Page 58 of Keeping Lilith

“I know you don’t like the look of this place. I don’t like it either. But my Voice assured me that you would do what is expected, and ensure that it’s livable and looks appropriate for the leader that I am. Of course, everything you do will have to be approved by me.”

He spoke as if it was a forgone conclusion that she was going to be there long enough to renovate. Her hope was to be away from this place in a couple of hours, but she was prepared to be there for a few days, at the most. All she had to do was make sure that Micah kept his hands to himself. “Do you have any ideas?” she asked meekly, immediately assuming the role of a docile follower.

“Plenty, but first you will prepare me some food. I have a lot of planning to do. The first lot of candidates to join us will be arriving tomorrow. I need people to build my dream.”

God, was there a way she could warn those people to run as far away from this place as possible? Probably not, but again, maybe when they turned up tomorrow, there would be people there to redirect the innocent souls back to their homes.Although the people that Micah had enticed to this place were probably desperate for a new change. Or didn’t have a home to return to. Would the authorities help them? She didn’t know, but she would ask Julian if he could do something.

Julian.

She hadn’t allowed herself to think too much about the man who’d come to mean so much to her. No, that wasn’t right. She loved him. Loved him with everything she had, and it had been reinforced when she’d been swept into the car, and the fear of never seeing him again seemed to outweigh the fear of her being kidnapped.

Would she get the chance to tell him how she felt?

She assumed the tracker was working, but what if the battery had died? Then again, she had no idea if it even had a battery. She didn’t know how it worked, only that it did.

“Do not ignore me! You are mine to control. You don’t think for yourself.” Micah’s harsh words pulled her from her thoughts, and she looked at the man who’d spoken them. His eyes were wide, and he looked manic. It was on the tip of her tongue to yell at him. To lash out and tell him he was delusional if he ever thought she would obey him, but she controlled herself. Keep him believing he controlled her, all the while looking for a way to escape.

“I’m sorry. I wasn’t ignoring you. I was thinking about what I could cook.” Lilith kept her eyes downcast, because if Micah saw them, he wouldn’t see an amenable person, but someone who was far from happy to be there. Perhaps she could act as well as Stella.

“The only way to cook is to get to the kitchen, not stand in the middle of this room. Now go. I want to eat in an hour. And then after Richard has performed the ceremony. . .” Micah trailed a finger down her arm and how she held in her shudder of revulsion she’ll never know, but she did. “We shall become one.”

Lilith kept her lips firmly shut. There was no point in agreeing or disagreeing. Micah would punish her if she responded. The only times she could speak were when spoken to, or when he hit her, and then she had to apologize for whatever slight he believed had occurred.

Except this time, she would have to speak, because she couldn’t cook with her hands bound. Through their short conversation, he hadn’t made a move to release the binds. “Micah,” she said his name softly and held out her hands.

It appeared as if he was going to admonish her, but then he saw her hands and sighed. “You needn’t worry. Stella will be punished for her insolence. She will learn her place,” he said as he untied the rope.

She may not like the other woman, but the punishment that Micah was referring to would be anything but pleasant for Stella.

Without the restriction, blood rushed to her fingertips, and a thousand pins pricked her skin. She shook them, hoping to alleviate the sensation, but it only seemed to make it worse. But she wouldn’t complain. Nothing good would come of that if she did.

Once the tingling had died down, she made her way to the kitchen. There was a basic oven. The fridge looked as if it was a holdover from the 1950s, and there wasn’t a dishwasher in sight—which didn’t surprise her. The cabinets were nothing pretty to look at. The dark wood was serviceable, and upon inspection, showed a sparse collection of crockery that looked as if it needed a good wash.

How long had it been since someone had lived in this house? Years and years by the looks of things. Not that she’d ask Micah, but she had to wonder how he could afford this place. Unless he’d done something to the owner and taken it over.

“Don’t think about that,” she whispered to herself. It was far better not knowing. “Just get through this. Help will be here soon.”

She had to believe it. Had to believe that soon all this would be over because if it wasn’t, she didn’t think she’d survive living in another cult. Even if it looked as if she would be Micah’s favorite. A thought she didn’t like at all.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

The rotorsof the helicopter propelled Julian and the team through the night. Once they’d determined that it was indeed Micah who’d taken Lilith, he’d been wanting to get in the air.

Through the tracker, Cass was able to get an exact location on Lilith and found that the property had recently been purchased by Micah Livingstone. She’d also traced back the origins of the job advert, and it was placed from a computer recently purchased by Micah.

Somehow, the man had got his hands on an inordinately large amount of cash to enable all these transactions to be made. Cass would get to the bottom of it, but that was the least of Julian’s concerns. The longer Lilith was with Micah, the more dangerous it would be for her.

Normally, Julian had time to do some background research on the cult and the people who ran them. With his background of growing up in one, he usually had an idea of how the leaders thought, and what they believed themselves to be. How they operated. Most of the time, they were all similar, but Micah was an unknown quantity, because he hadn’t been on anyone’s radar. Cass was doing everything she could to find out about him. What his motivations were, but there just wasn’t enoughtime to nail it all down. They were going into this blind, but he trusted the men in the helicopter with him. Knew that they wouldn’t do anything that would endanger Lilith.

The tracker was still showing her at the property, so Julian had to hope they hadn’t taken the necklace off her and moved her somewhere else. Most cult leaders delighted in taking every possession, personal or otherwise, from the people they recruited in a show of power, disguised as a generous contribution to the success of the organization. As a way of thanking the followers for believing in them and their ultimate goal.

“We’ll be landing in five. We’ll be two miles out and making the rest of the way on foot. Even going into silent mode, it’s so quiet out here, and we don’t want to risk our presence being noticed.” Ox’s voice sounded in his ear, and he nodded along with the rest of the guys.

Julian understood why they couldn’t land next to the house, but he wished that they could. His fingers curled into a fist and he tapped it on his knee, the need to get on the ground and get running overwhelming him. He had to play it cool. Had to keep his impulses controlled so nothing happened to Lilith.

The copter landed with a gentle bump. In seconds, he had his safety harness off and was out of the machine.

“We all know what we have to do.” Ox directed a look at the group of men. “Julian, you’re with me. Fox and Deal are in the lead, and once they get to the house, they’ll tell us what to expect. Remember, we get Lilith and subdue the men in time for the Feds to come and deal with them.”