Redemption (Enigma Black Trilogy Book #3) (33 page)

“Okay.”

“Hey,” he said. I turned my attention away from the doorway to face him. “It’s going to be okay. You’ll see her again.” He wrapped his arms around me, pulling me toward his body. “We’re going to be okay.” I held onto him tighter and wondered whether he believed his words. “We’re going to be okay.”

With our mission clear, we walked out of the warehouse to face our destinies and the man responsible for them.

In a line spanning the width of the roadway, they marched. Side-by-side in lines of ten, they strode in well-executed unison, their footfalls creating an ominous thundering sound each time their feet struck the ground. With weapons at the ready, they knew that any hope of reasoning had long since been lost. At each designated point, their numbers grew when they were joined by additional rebels, both those left over from the attack on the address, and those who had trickled into the city over the last couple of weeks. Even more of them would meet them at their final rendezvous point in the heart of the Capitol. But despite their growing numbers, they were going to be grossly outmanned and, more importantly, outgunned by the soldiers, but, still, they pressed on.

From her position in the front line, Jill couldn’t help but notice the curtains hastily drawn in the homes and apartments of those too afraid to stand up and fight, yet curious enough to watch from the safety of their homes. To them, wars were better fought by the hands of others. Survival meant keeping your mouth shut and your convictions to yourself.

While they trudged down the street, the most peculiar thing she noticed was the lack of soldiers along the roadway. By now, they had traveled a mile from the warehouse, and on all accounts, they should have encountered at least a few groups patrolling the street. Concern crept into Jill’s head as she tried to reason with herself why they had not run into any of them yet and what that could possibly mean.

Next to her, Aron marched with more confidence than she’d ever seen him project before. When they had originally formed the lines back at the warehouse, she had been the first person to volunteer for the front line and had been shocked when he’d volunteered right after her, making it a point to insert himself in line next to her. Now, as she marched next to him to the uncertain future that awaited them all, she couldn’t help but smile to herself. He’d never been one for great timing when they had been a couple, and that was apparently still the case.

The closer they came to their target destination, the more Jill noticed that the landscape around them began to change. Instead of ramshackle homes and the hollowed-out shells of dead businesses, they were entering an area of prosperity. A land where lawns were well-manicured; where the paint on each of the homes and other structures still seemed fresh; where people still dared to venture out onto the streets, and where the presence of electricity seemed to be a right instead of a luxury. Taken aback, she couldn’t help but observe every detail of her surroundings as its inhabitants scurried back into their homes.

“They’re Brooks’ supporters,” Aron said, wagering a guess. “I bet everyone on this side of town either works for him, has narked their own brother out to him, or knows enough to still be useful to him in some way.”

Jill nodded her agreement, angered by the unfairness of it all. “I’ll bet none of these people have ever lost anyone in their lives,” she said.

“No, they’ve lost more than the rest of us,” Aron said. Jill turned her head, her eyebrow raised up in confusion. “They lost their souls when they made their deal with the devil, and they will have to pay the consequences of their decisions eventually.”

They rounded the block of the next street over, coming to an immediate halt at the sight of the barrier placed before them several hundred feet away. Amassed in front of them stood a line of soldiers, spanning the width of the street and traveling down the road as far as their eyes could see. In front of the group, a lone figure stood out as the one who’d been designated as their commander, his helmet and distinctly superior armor setting him apart from the rest. Of the entire group before them, he was the only one still capable of thinking for himself.

Jill reached for Aron’s hand, which he took and kept firmly in his grasp, neither of them having to look at the other to understand what was going through their minds at that moment.

“Are you getting this, John?” Nicholas asked.

“The camera is recording it,” John answered. “Let’s just hope the live feed is going through and that we get decent footage for them to use.”

“How did they know we’d be here?” Gage asked.

“Brooks must have been tipped off by someone,” Nicholas answered him.

Both groups stood their ground, facing each other. The rebels knew that their chances were slim; the soldiers knew that their mission was to kill at all costs.

