Briony
his head. “No. Absolutely not. You’re crazy!”
Aero hasn’t stopped glaring at me beneath his mask, and the chills it’s creating have my body trembling with the unknown. His hard eyes speak to me, as they always do, but their message just isn’t clear.
This was my idea. My plan. I signed up for this, but something in my gut twists with the fear of deception. That I’m still only a piece in his game of chess. Just another pawn in his sick, twisted game of revenge.
It couldn’t be.
“He’s using us,” Saint says to himself. “This sick man is using us to ruin the church.”
He’s not entirely wrong in his statement. I assisted with that.
“He was right about you,” Saint seethes, and I clutch onto his forearm that’s still reaching back to protect me.
The statement makes Aero cock his head in interest.
“I heard them talk of you. Of your plight to destroy Christianity and those who believe,” he spats. “You’re a disgrace. A fallen soul that needs saving.”
“Wow,” Aero utters sarcastically. “Destroy all of Christianity? Simply impressive that you’d assume I have that kind of power.” He scoffs to himself, dropping the gun to his side. “But you’re wrong about one thing.”
Aero grabs Saint’s shirt by the middle of the chest, throwing him back on the bed before turning and taking a casual seat on the bench. He rests his elbows on my vanity behind him, the gun dangling from his fingers.
“My soul was ripped from me long ago. Saving is a ghost of an idea lost into the dark abyss.”
Saint freezes in horror as his eyes peer over at me. He gives me a sorrowful look, one that emits the regret of what this will do to me. Selflessness is all I see.
“Please,” I beg, turning my focus to Aero. “We can’t do this. It isn’t right.”
I’m referring to us as the ‘we’ here, begging him to pick up on the message I’m throwing at him. I feel he’s wrong about Saint. And maybe he is and knows it. Maybe his overall goal of destroying the chosen son has been his mission all along. Vengeance for a life he saw handed to Saint from the shadows.
There are ways to achieve revenge, but not by destroying the innocent. Whether Aero believes in Christianity or not, I still have my own morals as a decent human that I can’t rid myself of.
Aero runs his free hand down his abdomen, nails trailing his scars as if they suddenly itch with memories of his past.
“You see, Saint, sex doesn’t destroy Christianity,” he says, ignoring me entirely, turning his hard glare on him. “Sex is natural. It’s genetically programmed into us as a biological motivator in which we live our everyday lives. It’s pleasurable, organic, and a primal need our bodies constantly seek, whether or not you’re aware. You fight it because you’re told to. For no other reason than the idea of control. Control of the masses.”
“Fornication is a sin—”
“Sex doesn’t destroy Christianity,” Aero repeats calmly but with annoyance, interrupting Saint entirely. “Men do.”
Saint’s eyes narrow, both of their heated gazes burning a hole through the other.
“So you’re going to fuck her like you’ve been imagining, and show your father who you truly are; a man with no attachments other than the eternal love for his God alone. You are going to use her, take from her, and throw her away as planned. Just as he did with his mistress. Just as they all do when the time comes for them to prove themselves.”
Bile rises in my throat at his statement.
Saint shakes his head, his nostrils flaring. Standing from the bed, he takes a step towards Aero, and I suck in a breath of terror.
“You think you can scare me with these threats? What are you going to do? Shoot me? Kill me? Bury me in the dirt? You think I’m not ready to die for my religion?!”
He’s standing up to Aero, unknowing of the craziness that sits casually before him.
Aero lazily tosses his head towards me, a eerie smirk on his face like he holds some sort of secret. Like he’s cluing me into the pieces of the puzzle he’s forming.
“You may be ready to risk your ignorant, privileged, irrelevant little life for another man’s rules, but are you willing to allow her to die because of it?”
Saint doesn’t answer, and Aero’s knowing eyes narrow at him.
“The ultimate sacrifice. The ultimate test. He was preparing you for this. The brick. The writings on the wall…”
My stomach churns, my heart raging with fear only the dead silence of this room could create. Both men stare at each other. Unspoken words flirt between their gazes, and I’m left feeling utterly dazed in their presence. Could Saint truly know who his father is?
“Are you aware of what she’s been doing behind closed doors?” Aero tips his head.
My mind swirls with thoughts of ultimate betrayal and deception as my nausea tears away at me.
“Trust me, the blackmail was only the tip of the iceberg.”
Saint stares at him with betrayal and uncertainty dancing dangerously together in his eyes. Aero’s smirk deepens at the realization.
“She’s no Saint,” he gloats humorously. “I assure you. Her devious little mind surprised even me, the devil himself.”
“You’re lying,” Saint retorts. “She had nothing to do with that!”
“No? Why wouldn’t the only female Magnus Princeps want to bring down her competition? Your father knows it. You know it. Everyone sees it. She’s always desired and gotten off on being above you. Above your religion. Above your beliefs.”
Saint listens intently, staring into Aero’s eyes that burn with deviance.
“Maybe if you knew the truth, you’d think differently of your sweet, innocent little church girl. Maybe your father is testing your obsession with the only stain meant to ruin you. You thought you could really do this on your own? You thought Callum Westwood was going to let his son take matters into his own hands when he developed a school-boy crush on the woman meant to destroy the sacred structure of the church?”
Realization hits me then, that I don’t know anything for certain anymore. I’m blind to these twisted endeavors. Was I entirely wrong about Saint and his motives? My heart threatens failure with how hard it’s pounding within my chest.
Aero stands from his seat, making his way over to my nightstand. Opening the drawer, he removes my rosary, tossing it on the floor out of reach of Saint. His perplexed expression rises from the floor and finds Aero’s. A simple gun pointed at his head has Saint bending down to retrieve it.
“Tie her to the bed,” Aero demands.
Saint’s eyes land on mine.
Aero scratches the side of his head again with the barrel of the gun and his taut abdomen flexes, highlighting the evidence of our matching wounds, his still oozing blood down his flesh.
“I’m not a man of much patience. Fucking do it. Now.”
I close my eyes tightly, nodding slightly. Walking towards the bed, I approach Saint. I place my palm on his shaking hand holding the rosary, and our eyes connect.
“I’m scared,” I whisper truthfully.
Saint tries to read my gaze, but I already feel him faltering, slipping away.
“Just do what he says,” I plead. “He’s a dangerous man.”
The corners of his eyes crease with his growing uncertainty. I can tell he’s racking his brain for the answers, for a way out of this, but Aero’s entirely too calculated. There isn’t a plot twist he hasn’t already imagined.
“On the fucking bed!” he yells behind us, causing me to jump.
The beads of the rosary sink into the tendons of my wrists, causing an uncomfortable pain. Aero has Saint use his own rosary for my other wrist, and one of my legs is tied down with Saint’s belt. His sorrowful eyes keep averting my gaze as he follows Aero’s orders with the gun pointed at him from afar.
Once I’m secured in place, Aero sits back in the corner of the room, watching closely.
I can’t pick up the emotions he’s emitting. He’s become a wall of absent art, depicting nothing but deep cracks from years of abuse as he sits casually orchestrating the downfall, his eyes dark and unforgiving.
I don’t know who he is anymore.
Maybe I never knew him.
Or maybe…
Maybe I need to remember the core of who I am. A woman whose past is also a cracked image of perfection burdened by lies. A woman who is so much more than just another stepping stone for yet another man. A woman who stands strong and tall against those that berate, deny, and hold back.
A woman who still holds strong in her faith.
Faith in the man that’s routinely forced her to save herself.
