Thicker Than Water

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Epilogue

Prologue

“Can’t you see that we’ll die if we don’t get the hell out of here?”

“We won’t, Jewel,” Lizzie whispered. “Mordecai would never let anything happen to us. Not to us.” Her voice changed to a singsong kind of coo. “No, he wouldn’t. Not to his own baby, would he, Sunshine? No.” She sat cuddling her newborn daughter in the rocking chair Mordecai Young, “the reverend,” had brought into their quarters.

They no longer had to room in the barracks with the other so-called Young Believers. Mordecai Young had moved his special girls into the spacious attic of the main house, where he could be closer to them.

“Lizzie, you’re being stupid. You’re forgetting the plan.” Jewel paced the length of the large room, growing more and more agitated. “And it was working so damn well.”

Lizzie looked at her and for a moment Jewel thought she saw the sharp mind and clear eyes of the girl her friend had been six months ago. “It was,” Lizzie said. “We made him believe we loved him, didn’t we? And it worked.”

It had worked. Mordecai had made them his right hands. They had access to the house. They ate better. He never hit them anymore.

“But, Jewel, I’m not acting anymore. I love him.”

“He’s a criminal. Jesus, Lizzie, he takes in runaways and makes us into slaves. He has armed guards and those dogs of his patrolling the compound in case any of us try to leave. We’re fenced in, fed all the drugs he can slip into our food to keep us complacent while we listen to his sermons and cultivate his crops. And you’ve seen the weapons room. He’s got more firepower than the freaking National Guard down there!”

Unmoved by Jewel’s impassioned speech, Lizzie stroked a forefinger along her baby’s whisper-soft cheek. “He’s my daughter’s father.”

“He’s a drug dealer with a Messiah complex, Lizzie. And this is no place for a baby.” She moved closer, ran a palm over Sunny’s silken baby hair. “We have to get out—for her sake.”

Lizzie closed her eyes. A tear squeezed through her lashes. “I know. I know you’re right. I just…I don’t think he means to be…I think he really believes the things he tells us.”

Maybe he did, Jewel thought. Maybe he really did believe he was more enlightened than the rest of the world, or that he’d been chosen by God to be his new messenger and ordered to create this compound. And that the marijuana crop didn’t do much real harm, and that it was the good he could do with the money it brought in that made it all right in the eyes of the Almighty.

Yeah, maybe he really did believe all that. Which made him insane, and even more dangerous.

“He loves her. It’ll kill him to lose her.”

“He wants to control her,” Jewel insisted. “He named her. He sets her schedule. When she eats, when she sleeps, when she’s bathed, how often you get to hold her. He sees her as something he owns, just like us.”

“It’s just his way.”

Jewel thinned her lips. “Tonight,” she said. “I made a special snack for the dogs. It ought to put them out of commission. We’ll tell the guard at the gate that Sunshine is sick and that Mordecai ordered us to get her to a hospital. If he gives us any trouble—” She took the paring knife out of her jeans pocket. “I snatched this from the kitchen tonight.”

“My God, Jewel!” Lizzie’s eyes widened. “Why can’t we try to go out through the tunnels?”

“How, when he keeps the only key on a chain around his neck?” Jewel put a firm hand on Lizzie’s shoulder. “I’m seventeen years old, Lizzie. I am not going to spend the rest of my life in this prison. And neither is she,” she added with a nod at Sunshine. “I love her, too, you know.”

“I know you do.” Lizzie sighed, lifting her eyes. “What about Sirona and Tessa?”

“I don’t know. Since he moved them into the main house, he’s been visiting us less and less at night. I think he’s going to get tired of us soon, anyway. We lose favor, we end up back out in the barracks. And you know that wouldn’t be good for the baby.”

“I know.” She looked more sad, though, than afraid. Sad that her lover was spending time with other women. She’d never minded sharing him with Jewel. But that was different. They were like sisters, the two of them.

“I’d like to take Sirona and Tessa with us, but I’m not sure we can trust them not to run straight to Mordecai if we tell them our plan.”

“I don’t like them, anyway,” Lizzie said.

She was pale and far too thin. She’d been bleeding heavily since giving birth—too heavily, in Jewel’s opinion, but then again, what did she know? It had been seven weeks. She thought it should have stopped by now. Lizzie wasn’t the same spunky, fun-loving girl she’d been when Jewel had met her on the streets. They’d heard rumors of this place, that it was a dream come true for runaways.

It wasn’t a dream, it was a nightmare.

They both looked up quickly as they heard his unmistakable footsteps, coming up the stairs. The door opened, and he stood there, with his warm brown eyes, long, mink hair, and neatly trimmed beard. He wore white robes and sandals, and he looked for all the world like Jesus. But when he spoke, the illusion was shattered by his soft Southern twang.

“I need to take li’l Sunshine now. Bedtime.” He smiled as he looked at the baby.

Lizzie kissed her child’s forehead and hurried to hand her over to her father. “Good night, my sweet baby.”

Jewel watched him take the baby. He stared down at the child adoringly, his brown eyes softer than ever. “You’re a special li’l girl, you know that? The daughter of the Son. You’re blessed, my Sunshine. You’re blessed.” Then, as he turned and carried the baby away, he began to sing. “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine…”

“Mordecai,” Jewel said, knowing he would be angry at her interruption, but daring it all the same.

He turned, scowling at her.

“I’m worried about Sunny. Do you really think it’s safe for her here, with the drugs and the weapons and all?”

“Do you think I’d risk my only child?” he asked.

She licked her lips. “I just—I overheard you talking to one of the guards today. You said there had been some kind of…government men asking questions in town.”

He walked closer to her, his face gentle—right up until his fist connected with her jaw, knocking her backward to the floor. Lizzie shot to her feet, rushing to where Jewel landed.

“Let that be a lesson to you about eavesdroppin’,” Mordecai said. “Haven’t I taught you better?”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, a hand on her face, not daring to get to her feet. Lizzie was leaning over her, hands on her shoulders, but she turned now to the man who stood nearby, cradling the baby in his arms.

“You didn’t answer her question, Mordecai. What happens if these government men try to come in here? What we’re doing isn’t exactly legal. And you have all those guns—”

Sighing, he gazed down adoringly on his child. “It’s as I’ve always told all of you, mankind is not ready for a soul like mine. They may very well try to kill me, in the end. And if they do—well, now, what better place for my only child than with her daddy?”

“You—you mean…?”

“Death is nothing to fear, you know. Haven’t I taught you as much? Haven’t you learned a thing in your time here?” He shook his head slowly, then turned and carried the baby out of the room, pulling the door closed behind him.

Lizzie hurled herself after him, only to collide with the door. When she went to tear it open, it had been locked from the outside. She pounded on it uselessly, then collapsed against the wood, sobbing.