"Rhett," Neva whispered.
Rhett hummed a query.
He had been staring at her, as she was lost in her thoughts with her eyes boring a hole through the white wall across.
Elk and Agent Knight had left thirty–five minutes ago. Ace was back in his room.
All was left in the quiet living room were them with their deafening sentiments.
The rain has ceased falling and rays of sunlight peeked through the curtains of pure white clouds. The birds and crickets chirupping, the calming rustling of trees, the weather was warmer.
The glazed window to the balcony wide open, the faint breeze floating in through made Neva's now dried luscious strands veiling thinly the sides of her face waver like small flowers and leaves.
She had gone astray in her deep musings. And he in her: her kind soul, her beauty, her soft breathing, her admirable virtue, her glittery cocoa pools, her perfect pointed nose, rosy cheeks, rosy lips, her fair skin, her—
"I want you to tell me everything." Neva's voice drew him out of his pleasurable rupture.
Rhett raised his brows. "You—want me to?" He asked not sure if he heard her right.
Neva glanced at him.
Their familiar warm eyes; threading with the gold string weaved by the great hands of the sacred Spirit Himself.
Neva and Rhett had found heaven on Earth.
The purity of love and strength; no longer in the enslavement of the persecuting world.
They had broken the shackles of trials.
The red rose under the sun was blooming from the naked plant along the budding leaves, and they shall tend the soil and grow a garden more beautiful than before.
Neva's tears fell. "Please, can I have faith in you?"
Rhett smiled softly.
He closened to her and Neva let him engulf her. Her head on his chest, tranquility in the rhythmic beating of his heart.
"Yes." Rhett whispered, his chin shored on the crown of her head.
"I want you to know, nothing has altered between us. Even if it did, we had just patterned deeper in each other. Our souls were always one, now it's only stronger."
Neva thawed in his warmth, and she closed her eyes, letting the colour of tears trickle down her cheeks, and through the sweater, his skin soaking in and making her emotions his own.
"It was love at first sight." Rhett started with a smile.
"We met in 2019. I still remember it very vividly. It was a warm October evening, you were walking through the side of the pavement with maple leaves falling. And I was mesmerized by you." This sudden delight of a memory made his heart skip a beat.
"And?" Neva asked.
"You were just in your own world and hadn't seen me. But I saw you, and your dishevelled shoe laces. So I called you.
And there and then when our eyes met, nothing was mine anymore; I was all yours."
Neva chuckled lightly at him through tears. His chest vibrating with each low rumble of words. "And?"
Rhett held her closer, an arm around the small of her small back, his other hand on her head, long fingers brushing, stroking through her hair.
Neva's fist on his sweater tightened, this grounded warmth, swirling euphoria in her chest.
"After I fixed your shoelaces, I followed you to the bakery store. You got annoyed when I kept bothering you, even after you'd reached your apartment. You were about to call cops on me, but then, I lived just the next door."
"Really?" Neva raised her head.
He only smiled, and caressed her head close to his heart again.
"Yes really. But I would be away for days because of my job. We barely saw each other. But everytime we did, I did my best to pursue you. At one point, I thought you hated me.
Then one day: I came home injured due to a fight I had with a gang. They were assaulting a woman.
A guy caught me off–guard and stabbed me. It was nothing deathly, really. Then you found me, and treated me. You offered to care for me until I healed, and allowed me a chance to court you. Soon we grew closer then got into a relationship." Rhett paused.
Hesitation ringing in his ears to bring up the person who ratified their ruin.
"Why did you stop? It's fine. I want you to tell me everything." Neva murmured, adjusting her comfort on his chest better.
Rhett sighed, but continued. "You told me you had an accident when you were ten and had amnesia. Your parents were gone and you had been with your aunt and uncle, until you travelled to Erriador for college."
"On the Christmas Eve, I proposed to you. You said yes."
Rhett swallowed. "Following another day. Raka came to our apartment. I wasn't home when he abducted you."
Neva's eyes were wide. Her heart caught in her throat. But she remained silent.
She believed each words that left his lips.
"With the help of an agent, I got you back. Then we had no choice but to leave home. And when we were on the cruise, something terrible happened."
"What?" Her voice was barely a wind over dried grasses.
"They weren't Raka's people, but the one's who ambushed the cruise were armed and better experienced. Hundreds of lives were taken."
"They demanded you too." He uttered carefully.
"They were killed because of me." An unnamed black canvas of misery shrouded Neva. The agony was all too familiar.
"No Angel. You were never at fault." Rhett frowned.
"Please, go on."
He breathed out heavily.
"Then we travelled to a countryside named Ziriri."
He smiled. "We got married and made home in a cottage with a lovely garden we grew. You had made friends easily. And shortly we found out you were pregnant with Rhean. In the same year of our marriage, on September, Rhean was born." Their time there in Ziriri, he found it the most precious.
Neva was haunted by regret and anguish. Such beautiful, cherished memories she couldn't caress and hold onto. Especially their marriage and Rhean's birth. She felt she had to harmonize for all the lonely days her son had spend without her.
"We had to move again one night. Raka had found us again. Then we shifted to another country and lived for a pleasant six months." Rhett shored his cheek on Neva's crown.
A drop of tear fell.
And another. Dripping on her hair.
Neva felt his quickening heartbeats, so she soothingly placed a hand on his chest.
"I was away with Rhean in town and you were home. You had called, and told me Raka got there." Rhett's jaw trembled.
"I'm sorry Angel.
I tried, but I couldn't stop them." He let out a whimper, clutching her impossibly tighter, he was afraid she might wither.
Neva felt her heart clenching at their agony. An air, a feeling of a barren shell.
A vision of a faint, large ghastly shadow peeling her skin, nails harrowing her flesh, the soul being burned to ashes.
Neva couldn't breathe.
Rhett felt her stiffenned, so gently he rubbed her back.
"When I got back home. Raka had not left a clue of the damage caused around the house. But only our home was a mess."
His heart was clawed. "And I knew he had raped you."
Neva fell apart.
A deafening buzz of aftermath ringing in her ears.
Hot tears streamed down her cheeks.
Rhett caressed her head and kissed her crown; praying to take all her grief away; praying to somehow turn back time.
Make everything all right.
"I made a deal with Elk. I'd work for him and he would find you. But even after years, nothing seemed to work. The case was closed. Then I left my job and took it upon myself. I thought of leaving Rhean in a boarding hostel for the time being, but Elk reopened the case and offered to help me again. Rhean stayed with him."
"I'm sorry. It took me so long." He weakly said.
Rhett just held her in quietness for an unknown, securing span of while.
He devoted her time to absorb it, as much as she wanted of the details. If she refused and shredded some, he was all fine as long as Neva was back home.
"You had been hurt so much." Neva mumbled.
She pulled away and looked at him, and she saw his tears still trickling.
Neva leaned in slowly, wrapping her arms around his neck as he encircled his own rugged ones around her fragile frame. His face buried in the crook of her neck.
Look at her.
How could she find strength to worry about him?; when he couldn't even imagine the horror she endured.
"You're my cure. I'm never in pain with you here." Rhett murmured, and a choked sob broke out Neva's lips.