Michael Ch. 19

"Just tell me what's going on!" insisted Gabrielle.

Anguish creased Michelle's face, then resignation. "Max and I had a disagreement. I had to protect you. That's all." Tilly appeared on the stairs with the bags, watching closely.

"Why? Is it this nipple ring business? I'm not stupid, Michelle. The atmosphere was odd when I mentioned what was inside. Whose hair was it, and what do you mean to protect me?"

"It belongs to Jan Brody." This was partly true.

"So? You looked after her, admired her, so why the big deal over the momento?"

"It's sort of--complicated."

An odd spasm pulled at Gabrielle's face, her eyes drawn to the half-closed kitchen door, the dread heavy in her stomach. "No, no, no!" She recoiled from Michelle, tears beginning to fall. "Not this, not again! I can't, Michelle, I really can't--" a gulping cry as Michelle took her in her arms.

"I know, I know." Michelle kissed the top of Gabrielle's head.

"I just can't--" Gabrielle raised her head. The certainty that this was the end hit her hard, overwhelming her. She could see the love and pain in Michelle's eyes and the demons that drove her. "I have to go," whispered Gabrielle.

Trembling, Michelle closed her eyes. "Take the car, I won't stop you. I meant what I said. I will never harm you."

"And I will never betray you, I love you too much for that."

Michelle couldn't say anything. She pressed her lips against Gabrielle's and turned away. For the third time in her life, she was losing someone she loved.

****

Amanda ducked into the car to avoid the splatter of rain. Sammie was slumped beside her in the passenger seat. Amanda reached out and squeezed Sammie's hand. This time there was a flicker of response.

"I am not in the business of questioning Michelle Leason," said the woman who had helped Sammie into the car. "Ms Leason broke her, but she'll recover," the woman added before turning away.

The thunder crashed, and the heavens opened as Amanda stared out of the obscured window. The police raid, the search of her apartment--talk of ritual murders? And now Sammie, beside her like a crumpled marionette. Is this what her life had become? This madness? Was she just a walk-on part in her mother's psychotic drama?

Amanda gripped the wheel, the tears beginning to flow as readily as the rain on the windscreen. A revulsion seized her body. Acid bile choking her. Hastily, Amanda scrabbled for the car door and vomited dark poison into the running waters streaming down the pavement.

****

The heavens reached Michelle as she watched the lights of Gabrielle's car recede. Raging fury laced with grief gripped her as she stood oblivious to the weather. The wind whipping around her.

Tilly pushed the bags into the car borrowed from the farm owners. She had seen Max's sprawled figure as the Syrian couple dragged his body away. Fear was Tilly's prominent emotion. Fear, in many ways, had been the backdrop of her life since the return of Miss M that fateful day. Fear that one day she would suffer the same fate as so many others at the hands of her Mistress.

The rain obscured Michelle as Tilly hurried over to her.

"We have to go!" Tilly tugged on Michelle's arm. The pain was sharp and immediate. Stunned, Tilly collapsed to the ground, the wet grass soaking through her dress. The pounding in her head from the blow disorientating her. "Mistress?" she croaked.

A weight descended on Tilly, a knee in her chest. Her breathing became difficult, then impossible, an iron band circling her neck. Tilly stared into the eyes of her Mistress. Eyes that were nothing but black pits in the fading light and falling rain. A stab of lightning illuminating the monster that ruled her.

Panicking, Tilly began to struggle but knew it was useless. The panic ebbed away to be replaced by an acceptance, a calmness. Death was at hand. A death that she had long foreseen.

Tilly was finally at peace.

The End.