Kidnapped

Chap.21

"As I was saying, it all started way before either of us was born. It started on the day that my father was born..."

"What does this have to do with your dad?"

"Just listen, please. Or else I won't tell you, and you can just forget that I was going to tell you something, got it? Good. Now let me continue. My dad has always been a little different from everyone around him, or so my aunt says. He had gone to school with my mom and they got married right out of High School and had three boys and two girls. I was one of the older ones and well he never really liked me, my dad that is. My dad's dad owned a business, the very one that my father and his dear friend took over after my grandfather died. This business has been around since it was founded at the time when my creepy grandfather was in his mid-twenties. He, alongside his friend and father of my father's friend started the business. I can't really call it a business, but that was what they referred to it when the kids were around. I've always known that my older brother and his best friend would take over the business. This probably makes no sense but it will in a few minutes...I hope. When I was fourteen I witnessed something that almost killed me, my father was talking to his business partner on the phone and I over-heard him say something about a room number and a girl and meeting him somewhere at four in the morning...I followed him. There was a van and they drove deep into the woods, they drove up to a building and...they pulled a girl out of the back of the van. This freaked me out, mostly because the girl had been on the news, she had been the third kidnapping of that month. I saw my father...umm...he sexually assaulted her and all the other men around him took their turn as well. I almost threw up. I stumbled back to my house and packed my things and made it look like I was killed...I don't know if they believed it but I was never found...until I was brought here. I thought that they knew, I thought that was why I was taken, but that meeting, if you could call it that, told me otherwise," Sky stopped talking and looked up at Mason, all she saw was confusion.

"So you do know him?" was all he said.

"Yes I do. He is my brother's business partner, Sam. He and Blake most likely took over the business or they are in the process of doing so."

"What? Ok I am majorly confused, what is their business exactly?"

"Well, it's...umm, it's called the Volcano Vegetation, grown locally and hand picked."

"What? How is that a business?"

"You aren't making the connections! We are his business! We the kidnapped children grow and harvest his goods and we even make clothes for him to sell! My grandfather started this so he wouldn't have to pay his workers and they would work everyday! You know he got the idea from his ancestors, the slaves that picked cotton; my family was one of the biggest plantations around these parts. Mase? You Okay?" Sky asked softly reaching out to him. He shrugged her off and scooted away.

"Don't, just don't get close to me. You're related to these people, you knew and just ran away instead of going to the police with what you knew! I wouldn't be here if you had! I would have graduated with my class and I would be in university right now!" Mason's voice rose, which made Sky flinch slightly.

"I was scared and didn't think that I could trust anyone, do you really think they would have believed me! Why would I say something like that about The Greg Thompson, oh he could do no harm! He is the representative of the town; he is the nicest man to ever walk this earth! No Mase, I could never have gone to the police with this. They would have just brought me back to my family and told them to keep an eye on me. And what do you think my lovable father would have done with me? Most likely thrown me in here at the age of fourteen!" Sky broke down and started to cry, she was worn out from work and her third pregnancy and most of all, the secret was weighing her down. She felt a little lighter after this long confession except that now Mason hated her for whom her family is and who she was before her aunt. "Please don't hate me. I can't help who my family is or was. They haven't been my family since I went to live with my aunt. Please! Mase, Thompson isn't even my last name anymore! It's Lovegrave and it has been since..."

"Since your aunt, I get it! But that doesn't mean you aren't like them. How do I know that you don't communicate with them and tell them...stuff." Mason cut her off and snapped the last comment at her. She swallowed heavily and wiped her tears away with the back of her dirty sleeve.

"How could I? I've been working or here with you! I haven't seen my family in almost seven years! And I don't ever want to see them again! I know how it is in this place! Do you really think that I would go and talk to them after all this! After what happened to me or you!"

"It is very much possible, you could have faked it, or even enjoyed it, oh wait you did! You probably even knew that we would be taken! You probably wanted me! So you told your creep of a father to kidnap me so you could have a little fun!" his words cut her deeply. She had no idea how she could convince him that she hated her family, no! They are no longer your family! Correction, she hated them! Those people that ripped her from the only place she knew that she could have bee happy, with the only people that she could trust.

"How could you?!" was all she whispered in a broken voice. With tears streaming freely down her face she left the kitchen and entered the twins' room. She sat down into one of the chairs and watched them sleep. Their new life so innocent and beautiful. Born into this harsh world and placed into a home where their father will most likely hate them for the rest of their puny lives. Sky couldn't even think about their future and what it'll bring.

"Fuck! Where is the damned liquor when you need it!" Mason yelled from the kitchen. This comment saddened Sky, she could remember when alcohol was Mason's water, and she remembered how he would party all night almost every night and how he would sometimes get to school with a major hangover.

She wished she could drown her miserable life with a bottle and forget everything around her; the sweet oblivion it would grant her for a short time.

Sky fell asleep in the chair and was woken up by the babies crying for food. She got up and sang softly to them a slow lullaby that her mother used to sing to her little sister Cora. After they were fed and had fallen asleep, she set them down into their crib. Sky went to the room she shared with Mason, she found him sitting on the bed his head in his hands, he was shaking slightly and she knew that he was crying. She wanted to comfort him but knew that he wanted to be alone, so she went back to the twins knowing they wouldn't yell at her and cuss her out.

Tomorrow she would get the rest of her children from Lucy and maybe she will have some advise for Sky.