Cary (Henchmen MC Next Generation 5)

Back in those days, my ex-husband had been the victim in my mind, a poor, unwitting man strapped to a woman who couldn’t give him what he needed, who forced him to do something as blasphemous as file for divorce from me.

It took a really long time and a lot of inner work to realize that Kian hadn’t divorced me because I wasn’t able to have children. He’d divorced me because he believed—as I’d been raised to as well—that the only purpose of sex was reproduction. So if I couldn’t ‘be fruitful,’ then he couldn’t have sex with me anymore. Which made him a miserable wretch to live with. Even if, admittedly, a part of me had been relieved that I wouldn’t have to endure those ‘attentions’ from my husband anymore.

In the end, the community we’d been raised in embraced him even as they shunned me.

“Why’d you stop writing?” Cary asked, voice low, a little soft, even. Maybe even a hint of raw and vulnerable, making it clear that our communication had meant something to him as well.

“I fell into a really deep hole after the divorce,” I admitted.

“All the more reason you should have written. I’d have been a lot more helpful than that cult you were raised in.”

Okay, maybe that was harsh-sounding at first blush. But time and distance had taught me that while my religion hadn’t been a cult, that the particular off-shoot of it that I’d been born and raised in definitely had some culty vibes. Complete with a creepy, but beloved leader who used fear and shame against us. Especially the girls and women.

And the rules had been harsh.

We couldn’t attend any public schools where we might have become privy to how the real world actually worked. Instead, we attended a small religion-based school in our community where the boys and girls were separated at all times. We couldn’t even go on the playground together.

We didn’t learn about sex until right before our weddings.

And even when we did, we knew of it as a duty and nothing more.

I’d been raised to believe I had one purpose and one purpose only.

To get big and round with baby after baby until my body couldn’t do it anymore.

In turn, Kian and all the other boys and men had been raised to believe their place was at the head of the house, and therefore, could expect absolute subservience from everyone under their roof.

I wondered at times what that community was still like, if there had been any progress in the years I’d been away. But my gut told me there wouldn’t be. If anything, as they thought the world was getting more and more evil and sinful, they would have pulled tighter and doubled-down on their narrow-minded beliefs.

They would be no help to me.

Somehow, they would spin the situation into my being at fault for what had happened to me. Not even my parents would offer a hand to help me. The parents who’d given Kian tearful hugs after our divorce proceedings, paying no mind to the puddle of despair their daughter had been reduced to right there in the office.

“I felt a lot of shame back then,” I admitted. Though I didn’t admit that I still sometimes felt that. About my marriage. But also about what had happened to me afterward.

“For what? Not being able to give that asshole kids?” Cary asked, scoffing. “Your body is meant for more than making babies.”

“I realize that now. But back then, it felt like the end of the world. I didn’t open up to anyone about it.”

“What did you do then?” Cary asked.

“I decided to go on a mission.”

“A mission? Like to make people join your religion type of mission?”

“Yes. Exactly.”

“Because it made you so happy,” he said, shaking his head at my previous lack of logic.

“I think my mindset back then was that if I was good enough, if I tried hard enough, if I did everything in my power to bring our ways to more people, that maybe God would let me back in his favor.”

“From the way you flinch whenever there is any noise around you, I’m gonna go ahead and figure that all that hard work didn’t end up how you wanted it to.”

“No,” I admitted, taking a steadying breath, feeling a little too open and exposed right then.

It had been a long time since I thought of my life before Raúl.

And I’d never actually openly discussed it with anyone.

Cary looked off for a second, giving me a view of his profile as he worked through something in his head before facing me again.

“So you need my help.”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

“Okay?” I asked, slow-blinking at him. “You don’t even know what kind of help it is yet.”

“No,” he agreed. “But the way I see it, your first letter came to me in a down time. I needed someone then. And there you were. And you remained there for a long-ass time. I owe you for that. You made prison more bearable. But before I even want to hear about whatever shit has you jumping at shadows, I need to feed you.”