Joseph Fallen (The Estate Series) (14 page)

“It’s a risk worth taking!”

She jumped in response to his raised voice and shame
instantly appeared in his features when he looked down at her.
 
“I’m sorry.
 
I didn’t mean to…fuck!” Letting her go,
he walked away again and what was left of her already broken heart was crushed
into dust as she watched him struggle with their fate.

Quietly, purposefully, she suggested, “Let’s give it some
time.
 
You can figure out a way, a
plan that would help us leave, possibly someone who’d be willing to help.
 
However, leaving here tonight, with
nothing but anger and rage to shelter us, that would be suicide.
 
You have to agree with me on that,
Connor.
 
It’s the only reason we’ve
stayed as long as we have.”

He stopped pacing, but didn’t turn to look at her.
 
His eyes remained locked on the water
and the distant field that spread out before them.
 
“I will find a way Arianna, I don’t know
how long it will take, but I will find a way.”

Futility.
 
Hopelessness.
 
Impotence.
 
Those were the
only words to describe their life.
 
After the day by the stream, Connor worked quickly in an attempt to find
a way to not only escape the Estate, but to remain hidden after they’d
accomplished it.
 
However, barriers
and roadblocks were all he could find.
 
The Estate’s reach was far and deep.
 
Connor had to be careful regarding the
people he approached, and even when he could find a person who would not report
back to Joseph Carmichael, they refused from fear of being caught.
 
Had it just been Connor, the chances
would have been better, but as soon as it was mentioned that he intended on
taking Joseph’s wife with him, most people would refuse.

When Arianna’s symptoms were discovered by Joseph, he’d
immediately hired a midwife to assist her for the duration of the
pregnancy.
 
Connor and Arianna were
never left alone, and she was specifically restricted from leaving the mansion.
 
Security in the right wing was
heightened and Joseph’s appearances became more frequent.
 
The only blessing that could be gained
from the discovery that she was pregnant was that Joseph’s abuse stopped and
Arianna was not subjected to the degradation to which she’d become accustomed.

As Arianna grew larger, and when the baby inside her moved,
her love for that child grew with her expanding waistline, and she couldn’t
care which man had sired the child.
 
She spent more time in the music room, playing to the developing child
in her womb, wondering if she’d be given a son or daughter.
 
Over the months of her pregnancy, she’d
written a song for the child.
 
She’d
intended for the song to be happy, to express the love she had for the person
she’d someday meet, but the melody had come out sad and hauntingly beautiful
instead.
 
Secretly, she’d given the
music to Connor after it had been completed and he took it, had it transcribed
and penned under a fake name, returning it to her as a present for the child
that was to come.

“Push!”

Her legs spread wide, Arianna’s teeth clenched to the point
of fracturing while the midwife sat positioned to assist with the birth.
 
She’d been in labor for seven hours, had
writhed atop the blankets of her bed, while Joseph paced at the foot.
 
His presence sickened her, and although the
midwife had told him it would be hours until the child was born, he’d refused
to leave.
 
Playing the role of the
concerned husband, he made Arianna’s stomach turn.
 
Every touch, each caress, every offer of
assistance or comfort caused her to flinch away from the monster she knew was
hidden beneath the caring façade.

Bringing her knees up, bearing herself to the midwife, she
pushed down with her body, forcing the child out into the cold air of the
room.
 
Pain unlike anything she’d
known, tore through her center, made her feel like she was being ripped in two
as the child progressed downwards.

When the midwife announced that the child’s head could be
seen, Joseph stopped pacing and leaned against the opposite wall to watch as
the baby emerged.
 
Grey eyes alight
with anticipation, he smiled when the baby’s head was exposed, and his eyes
beamed when it was finally discovered that the child was a boy.

Falling back into the sweat soaked pillow, tears ran from
Arianna’s eyes at the announcement.
 
She was thankful she could hide the true reason for her tears beneath
the guise of pain.
 
When the baby
wailed, a small cry that spoke of life and health, Arianna silently apologized
to the child, and prayed for the future of a soul born into damnation.

After the boy had been cleaned, the midwife handed him to
Joseph swaddled in a small blue blanket.
 
The sight was unnerving; Joseph lovingly caressed the child’s head with
hands that had been used for torture and abuse.
 
The midwife stayed long enough to deliver
the final remnants of the pregnancy and to clean Arianna enough so that she
could comfortably lie back on the bed.
 
When they were finally left alone, Joseph approached her holding the
small child in his arms.

“He’s beautiful, Arianna, just as I always knew he would
be.”
 
Awestruck and proud, Joseph’s
tone of voice reminded her of who he’d been years before, the quality grating
against her nerves.
 
When he
approached, she peeked out from under her lashes to see a shock of black hair
on the child’s head.
 
Reaching down,
he placed the child in her arms, small sounds escaping from out of the blanket
he was wrapped within.
 
Tears
streaming down her cheeks, she reached over to carefully pull the blanket from
the child’s face, love becoming an inferno in her heart to look on the small
features that faced her.
 
She smiled
sadly.
 
The baby’s eyes were
clenched tight against the light in the room, but when they opened, Arianna’s
heart sank.
 
Staring back at her,
unfocused and newly born, were eyes the color of steel, shimmering silver that
confirmed without a doubt who had been his father.

“He has my eyes.”
 
Standing beside her, Joseph wrung one hand over the other as he stared
down at his son.
 
“What will we name
him?”

Surprised that he’d asked, Arianna looked up at the proud
father before returning her eyes to the child in her arms.
 
