Defiance (New Adult Romance) (Isaac & Maya) (15 page)

“A Wire?” I nearly shout. “Are you out of your fucking mind?”

“My client isn’t putting himself in that sort of danger,” Nigel declares a
t the same time Glory sputters, “I don’t fucking think so,” before she starts whispering with her attorneys about ways around this.

“Isaac will at least get him talking.”

“That won’t get you a conviction,” my lawyer says.

“It will get us closer.”

“All you’re going to do is get him killed,” Glory shouts, but nobody’s listening to her except me.

“
Closer
won’t get Isaac immunity, will it?” Nigel surmises, shaking his head.

“Well, no, but—”

“Then it’s completely out of the question.”

“Were you even listening when I told your client about what we have on him?”

“Charges that you won’t move forward with until you have something better on Baron, which could take years if it happens at all.”

Dan responds with something about it being a matter of months and time being of the essence, but none of it fucking matters to me at this point so I stop listening and stare down at the wood grain pattern on this cheap ass table. Glory’s hand brushes against mine and I resist the urge to grab it, instead turning my face to hers. She can’t say it out loud, but her eyes are asking me why I didn’t just tell my dad that I wanted Maya instead of going through all this anguish to keep it a secret.

“Not like that,” I explain in a whisper that’s too low for Dan and Nigel to hear because they’re basically screaming at this point.

Glory tears up and reaches forward to run her fingers across my hairline slowly, making me shudder. “How did you manage to stay such a good person?” she asks, gnawing on her bottom lip as a tear rolls down her cheek. I know I’m supposed to hate her completely, but I don’t and I wipe it away before she leans toward me and kisses my forehead. “Even you don’t know how, do you? It’s just who you are.”

“I guess,” I sniff. “Glory, if this all goes to shit… will you keep an eye on her?”

“Yeah.”

“You know what I’m asking you to finish for me, right?” I ask as quietly as I can, resisting the urge to glance at the camera.

“You’ll get a chance to do that yourself,” she says, her face contorting as she squeezes both of my hands. “Isaac… I am so fucking sorry. Try to forgive me if you can.”

“What?” I reply as she throws her arms around my neck and hugs me harder than she ever has, choking out a sob into my shoulder. I hug her back a little, completely at a loss for words.

“He needs immunity, we need hard evidence. That’s how this works,” Dan snaps, slamming his fist down and shaking the table.

“Well, you’ll have to get it somewhere else because we will take our chances in front of a jury.”

“Isaac
is
evidence,” Glory murmurs, grabbing the camera and tilting it toward her.

“If you’re about to say what I think you’re about to say…” her attorney cautions her.

“I can’t let him go to prison,” she says, her wavering voice getting louder and calmer. “Isaac is evidence. And a victim. You can’t charge him with anything, it won’t stick.”

“What are you getting at?” Dan asks, but there’s no way he’s as curious as I am.

“The immunity deal you’re offering him… I’ll take it instead. I can do what you want, Isaac can’t.”

“
You
can purchase a sexual servant from Baron?” Dan says skeptically.

“Not for myself, but if I wanted to buy Isaac a specific type of gift, yes, I could.”

“No, she fucking couldn’t,” I interject. “Not without…”

“It would take a few months before I could bring it up without raising suspicion, but I can do it.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because I’ve done it before,” Glory admits right before I tell her to stop talking because we need to regroup. “Isaac is Baron’s biological son. And I…” Despite her best efforts, she chokes out a sob as her eyes lock with mine for a moment before they drop to the floor. “I bought your mother.”

Did I just hear that? “What do you mean?”

“I lied to you. She wasn’t a prostitute and she wasn’t fifteen when she gave birth to you.”

My throat twists shut as I blink at her. “But you found me that picture…”

“I took that picture. You’re actually in the original version, I cropped you out. She’s fourteen and you’re two years old.”

“That would make her… But then she’d only have been…”

“Twelve. She had
just turned twelve a few weeks before you were born. I took that picture to convince your father that he should visit his firstborn son while he was still little. He did.”

We all stare at her in silence for a few seconds. “Let’s start from the beginning,” Dan says quietly.

“Yeah, Glory,” I croak, sliding my chair back so I don’t have to be so close to her. “Let’s start from the beginning.”

20

Isaac

“We were in India, purchasing a textile
dye manufacturing facility, which basically meant we were purchasing the whole town because that was the only thing there.” Glory says. “It was just another deal for Baron, but it was a make or break moment for me. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one involved, there was another man around my age who wanted to be Baron’s right hand just as much as I did. He was as good as I was, too. And once again, I was on the outside and about to lose a golden opportunity because I wasn’t one of the guys,” she says bitterly.

“Get to the part where you
bought my mother.”

