Rebels : The Complete Series Read online

  Taking a leap of faith, I explain to her that I want to make a break from The Regime, but first I need my weapons back. I need to play along for a few days to get my bearings while she figures out a way for us to lay low once I’m out and until The Leader stops looking for me.

  “How do I know I can trust you? What assurance do I have that this whole thing isn’t just a ploy to get your weapons back?” she asks angrily. “For all I know, you’re playing me to get information about who I work for.” I can see worry and sadness in her eyes. She’s worried about losing me and that makes me want to beat my chest because I can see how much she really cares for me.

  “You have my word. That’s all I can give you,” I reply. “Look, if I was truly The Regime’s bitch, I would have tied you up and ransacked your apartment already, looking for my weapons, and tortured you for names and places. You know that’s how they work.”

  “Then why haven’t you done that?”

  There’s a vulnerability in her voice, and I lean over our blanket picnic to give her a gentle kiss.

  “You know why.”

  I can’t say the words because she’s not ready to hear them from me yet. So instead, I kiss her again and attack her body. I push her down on the rug, spread open her legs with mine and sink my cock into her. I take off her goddam top for the last time. She giggles at how annoyed I am that she’s hidden from me.

  I fuck her hard on the floor and don’t hold back this time. The two of us know the consequences, and somehow neither of us is putting a stop to it. This is for keeps and we both know it. I am not a man of words, so I use my body to show her what I can’t yet say. It might be a little rough, but that’s how I feel about her.

  My body, mind, and soul want her, and only her. I can only hope that what I feel in my chest is the same for her. The look in her eyes is real and I’m thrown into a world of emotion I can’t even begin to understand.

  She cums for me while I rut on top of her like an animal, and I follow her over the edge. I’m wound too tight to hold back, and having her wrapped around me is pure heaven. She has shaken me to my core and I’ll never be the same again. She deserves a gentle lover, but she has me now so I’ll try my best to learn how to be tender.

  As I look into her eyes and brush the hair out of her face, one word flows through my mind. Love. Love always wins. The opposition has been saying this for decades. Our side laughed it off as bleeding heart nonsense, but here I am. This is powerful, and the Regime underestimates what love can do.

  We lie around for hours making love. In the morning, I watch her sleep one last time before I leave to report to the office. Sylvia returned my guns to me and we agreed to make everything look legit. I would say I killed her and that her body was taken away by The Insurgence. After that, we came up with my escape plan.

  All of that seemed clear last night, but as I watch her sleep I worry about what will happen when I’m not beside her.

  After I get dressed, I scribble a note and place it next to her on the mattress.

  Before I leave to report to The Leader, I whisper, “My Sylvia.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Sylvia

  The next day is pure torture.

  So is the day after that.

  Brad and I have a connection, I know it deep in my soul. But I haven’t heard anything and I’m getting worried. I sit in my apartment, staring at the wall, reading books and listening to music. Bo and I sit, waiting.

  The waiting causes paranoid scenarios to play out in my head. He could be dead. They could have followed him here and somehow recorded him fraternizing with the enemy, and shot him on sight. The thought makes me want to vomit and curl into a ball and cry.

  He could have been shipped off to some remote assignment, unable to contact me. At least I know it’s not that the sex meant nothing to him or that he used me to get his weapons back and get a good lay in the process. The reassuring note he left me quelled any anxiety I might have had about that. Still, I’ve spent a good two days mulling and picking apart every other scenario until nothing makes sense.

  I look at the note, now crumpled and sweaty in my hand.

  Sylvia,

  I love you.

  I’m not good at talking about this out loud, but maybe you can help me figure that out.

  Yours soon,

  Brad

  I left the building after checking my mailbox. I didn’t feel like eating or completing any assignments at that moment. I just wanted to walk with my dog and keep replaying over and over again in my mind the time I had with Brad.

  I scan my fake pass and cross into the government district, where there are sure to be closed circuit cameras picking up my moves.

  At one of the city’s busiest intersections, at an outdoor cafe, I look up and see Brad. Sitting across from him is a female. She’s tall, pale skinned, with long straight hair. She’s clean, styled, and dressed in an outfit by a designer I am sure I cannot pronounce. My stomach turns sour and I want to throw up.

  She’s saying something and he’s laughing. Suddenly he drops something from the table. He reaches down to get it, and that’s when I notice he’s messing with her purse. She doesn’t see him do it because she’s too busy laughing like an idiot.

  I take half a second to think, then I pounce.

  Chapter Twelve

  Brad

  Naomi seems like a sweet girl. Tall, conservatively dressed, smart, loyal to the Regime’s cause.

  The Leader had personally introduced the two of us in his office two days ago. When The Leader’s personal assistant announces your entry into the Oval, in front of some of the empire’s most powerful oligarchs, you had better play the part.

  “Chalmers! I’d like to introduce you to Naomi, recent graduate of the Ladies University. She sings, she cleans, cooks, dances, has an excellent bill of health, has been checked over by a doctor who says her plumbing is all ready for babies, and, to boot, she has solid bone structure for natural births…”

  The Leader prattled on and on as I scanned Naomi’s face. She had no reaction whatsoever to being described like a horse at an auction. In fact, she seemed flattered. Three days ago I might have found this whole scene totally benign. Normal even. But now, watching this powerless yet educated woman stand there and take this treatment made me sick. I wanted to shake her. Tell her to wake up.

