do have to go back.” I unbuckle myself and put my hand on the door, scared to get out.

  Half the people in The Community packed up what little they had and left. A few stayed, holding tight to their belief. They went so far as to say Father Weston wasn’t their leader. He wasn’t fit to lead them through the end of times.

  But that I am.

  Those people who stayed might be more crazy than Weston himself.

  The others, those who now see the lies but didn’t leave right away, they stayed because they have nowhere else to go.

  Like us, like Kiev.

  He did what he wanted: take down The Community. And now he’s forced to return once more, because it’s not over.

  I walk slowly next to Kiev as we make our way to the front door. I blink and feel a rush of panic.

  The last time I was in this house, horrible things happened, and I feel pain shoot between my legs and goose bumps break out along my arms.

  Kiev takes my hand and gives it a reassuring squeeze. He’s limping slightly, though he denies any pain. He saved me that night, but he tells me I saved him when he didn’t even know he needed to be saved.

  Everything is in disarray inside the house, messes, footprints, fingerprint dust and all the things that made the house a home are displaced—out of order. During our time away, the police searched it for evidence, coming up empty handed. Father Weston had skeletons in the closet, and Kiev and I are determined to find them.

  Or at least one: Kiev’s mother.

  Chapter Twenty

  Kiev

  My leg hurts like a bitch. Supposedly, that's normal. Since I've never been shot before, it's a new pain to deal with.

  Seems small compared to all the hurts of the past that are now over.

  Weston is finally dead.

  Audrey's hand is damp in my grip. She's nervous. Because this is the house of horrors.

  This is the house where she was ultimately kept against her will. Raped. Beaten.

  Where we found love. A first for me.

  But not without a journey of pain. Finding that promise at the end of the torture doled out by Weston has been the biggest challenge of my life.

  Audrey's brave. But she doesn't realize all the details. I sheltered her from a lot of it.

  Weston was loaded. Made it off the backs of the hundreds within The Community.

  It's all mine now. Blood inheritance. At least, that's how I think of it. I’d be lying if I said having the financial security wasn’t wanted. It is. It’s not as though Audrey can just go out and get a job after all she’s been through. And I don’t want to clock in eight or more hours a day and leave her alone. Not yet. She needs me.

  And I need her.

  But no amount of money can erase the past. Nothing can take away the scarred memories. But something can ease the pain. It took a lifetime and one Little Bride for me to figure it out. And hell if I’m letting Audrey go.

  Ginny is in jail after she spilled her guts. She held out as long as she could, wanting to keep the image of Father Weston pure, as fucked up as that is. I don’t think a lifetime of therapy is enough to undo the damage dear old dad did on that woman’s mind. Though I’m fairly certain Ginny was batshit crazy from the start.

  As Audrey and I stand there by the house, I hear the distant sound of bloodhounds. Searching.

  Many years ago, the houses in South Dakota had cisterns, shallow wells that served the family within the home with running water.

  I can't go with the roaming dogs as they search for my mother's watery grave.

  Langley disallowed me accompanying them anyway. No son needs to remember his mom that way.

  With Weston's death, Ginny had finally buckled under pressure. And the simple fact that her fingerprints had been on the gun.

  My mom had disappeared all right.

  Ginny and she had been having an argument all those years ago. Ginny wasn't top bride, as she'd seen it. Swollen with her third child, she'd been overcome with rage and jealousy at my mother. She'd shoved her.

  The hidden cistern cover was originally covered with wood, but succumbed to the elements long ago.

  Mom didn't have a chance.

  Madeline DeVere, first and only lawful wife of Father Truman Weston, had fallen to her ultimate death.

  The cistern had been deep enough to make climbing impossible. Stone construction caused the walls to be a slick cylindrical tomb.

  It's too fucked up to speculate about Mom being down there in whatever cold fetid water remained in the unused well, slowly treading water.

  Finally succumbing to hypothermia. Then drowning.

  Every time I think about the last minutes of her life, it's almost as if I can feel the sensations she did. Did she think about me? Her only child—still alive—never knowing what would become of her?

  But I do know. It's a terrible knowledge. But I've reconciled it. Better to know what happened to Mom than to wonder forever.

  Ginny admitted she came to Father Weston. Told him her sin of coveting Mom—the incident at the well.

  By the time Weston got to the cistern, there was only a floating body. Proof of their sins.

  Weston covered for Ginny. The small problem of that pesky first wife tidied up nicely.

  Problem was, no one knows where the cistern is. Ginny conveniently “forgot” all details. All she gave police to go on was that it was located on the property. No shit.

  A howl rolls over the prairie.

  I close my eyes, and Audrey leans her face against my shoulder.

  Maybe they've found her after all.

  *

  Audrey and I stand under the sleeting rain. A tent has been erected over the grave, but many of the bystanders are getting drenched.

  The public wouldn't miss the graveside service of the infamous first wife of what many are calling a cult leader.

  There's no calling involved. Father Weston was a cult leader. A sadist. A rapist. A liar.

  A polygamist.

  So many things.

  Primarily, he was evil. And that's the one thing I have that's totally solid. Real evil does exist in this world.

  Audrey tucks into my side, and I shift my weight, easing it off my leg that aches like a rotting tooth.

  Langley's hounds had found the cistern. A DNA sample fr
om me had proved the connection we all knew would be there.

  Mom was finally laid to rest.

  Ginny's in jail.

  Father Weston can't corrupt anymore. Hurt anymore.

  I gave the house to the wives. My brothers and sisters can live there. I can't. Rachel, who desperately wanted children of her own, has become the caregiver to Ginny’s children. Anna is still there, for now. She’s been talking about moving in with her sister in Texas and starting over.

  Audrey and I want far away from Tea, South Dakota.

  We've made our future home in Rapid. The foothills of the Black Hills is what we want.

  What our future child will want.

  I put my hand over her still-flat belly and smile.

  Subconscious urgings are sometimes listened to. I wanted Audrey, and I made sure she would be mine. First time I ever had unprotected sex was with her.

  My feelings got in the way of taking down The Community. But they were never more certain after I laid eyes on Little Bride.

  Now she will be a bride, my bride. She will be a wife.

  The one she wants to be.

  After purchasing our little house nestled in the mountains, we'd sequestered ourselves. The rest of my inheritance went to a support group for abused women.

  A small portion, I set aside for our child.

  The press won't leave us alone. They keep asking for interviews. They want to know the gory details.

  In a combined statement, we said they aren't ready for it.

  When we're ready, we'll talk.

  The priest says the final words, and dirt hits the top of Mom's coffin with a hollow ring of finality. She'd been Catholic once upon a time.

  Audrey fingers the slim sterling cross we'd found in a lockbox. I can remember Mom wearing the glittering symbol when I was small.

  Silent tears roll down Audrey's cheeks. “Don't be sad, baby,” I murmur for her ears alone.

  She tilts her face to look up at me. The sound of rain batters the temporary tent like an insistent drumbeat. Audrey's blue eyes appear to float in all the pale skin of her face. “I'm sad for you, Kiev.” Her lips tremble, and a sudden surge of lust strikes me.