“Anything goes in places like that. They were always saying goodnight to me at the end of the day and running off to the brothel a few towns over. There just wasn’t an equivalent way for me to… network with Baron. I couldn’t really risk fucking him, who knows what sort of disease I would have ended up with. So I had to figure out another way to be the cool girl at the strip club or I was going to lose
everything
.”

“Stop fucking explaining yourself,” I growl.

“There was this old woman,” she continues. “A madam of sorts, I guess you could say. Her daughter and son in law ran this little hole in the wall restaurant, it was the only thing in town. We were there a lot, she saw what was going on. One night I was drowning my sorrows in my chai, trying to come up with my next move when she sat down next to me and… gave me an idea. I couldn’t bond with him like his new prodigy was, so I’d have to one up him and give him a present. Show him that I understood him and that I could work better with the people, which was true. That was the one thing I could do better than him. She knew exactly what Baron wanted. I didn’t. I had no idea that she’d be so young.”

“How old was she?” I ask.

“This was a little over two years before you were born, so she was almost ten. I swear, I didn’t know.”

“Because buying him a teenager to rape would have been so much better,” I snap.

“Yeah, it would have been,” she shoots back, surprising the entire room with her honestly. “I convinced him to meet me in this house I was renting. He’d been trying to get in my pants the whole trip, so he was pretty eager. I didn’t want to see the girl beforehand, I knew I wouldn’t be able to go through with it. I opened the door and was face to face with the old woman and this sedated little girl. I was totally shocked and so was Baron.”

“How much did she cost?” Dan asks. I guess that matters to the fucking DHS, but it sure doesn’t to me.

“650,000 rupees.”

“That’s a hefty price tag. Do you know where she came from?”

“She was born in India, but ethnically she was from a remote area in western Afghanistan where exceptionally beautiful eye colors are common. I could have gotten a girl with purple eyes, but Baron prefers green. She was also half white, they told me she was the daughter of a prostitute and a British businessman.”

I’ve always wondered about that part of my heritage, but finding out is worse than not knowing. “How the fuck could you do that, Glory?” I say.

“I didn’t know.”

“But once you did… How the fuck could you just leave her with him?”

“I didn’t think your father would actually… He seemed so surprised, at first I thought he was angry with me. I convinced myself that he just didn’t want to say anything to offend me and obviously he took it as a huge sign of loyalty. And it worked. That young guy he saw himself in lost and I won. I am what I am today because I bought my way into the all-boys club the only way I could. Yet somehow, that makes me worse than them even though these assholes and their sick fucking needs are the only reason she was for sale in the first place. Supply and demand.”

My stomach churns and I need to put as much distance between me and the woman I consider my mother as possible, but Nigel grabs my arm and whispers that I should stay on camera.
“I can’t fucking believe this,” I breathe.

“I couldn’t either. I told myself that your father was waiting until she was older. I thought about her all the time, I even indulged myself in fantasies that he put her in school or something. But then…” Glory sputters, wiping her tears
away. “Then he told me that he got her pregnant. There was a woman watching over her, she and her husband were going to sell the baby before he got back. You. They were going to sell you. Baron visited unexpectedly when she was around six months and he simply couldn’t handle it. He was completely hysterical when he called to tell me what was going on. So I got on a plane. I’m relatively sure he had that woman and her husband killed when I arrived and he left me alone with Sevti the next day.”

“Sevti,” I choke. “
That
was her name.” It’s been sitting on the tip of my tongue for as long as I can remember.

“I moved her to a different region. Your father wanted me to find a way to have an abortion, but I convinced him that it was too late, that you were already a baby. His baby. She delivered early, about a month later. And I did put her in school and set the two of you up in a nice, safe place.”

We used to cuddle all the time. I always see her smiling when I think about her, but how could she be? “Did she hate me at first?”

“No,” Glory replies. “Not at all, I promise. She loved you immediately. She was like you, naturally good hearted, no matter what. She didn’t even hate me. Sevti wanted me to take you to America for a better life, she even asked me to name you so you’d fit in.”

“You named me?”

“Yeah, I did. I’m not exactly a Bible scholar, but I knew that Isaac’s father was supposed to kill him and he couldn’t go through with it. I guess I thought that would be good luck. We did the DNA test and you were his, but he still didn’t want anything to do with you. I didn’t either at first, but I was just too guilty, I had to see you and your mother with my own eyes so that I knew for sure you were okay. You always were. Sevti was doing well in school, you were thriving. And you grew on me,” Glory murmurs, her lips curling into a nostalgic smile. “You were
so
adorable. I kept looking for some of that evil that lives in Baron, but it never showed up. Somehow, you even managed to make that tilted smirk of his sweet and cute.”

“If she was so fucking happy, why does she look so miserable in this picture?” I ask, fishing it out of my wallet and flicking it across the table to Dan.