  “I can’t have my chief of staff skulking around without a wife any longer. It’s time you meet a girl and get serious. And Naomi is at the top of the list.”

  That was only a few days ago, and today is Sunday. Naomi and I are having brunch together in the state museum district at the only outdoor cafe in the city.

  I’m polite, a result of my impeccable upbringing. She’s perfectly suitable for me, on the outside. Naomi talks about her travels abroad with her well-to-do family, her studies of political science, and the names of all her animals. She’s wearing a modern skirt and jacket by a designer friend of hers, a name I’ve never heard of nor would ever care about. The same designer who had done her handbag, which rests under the table between our feet. And yet, if I were to marry this woman, which seems to be the trajectory, I would no doubt be hearing about fashion for the rest of my life. Knowing that people like Sylvia would never have access to such fine things makes anger burn deep inside me.

  God, I fucking miss her and I fucking hate that I can no longer smell her on me. It’s driving me crazy and I feel like I’m on edge.

  I’m nervous, but I have to do more than listen and watch my surroundings. I have to play the part as well. As a well-bred female, Naomi asks the right questions and tailors her reactions to my responses to build up my ego. As I speak about my family’s businesses, government contracts, and my ascent to the high office, she listens intently, acts surprised when appropriate, and smiles through the entire conversation.

  Even when I clumsily drop my fork and reach under the table to get it, then refuse the server’s offer of a new fork with a flourish of exaggerated machismo about no
t being afraid of street germs, she laughs in an annoying kind of way. Any other man would be thrilled with this kind of attention, and she probably deserves better. All I want is to get the fuck out of here and back to Sylvia. I need to get my eyes on her to cool the beast that is trying to escape inside me with the need to make sure she’s okay.

  And then, when I least expect it, when I’m just nodding along to some boring story about her first horse, there’s a flash of dark brown, and Naomi’s extravagantly expensive handbag is snatched away.

  Oh shit. Here we go.

  I jump up so fast my chair clatters to the ground behind me. I run after Sylvia as fast as I can, but she’s got a head start.

  “Brad, it’s okay. Just let her go! I can have the bag and everything in it replaced in five minutes!” Naomi calls after me, but I ignore her.

  I keep running. What kind of a man would I be if I didn’t run after my date’s purse snatcher? As I round the corner after Sylvia, I can hear Naomi’s voice one last time. “It’s not worth all this!”

  But that’s where she’s wrong. Sylvia’s worth all of this. She’s worth the busted nose, the headaches, and all the trouble she’s caused me since the moment we met. I’m not going to let her out of my sight ever again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sylvia

  I run hard and lead Brad out to the docks, where it’s quiet on a Sunday morning. The sun is high behind the smoke-filled clouds.

  Stopping behind an empty cargo container, I hide and go over the plan. As I hear Brad’s feet approach the water’s edge and pull Brad’s handgun out of the woman’s purse. I focus on my breathing, trying to calm my nerves. Then I turn around the corner of the container and reveal myself.

  Hardly able to breathe, I point a gun at the chest of my one true love and hope for the best. He raises his hands in the air, and I squeeze the trigger.

  The gun fires, and Brad collapses in a heap. It’s then I realize I missed his chest and shot him in the head. He rolls onto his side and drops off the edge of the dock into the water.

  I open my mouth to scream, but no sound comes out. I want to die. I run to the water’s edge but I can’t see him in the murky, choppy sea. Not knowing how to swim, and having nobody to call for help, I stand there in a shocked panic.

  Finally I snap out of it. I have to get out of here. That’s what Brad would want. He wouldn’t want me to get caught and hanged for the murder of a high-ranking government official. He would want me to keep fighting. Even if I had accidentally shot him in the head.

  I drop the gun and the bag, then run like hell.

  The closed circuit cameras at the docks will tell the story. Brad died a hero trying to go after a common thief. If there wasn’t a feed from the cameras, they would find his gun and her handbag. They would find that a bullet had been fired, and they could deduce what had happened. Either way, he was gone and had died in the line of duty.

  As for me, I would have to go into hiding. Hopefully the Insurgence valued me enough to help with hiding me until the government investigation.

  It’s a stupid idea, but I run straight to my apartment. I want to collect my things. I don’t have much, but my possessions are valuable to me. I thoughtlessly check my mailbox on the way to the stairs. There’s a note with instructions. They’d seen the killing already. The Insurgence is moving fast and they’re going to help me. That’s a small comfort, but it’s better than nothing. I’ll wait until I’m in hiding before I fall apart. Right this moment I can’t think about what I just did and how I’ve lost Brad forever.

  When I get to my apartment door, it’s locked up tight. Another small comfort—no evidence that anyone has yet come looking for me.

  But as soon as I unlock the door, a hand reaches out and grabs my wrist, pulling me inside. I yelp when I see him, then begin to cry.

