Page 14 of Rescued By the Operative

“We know that better than anybody,” I say, looking to my left and meeting my brother’s eyes. The things we’ve been through up to this point could fill a book.

Our older brother, Wylie, took us in and gave us jobs on his ranch after bailing us out of jail. We’ve had a nice little life ever since. Today, we’re partners. Partners in cattle and partners in sabotaging the cult next door.

Ennis took it really hard when our uncle, Curly, left the ranch. The old man was pretty tight-lipped about his career in analytics. But we enjoyed having him live with us after he retired. Uncle Carl was a consistently decent cook and kept the house clean. But he was more than that. Curly was the only father figure we had in our late teens.

When Olivia stumbled, barefoot, freezing, and hungry into our barn last year, she brought with her a whole heap of trouble. Curly didn’t bat an eye and took care of her the same way he took care of us. Wylie fell for her immediately, and now we’re all involved in helping others like Olivia get out.

Curly up and left us a while back, citing his need to retire and travel. We haven’t heard from him since.

Since then, Ennis has thrown himself even harder into the local rescue efforts. Sometimes without thinking.

Sometimes I think he has a death wish.

Ennis behaves as if he’s unaware of how much actual danger we’re in. He’s seen the kinds of guns they carry. He’s seen the way the sister-wives live and how little the children have to eat. Wylie and Olivia were attacked right on our property, and there have been several shootouts between the cult and other grassroots rescue groups that have popped up. Still, he’s not afraid of anything.

He’s not afraid enough. Not outraged enough.

And yet we both understand these people better than the average Darling Creek citizen does.

The Celestial Order of Covenant Kinship is as insidious as they come.

I have to remind myself that many people here are already sick of them. They couldn’t win any local elections, so now they’re trying to turn enough of the citizenry against the people who have publicly come out against them.

I should be happy, in a way, about this latest smear campaign.

C.O.C.K. has a way of telling on themselves with shit like this. Kidnappers? They’re the ones holding women against their will. Groomers? They’re the ones brainwashing their members from birth to think their brand of polygamy is for everyone’s benefit. Thieves? Okay, sure. Maybe on some of our missions, we’ve looked the other way when the rescued people ransack the doomsday silos on the compound. But that’s a drop in the bucket compared to forcing women to commit fraud to receive welfare benefits to support the hordes of children.

Worst of all, these elders are the ones who make young women marry against their will, often to old men.

There’s more. But it’s too much to think about. Too much to throw my anger at. And the anger is exhausting.

How can our local law enforcement allow accusations like this to be displayed all over town? This is slander, isn’t it?

The poster shows the faces of our brother Wylie, me, my brother Ennis, our neighbor Ellis, and our friend Barrett. It’s a hodgepodge of old social media photos, yearbook photos, and face captures from security camera feeds. And yeah, that’s my and Ennis’s mug shots from the night I turned 21 and got arrested after a bar fight.

I rip the poster in half and throw it in the recycling bin. While I do this, a car honks.

I jerk around to face the street, where a black SUV with out-of-state plates idles on the ass of my truck at the green light. I irritably shout, “Go around it, genius!”

“Geez, chill out, Jake,” Ennis warns. “You don’t know who’s in that car.”

I’ll be the first to admit this is not very neighborly of me. I’ve been tense lately. Everything in my sweet little town is going to shit because of these cultists, and I’m trying to run a ranch right next door to their creepy compound.

So, I’m not burning the candle at both ends. I’m taking both ends of the candle and blow-torching them.

Instead of going around me, the SUV’s back door, facing the opposite side of the street, opens, and someone hops out.

“Shut my stupid mouth,” I mumble as I stare.

A tall brunette in ripped jeans and stilettos waltzes diagonally and saunters into Nate’s coffee shop.

My cock hardens instantly.

I can’t see her face. Her hair is different. But somehow my body knows who it is.

Further, my suspicion is confirmed. I knew she wasn’t one of them.

My brain fights my body’s urge to walk right up to her. If I do that, I won’t be doing her any favors. Whoever she is, whatever she’s doing, she needs to keep her cover.