“Because Baron wanted me to take it. He asked if you looked like him and I said yes and no, so he wanted to see. He didn’t really believe that test. I told him he had to see you in person. You didn’t have his face, but there was still so much of him in you.”

“So you convinced him to come see it for himself?”

“Something like that.”

“Did he…” I don’t even need to ask. Of course he did.

“Probably. I don’t know.”

“How the fuck could you do that to her again?”

“You were his first kid. His
son
. I wanted the two of you to bond.”

“Yeah, well, it fucking worked,” I snarl. “We
bonded
. Thanks.”

“Isaac, I didn’t…”

“You fucking knew! At this point, Glor, you definitely fucking knew.”

“If you had been a girl, I never would have…”

“Seriously?”

“I wanted you. I wanted to take you home with me,” she explains. “Sevti too, but I knew that wouldn’t happen. She wanted me to keep you, and if you were out of the picture she could grow up, get married, have a normal life. None of that could have happened if Baron didn’t love you, so I had to make sure that he did.”

“Was he the one who got her pregnant the second time?”

“What are you talking about?” Glory asks, even though she knows.

“We were asleep. We always slept together,” I say, and it’s like I’m right there in that mud brick house, lying next to her in that little bed, listening to her tell me a story. Her voice never makes sense to me because I don’t remember Hindi anymore, but it still sounds so beautiful. “One night I woke up because my feet were all wet, but it wasn’t water. It was red and I was cold. So was she. She didn’t get sick, she fucking hemorrhaged and died in her sleep with her arms around me.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that you remembered that?”

“Why didn’t you tell
me
any of this?” I scream. “You knew her name. Do you have any idea how many hours I’ve spent trying to remember that? You never would have told me.”

“I didn’t want you to start digging.”

“You fucking bitch,” I snarl. That word means quite a bit coming from me and she knows it. “Tell me this last thing before I never look at your fucking face again. Was the dead baby that was all over my feet that night my half sibling, or full?”

“Half, probably. She was seeing a village boy. Your dad hadn’t been around for at least six months.”

“I guess it doesn’t even matter, because I’m the one that really fucking killed her,” I say, my voice cracking. “I doubt the uterus of an eleven year old was designed to carry to term. I probably ripped it up when I tore my way out of her.” I can’t breathe, the air is too hot and thick. I need to get the fuck out of here.

“You didn’t tear your way out, Isaac. They cut you out of her,” Glory tells me and I break down sobbing because I can’t fucking do this anymore. “You didn’t kill her. Neither did your father and neither did that nice boy that wanted to marry her. I did. I killed her and I guess it’s time to pay for it.”

“I hope you rot in fucking prison. You have no idea how much I fucking hate you right now. How the fuck could you… all those magazine articles, all that business woman of the year bullshit, all those little girls that look up to you…”

“I never would have gotten here without—”

“Without a sacrificial lamb? It was just one little girl, I guess that wonderful school you run makes up for all of it, right?” I shout.

“I’d like to think it does, in a way.”

“Oh, I bet you fucking do. You are such a fucking fraud. You’re worse than…” But she’s not worse than my father. It just hurts more because I always knew what he was. “I need to get the fuck out of here.”

“Isaac… You can’t hate me, I’m the only reason you exist.”

“Yeah, I’m grappling with that one right now, Mom,” I growl, clapping my hand over my mouth. “No wonder I always end up calling you that. I’ve always known this shit between us was sick and twisted, but… seriously, Glory, this takes it to a whole new, fucked up level.”

“I didn’t… I never meant for any of this to happen.”

“Don’t you mean you never meant for
me
to happen? I’m the only reason you have to face this. You should have just thrown me away.”

“I couldn’t throw you away then, and I can’t do it now.”

“What the fuck do I say to that? Thanks?” I scream, flipping my chair across the room. Glory flinches and everyone is waiting for me to hit her, but I’d rather cut my fucking hand off than have it touch her skin. “Can I go now?”

“Yes, Isaac,” Dan says. “You can leave.”

“Nigel…”

“I’ll take care of it.”

He probably wants me out of this room as much as I do so they don’t catch the explosion on camera. My feet are so heavy as I step toward the door. I need to be as far away from this and as close to Maya as possible, but I’m not sure I should drive.

“They’ll follow you from here, Isaac,” Glory reminds me. I turn around to look at her, sitting on the chopping block where I just was and still trying to protect me. Our eyes lock, but there just aren’t any words.

The rage and panic fades into the background as I walk out the door. I still can’t afford to make any mistakes. I already had a plan to get back to Maya’s place without being seen, but I would have forgot about that if it wasn’t for Glory. And I’d still be sitting in that room, bargaining with nothing while I stare down the barrel of a gun that’s pointed at her head now. Where the fuck does that leave us? Even?