  It’s Brad. Soaking wet, stripped down to his bulletproof vest and jeans. There are no entry holes from any bullets in the vest. But there’s a red slash at his hairline. The bullet had only grazed him. Holy shit.

  “You’re alive!”

  “Yeah. No thanks to you,” he says, scooping me up in his arms and kissing me until I can’t breathe.

  “I’m so sorry!” I finally say when he lets me up for air.

  I begin to shake. Everything I bottled up in the last 20 minutes is bubbling to the surface. I pretended to kill my lover, then really did think I’d done it, and now he’s back from the dead. I might be going into shock.

  He holds me close and kisses me again. “Hey, shhh. It’s okay. I’m okay.”

  I calm down as his arms tighten around me and I realize I didn’t lose him. I thought I’d lost him. That I’d never be whole again.

  “I love you, Sylvia. I’m never leaving you again.”

  His smell and taste are filling my lungs and peace comes over me. “I love you, too,” I say, snuggling close to him. “We have to go into hiding.”

  “If hiding has you in it, then I’m ready.”

  I smile as he kisses me again. I think we’re going to be okay.

  Epilogue

  Brad

  Four years later…

  I lean up against the doorframe watching Sylvia move about the room organizing her books and putting them back on the shelves in the school. My eyes go to her hips, which are a little fuller now. I make sure to keep her well fed. I would never let her go without, no matter what I had to do.

  I see two books sitting on her desk and I know they are coming home with us tonight. This is something she often does. She can’t seem to stop touching the books. Whenever people find new ones and bring them back to the school, they are always so excited to show her what they found. I would get jealous of the books, but those are some of the same books she reads to our daughter and me at night when we lie down for bed, one of my favorite parts of the day.

  She glances over her shoulder at me. “You going to join the rest of us outside?” I ask her. She smiles at me before putting the last book back on the shelf. The school day is over but some parents can’t come get their kids right away so a lot of us play outside in the playground until all the parents come to collect their children. All the teachers take turns staying after, but usually most of them stay. We just aren’t teachers here, we are leaders and the support system that help hold our community together. We all work together.

  Sylvia and I are both teachers here at the school. The children learn math, reading, science and actual facts of history. Along with sustainable gardening, they also learn how to build safe places for us to live and plan out our cities. Our community is growing and pulling together and we all know the heart of it must be our children.

  We knew this when we wanted to make a change for The Insurgence. We stopped going after The Regime and started focusing more on ourselves. The only time we mess with the Regime is when they try to come to our side. Then we rob them blind. It helps to keep them thinking we are worthless savages.

  They think their side of the wall is better, but they couldn’t be more wrong. We’re free here. There are no stupid laws and regulations. We live in peace together, helping one another. I’ve never felt more alive in my life. I had no idea of the bonds that had been wrapped around me until Sylvia set me free.

  I stride into the room. I can’t stand any distance between us. I pick her up and she wraps around me as I take her mouth in a deep, hungry kiss. She rubs against me.

  “Don’t get all worked up,” she teases before biting my lip and letting go. I growl, knowing I won’t get to be inside her until late tonight after we put our daughter to bed. I grunt and put her back into her feet. I steal one more kiss, but it doesn’t help the lust I’m feeling right now. It hasn’t lessened over the years and I don’t think it ever will.

  “Sir.” I turn my head to see Ryan standing in the doorway. He’s young, but he’s one of my best men. I run a small group of men who make sure everyone in our little community is kept safe. I’m going to have to get more men because each day more people re
quest to join our group. People come from all over when they hear what we are doing and we turn no one away. “I think they have finally given up,” he tells me, smiling. I nod.

  The Regime still tries to sneak in and put up hidden cameras from time to time, but we always find them. We have even caught a few of the men who have tried to install them before.

  We held them for a few days then tried to send them back, but they often didn’t want to leave. I don’t blame them. Life is so different on this side. It’s almost like going from black and white to color. Who would want to go back to that?

  “Good job,” I tell him. He smiles, happy with my appraisal.

  “I’m going to train some of the teens,” Ryan says, then takes off and heads toward the playground with the rest of the kids. Our school houses all the grades, but we are going to have to look into a second soon. I’m still not sure how we will divide it up, but we’ll get there soon enough.

  “We better get out there. I told Jamie I’d help her finish building the birdhouse.” I grab my wife’s hand, and she picks up the two books off the table before I lead her outside and over to Jamie. She sits down and watches us.

  A few of the kids run up to sit next to her when they see she has a book in her hand and she starts to read aloud. More kids gather around to listen to her. I don’t blame them. I could listen to her speak for hours. Though tonight I’m going to have her making a different sound for me for hours. I study her for a moment, transfixed just like the kids.

  “Dad.” I glance back to our daughter who is waiting for me. Her hand is on her hip and she’s giving me the same look her mom does when she is waiting for me to do something.

  “Measure twice, cut once,” I tell her. Our little girl, Jamie, is a mix of us. Sandy-brown curls, a pale face with deep brown eyes and a sparkle for learning like you wouldn’t believe. She loves building things more than anything, and I love showing her how to build and make things. I want to raise a practical and resourceful girl, and by the looks of it I’m succeeding.