“We don’t have to fight each other,” Nicholas said, matter-of-factly. “I know that you can’t hear what I’m saying, that your minds are being manipulated by President Brooks without your knowledge. But if there are any of you who can understand what I’m saying right now, our war is not with you. We don’t want to harm any of you. All we want is a fair shot at Brooks. We want our lives back. We want our country back to where it was before.”

“Don’t listen to him,” their leader commanded. “The rebels are trying to cloud your thoughts with falsities. They are the enemy. They are the reason for the death and destruction that’s occurring around our country, and they must be brought to justice.”

“The only person responsible for the chaos across our land is President Brooks. He is the one clouding the minds of others by exploiting their fear through the creation of The Man in Black.”

“Lies!” the commander yelled, turning around to address his soldiers. “Do you hear the blatant misrepresentations these people are willing to project to the world? This is why they’re dangerous and must be stopped before they have a chance to poison the minds of our people. That is why, at this very moment, their leader faces execution.”

“Marshall,” Jill whispered, blinking her eyes to control the tears from falling.

A deafening roar of approval echoed from the group of soldiers, further energizing their commander. “The vocalization of lies against our commander-in-chief in such a callous manner is nothing short of treason,” he said, walking back and forth in front of the first line of soldiers. “And what is the punishment for treason?”

“Death.” Their robotic-like voices resounded coldly across the roadway, turning the blood in Jill’s veins to ice water.

Their commander stopped in his tracks, centered squarely in front of the pack. “Death,” he repeated. Without so much as a second thought, he turned toward the rebels and fired.

Jill and the rest of the front row instinctively hit the ground the moment the gun went off. On the ground, Jill picked out the remnants of asphalt that had embedded itself in her hands, sighing in relief that she was still alive and breathing. Beside her, Aron lifted his head, and she found herself flooded with relief. But as she moved her hand to push herself up, she found herself slipping back to the ground. Confused, her eyes drifted to her hand. Covered in blood that wasn’t her own, she followed the drops of blood that dripped from her hand to the pool in which it had slipped and found its source.

“Nicholas?” she asked, a sickness overcoming her. She rolled him over with her bloody hand. “Nicholas,” she said, the bile rising to her throat as she stared at the hole in the middle of his forehead.

“Son of a bitch.” Aron stood up with tears in his eyes.

Following suit, the others stood, facing the soldiers once more. After composing herself, Jill positioned herself just ahead of the front row and turned to face the others. “We all knew when we chose to join the rebellion that we may not make it home one day. Whether or not this is that day remains to be seen. But there is one thing we do know for sure, and that’s the fact that many brave men and women have died fighting for us and our cause already. They died bravely and selflessly so that we may have a chance for a new tomorrow, and I, for one, refuse to have let them die in vain. In Nicholas and Marshall’s memory, I implore you all to raise your arms and ready yourself, because our struggles end today, one way or another.”

Jill turned around and remained just a step ahead of the front line, where Aron joined her. “If we fight, we fight as a team,” he said, smiling at her.

The others from the front line joined them, echoing Aron’s sentiment. “For our lives back,” she said loud enough for the others to hear. “We fight.” As a collective group, the rebels ran toward the soldiers, who began their advance. Weapons raised, both sides took aim at each other and fired.

Chase stood in front of the full-length mirror in the men’s dressing room inside The Woodland Lodge dressed in his suit pants and dress shirt. Hanging in the portable wardrobe, still zipped in its protective casing, were his suit coat and pink vest. He eyed the wardrobe as his heart and his brain waged a war that would soon be forced to come to an end, one way or the other.

“You’ve been staring at yourself in that mirror for a while now. I know you’re killing it in your tux, but damn,” Trey said from behind him.

He turned toward a fully suited Trey, his face blank. “Pink’s a good color on you,” he said flatly.

“You know that’s not true,” Trey said. “Seriously, this has to be the pinkest pink I have ever seen in my life. It’s like Pepto-Bismol pink, dude. Except, instead of soothing my stomach, it’s making me want to throw up right now. I’ve made three trips to the bathroom already and I’ve only had it on for ten minutes.”

