Fear the Wicked (Illusions Series Book 2)(78)
As we wound our way along the road, I thought about how convenient this entire abduction (that I’d never actually planned) had been. After Mass had ended and the parishioners filed out of the building, I’d moved quickly to hide in the tree line hoping for the opportunity to have a moment with Elijah alone. But then Eve stumbled out on the arm of this guy and it was like he was leading her right to me. I couldn’t help the way I’d stared, couldn’t stop the way my heart had clenched in my chest only to pick up its pace as they approached. I felt something for this woman that I couldn’t name, and the something that eluded me every time I tried to identify it had come to life to see her face, to know that she wasn’t just another one of my victims.
“What’s your name,” I asked the guy sitting quietly by the passenger window, Eve settled in place between us on the bench seat.
She turned to look at me with confusion lining her face, answering for the man before he could get a word out. “What are you talking about, Elijah? You know my brother, Joshua.” A nervous laugh filtered over her lips, her green eyes staring up at me like I’d lost my fucking mind.
Breathing out, I clenched my fingers over the steering wheel so tight that the blood drained from the knuckles leaving the skin white. “I’m not Elijah.” I wouldn’t play the same games with her that I’d played when she first arrived at the parish. The poor girl was sick in the head and I hadn’t helped her by playing along. I knew that now, knew that in order to save her from my twin who had lost his fucking mind, I had to burst the bubble that had been built around her. Sheltering her from the truth wasn’t the way to free her from the bullshit lies that had created her.
“Not this again,” she breathed out. “Have I done something?”
Dragging my eyes from the road for only long enough to stare down her brother, I jutted my chin in his direction and said, “You know who I am. Why don’t you do the right thing for your sister for once and tell her the truth?”
I would have sworn the asshole would argue, but instead, he sighed heavily and turned to his sister. “Eve…” his voice trailed off, the flicker of anger obvious behind his eyes. “Sedra, I mean.”
“No!” Eve’s body stilled at the mention of her real name. “You won’t call me that. I haven’t been Sedra since the day I married Elijah. Sedra was a stupid girl. A faithless brat that was full of sin. Elijah freed me of that-“
Joshua surprised me when he reached out to take his sister’s cheeks between his hands and turned her face toward him. “Sedra,” he repeated, his deep voice calm, yet authoritative. “I need you to listen to me without arguing for once. I need you to really listen, okay? There’s something you don’t know. A lot you don’t know, actually, and it’s time you found out before it’s too late. Please. You have to trust me when I tell you that Elijah has been lying to you for a long time. He’s not as holy as he says. He’s been hurting you, Sedra-“
“No!” she screamed, her arms flailing and damn near hitting me in the face. “I won’t listen to this! Not again! You won’t do this to me again!”
The truck swerved as her arm knocked against mine, and as I corrected it to keep up from driving off a fucking mountain, I raised my voice to grab both of their attention. “Get your sister under control now before I kill all three of us by wrecking!”
On one hand, I was still in shock to see Sedra alive. On the other, I was in shock that this son of a bitch seemed to agree with me about his sister and was going along with what I wanted. And if I’d had a third hand on which I could balance some emotion, it would be gratitude to discover that I wasn’t alone in the realization that Elijah had become a fucking monster.
Poor Joshua had to practically pull his sister onto his lap to keep her from knocking me out with her flailing hands, but eventually he got her under control and was holding her in place with his arms wrapped around her.
“Listen to me, Sedra. Elijah is not who you think he is. That man over there, the one driving the truck is not Elijah. His name is Jacob Hayle. He was the priest for the parish before Elijah made him believe you were dead and chased him off. Elijah let his own brother fuck you just to get what he wanted, so I’m sorry, sister, but you’re not as pure as you think you are. This entire thing has been a game so that Elijah could take over control of the parish without the townspeople knowing.”
Sedra’s eyes flicked to me, the green orbs rounding with recognition before the brainwashing and lies slipped in to make her scream again. It wouldn’t be easy to convince her of the truth, but that couldn’t be my problem. I was here for one reason only and that was to stop whatever games my brother was playing from ruining the town and destroying the lives of the parishioners I’d spent years trying to help.
I knew my brother was insane, and after learning about what happened to him when we were young, I understood why. But that didn’t mean I could feel pity for him and allow him to destroy other innocent lives. Hating the thought of having to harm him in order to get him the help he needed, I was willing to do whatever it took to ensure more people weren’t hurt because of whatever end it was he was trying to achieve. There were better ways to handle what happened. And going on killing people and making them believe in evil wasn’t one of them.
“We need to get off the road,” Joshua screamed just to be heard over the voice of his sister. “She’s not going to stop flailing. We have to get her somewhere we can calm her down so she’ll listen.”