“I thought of some names during the
pregnancy.
 
I was thinking, if it
was a boy, we’d name him Aaron.”

“So similar to your name,” Joseph instantly noted.

“Yes.”
 
Her heart
shattered when she was sure Joseph would refuse the name.

“Aaron Joseph Carmichael,” he mused.
 
“It’s a strong name, proud, like his
father.
 
I’ll announce his birth
this afternoon.”

She looked up at him, partly relieved that he’d allow the
name she’d chosen, but mostly sickened by his presence in her room.
 
Looking over his once handsome face, she
noticed how he’d lost weight, how his skin had grown pallor from whatever it
was he did while in the west wing.
 
While she stared at Joseph, the child stirred, turning its head towards
her breast in search of milk.
 
Immediately, she opened her robe and offered her breast to the child,
wincing when he latched on, but delighting in the small suckling sounds he made
while he ate.

“I must leave now, Arianna.
 
Business never stops, even when a child
is born.”
 
Joseph’s heavy footsteps
sounded as he made his way to the bedroom door.
 
Stopping when he reached the door, he
refused to look in her direction when he said, “You’ve proven yourself useful
for once.
 
Perhaps this can be a new
beginning, now that you’ve learned to behave and to give me what I want.”

She didn’t respond, didn’t release the anger she felt at the
words he’d spoken.
 
Silence
permeated the air when he finally opened the door and disappeared into the
hallway.

. . .

“Tonight.”

One word, spoken softly so that only she could hear it.
 
Sitting at her piano, her eyes looked
across the room at the bassinet that cradled Aaron.
 
Almost every day she brought the child
into the music room, serenading him with the music she’d written for him.
 
She marveled at how he calmed
immediately to hear it.
 
Even on
days where he cried for no reason, desperately seeking sleep or comfort, but
not finding it, the music would always grant him peace.
 
She wondered if it had been due to her
playing when she’d been pregnant with him.
 
Regardless of the reason, Aaron loved to hear her play, would settle
immediately when the hammer of the piano fell upon its string and the first,
solitary note sounded.

Connor stood sentry behind her.
 
His back to the door, his hands folded
behind his back.
 
Due to the
increased activity in the right wing, he’d been excused from guarding her often
and he’d had more time to leave the property, to seek out help from those who’d
be willing to hide them from the ever-watchful eyes of Joseph.

She didn’t need to ask what he meant, although she’d hoped
that when he discovered to whom the child belonged, he would give up the
fantastical idea of ever escaping their hellish prison.
 
The stakes were higher now that Aaron
had been born.
 
If Connor’s
abduction of Joseph’s wife had been unimaginable, his ability to steal Joseph’s
son was unthinkable and impossible - the minute chance that Joseph would have
given up in his search for them was completely destroyed now that his son was
added to the equation.

“You’re insane, Connor.
 
There is no way.
 
I’ve begged
you before, and I continue to beg:
 
Please, if you love me, please leave.
 
Give up the idea that there is any
chance for us and save yourself.”

Spinning on the bench so that she could face him, Arianna
looked up into green eyes, resolute and determined in his belief that they had
any chance of escaping together.

“You must realize that he’ll never stop searching.
 
We’d live in hiding every day of our
life; in fear that someone will someday discover us and turn us in for reward
or merit.”

Refusing to listen to her, Connor demanded, “Pack things for
Aaron and yourself.
 
I’ve found
people who are willing to help; another network that Joseph all but destroyed
when The Estate was built.
 
They’re
small, but they won’t turn us in to him.
 
Their hatred runs as deep as ours.”

“So, we’ll be leaving one hell only to bury ourselves within
another.
 
What’s to keep them from
subjecting us to the same nightmare?”
 
Her blue eyes glistened in the low light of the room while she attempted
to introduce logic into the true helplessness of their situation.
 
“At least here, Aaron will not be
harmed.
 
Joseph cares too much for
an heir to allow anything to happen to him…”

“And what about you?”
 

His interruption annoyed her, knowing that his sudden
response indicated her words had failed to alter what he’d planned.

“That remains to be seen.
 
He’s found me useful as a mother to his
son, in the chain he’s attached to me now that we share a child.
 
He hasn’t started the abuse again in the
three months since Aaron’s been born.
 
Maybe…”

“That’s because he carries out his sick fantasies on the
women who service the west wing.
 
I’ve heard the men talking.
 
He’s killed, Arianna, he’s taken his tastes too far.
 
His constant drug use is pushing him to
do things no man would normally do.
 
There’s nothing keeping him from carrying out the same acts on
you.”
 
Twisting from disgust, Connor’s
expression darkened when he thought about the activities of the west wing.
 
“His men encourage him, act with him,
and the bodies of the whores are tossed aside, burned; nothing more than
garbage.”

Arianna wasn’t sure what bothered her more:
 
the fact that her husband had fallen so
far, or the fact that she wasn’t surprised to hear it.
 
Her eyes fell to the floor. “It’ll never
work, Connor.
 
We won’t
succeed.
 
Attempting it will be your
death.”

“You have to let me try.”

Bringing her eyes back to his, she smiled sweetly at him,
distraught over how unfair her life had turned out to be.
 
“Is there really a chance?
 
Not fantasy, not something that might
occur, but something that is almost certain?”

He nodded, anticipation gracing his features that he’d
convinced her to leave.

She knew she wouldn’t be able to stop him and it broke her heart
to think of what would occur if he failed.
 
“Fine.
 
I’ll pack a few
things tonight.
 
If he doesn’t show
up, we can try.”