“Yeah,” Chase said, laughing half-heartedly. “It’s pretty pink.”

“Are you all right? You look like you’re going to be sick. Do you need me to grab a puke bucket for you or perform some other best man duty?”

“No, man. You’ve been great already.” He slumped down on his chair, placing his head in his hands as he gazed down at the floor.

“Okay, then, you may want to think about getting yourself dressed in the other half of your suit. There’s less than an hour left until the wedding starts.”

Without answering him, Chase remained staring at the individual white fibers that comprised the carpet at his feet. His father’s words from the night before resounded in his ears as though he were sitting next to him that very moment.
What’s horrible is seeing the light leave your eyes and taking theirs with it
.

Then there was the matter of the promise he’d made to Paul to take care of his daughter, to make her happy. Chase found the words of both men dueling with each other inside his brain, drowning out the one voice he needed to listen to. His own. What did he want? What about his light, his happiness? Had he given up on it too easily? Had he given up on her too easily?

“Yoo-hoo,” Trey said, whistling as he waved his hand in front of Chase’s face. “You’re really starting to worry me. What’s going on in your head?”

“Clarity,” he said, standing up. “A moment of clarity.”

“Care to elaborate?” Trey looked down at his vest. “It’s the vest, right? The pink is too much for you. It’s making you sick too, isn’t it?” He laughed.

“No, man.” He laughed as he stood up to walk to the door, stopping just short of turning the handle. “Go ahead and take the vest off,” he said, turning his head toward a confused Trey. “The wedding’s off.”

Jill fired, striking and mortally wounding one of the soldiers before they could fire and take her out first. She dove behind a car when more bullets flew in her direction, finding Brad, Drake and Aron also taking refuge behind its steel frame. Across the pavement, bodies, both soldier and rebel, lay lifeless, their blood staining the streets.

“There’s at least three of them for every one of us,” Brad said, peering around the car and getting a shot off before a bullet forced him to hastily retreat back behind the vehicle. It struck the mirror of the car before ricocheting off the pavement just inches away from his foot. “And our numbers are falling by the second. At this rate, we don’t stand a chance.”

“No shit, Sherlock,” Aron said, shooting at and missing a soldier when he ducked behind a dumpster. “We’re screwed. We all know it. Hell, we knew it going into this. Now, do you mind putting that brilliant mind to use and thinking of something we don’t all already know?”

Jill edged her way over behind the trunk of the car and fired, hitting a soldier as he advanced towards them. “Well, I’ve taken out four of them myself,” she said. “So I suggest you boys get with the program and start pulling your weight.”

“I’m sorry that I’m not so willing to kill or even wound the people I used to fight alongside,” Brad said.

“Do you think they’d hesitate to wound or kill you?” Jill asked, frustrated. “We’re at war. There’s no room for compassion here, so I suggest you just don’t look them in the eyes and pull the trigger.”

“You’re hot when you’re bossy,” Aron said. She rolled her eyes and returned to crawling behind the car to get a view of the other side.

In the street, Britta seemed to wander without purpose, her gun hanging limply by her side. Appearing to be in a trance, she grabbed the arm of one of the soldiers and spun her around.

“Has Britta gone completely insane?” Jill asked.

Confused, Brad stood to a crouch to look over the hood. “Oh, no,” he said, concerned. “I think that’s her sister.” Eyes wide, Jill raised her gun as she prepared herself for the inevitable.

“Brianna,” she said, pleading. “It’s Britta. Can you hear me, Brianna?” She took a couple of steps closer to her, raising her arm toward her.

“No, Britta. No,” Jill said with tears in her eyes.

“They have control of your mind, Brianna. Let me remove your helmet and you can come back to me. Please, Brianna, come back to me.” Britta lunged to remove the helmet from her sister’s head, but not before Brianna jolted to life, her hand tightening around the gun without so much of a hint of recognition evident on her face.