Chapter 55
Malcolm wasn't having any luck today, the poor bastard. Taker, on the other hand, was laughing his ass off. The look on Malcolm's face as he had awkwardly shuffled out of the room and the sound of how fast that old man was carting himself down the steps… hilarious.
"Darlin', he's gone… you can come out." He chuckled, wondering what on earth she was doing up here naked since the tower wasn't exactly the warmest. Being up so high, things got drafty. "Abbie?"
"Nope, I'm not coming out!" Abigail called out through the door, having flipped the lock on it and folded her arms in front of her chest, pouting.
She wanted to surprise her man and got WAY more than she bargained for. His own father had walked in on her completely naked in bed! Groaning, Abigail tried to keep her cheeks from burning and couldn't believe how stupid she was! Stupid, stupid, stupid! When he tried the door, she pressed her back against it and grabbed the nearest towel, which had been used earlier that day, but at least it was dry.
"Just leave me alone, Mark. Let me wallow in my embarrassment alone, please."
"Well, that won't do, darlin'." He drawled through the door, beginning to shed his own clothes. Taker began to see what had happened here. Abigail, bless her, had been looking to surprise and entice him, only to get more than she had bargained for. "You probably made his day," 'Taker shouldn't have found that amusing, but he did, especially considering Malcolm had lost part of his finger to his own idiocy. "Open up, Abbie, or I'll do it myself." He was now outside the door bare-assed.
Groaning, Abigail knew he'd do it with magic, if necessary, and reluctantly stood up to face the door, opening it a few seconds later. "I was just…oh wow…" She had wrapped herself in a towel, not expecting to find him in his birthday suit when she opened the door. "I was trying to surprise you since we haven't had sex in 4 days…" Her voice had gotten softer and lower with each word spoken.
He reached out to pull her into his arms, her cheeks flushed and red for an entirely different reason now. Four long days without feeling him inside of her was a crime, it had to be. Her hands slid up his muscular chest, along with her eyes, until they locked on smoldering dark forest green.
"Nothing rough tonight, show me your softer side, Mark…please…"
His softer side, he could do that. Four days without her felt wrong, but he had been giving Abigail time to recover as well as focus on learning her new job. Today, she had probably dealt with Dean Ambrose, he had gotten word about the accident in the barn. It was also none of his business, he knew Abigail was loyal to him. Sweeping her up into his arms, he carried her to their bed and knelt down on it, not letting her go, and simply kissed her. She wanted soft and tender, his gentle side, and that was what she would get.
Soft, gentle, tender and loving was exactly what Mark gave her, taking his time to thoroughly make love to her. Abigail did enjoy the roughness he brought to the table in the bedroom, but this was amazing too. An hour later, they lay in bed together with her leg draped over his, her body curled into his side and her head resting on his chest, caressing him. No more secrets between them, she promised, so she looked up at him and sat up a bit, caressing his face tenderly with her hand.
"I need to tell you something. It's not…bad or anything, but…Dean came into the medical wing tonight needing staples. I was the only one who could handle it since Jeff was still with Stephanie and monitoring Anthony and there was no way Melina could handle all that blood. It was pretty bad…" Nothing she couldn't handle though. "You're not mad I had to tend to him, are you?"
"Why would I be mad with you for doing your job?" Taker couldn't keep the note of confusion from his tone as he moved so he was laying on his side, elbow on the pillow, head in his palm, blinking at her. But, he did smile at her, pleased with her telling him this because that was a good thing. "I heard about the incident when they were removing the tusks, it sounds like you had your hands full, Abbie." He said quietly, reaching out to caress her face with the back of his hand. "Thank you, darlin', for telling me." All things considered, it took a lot of guts, especially after the last two times they had had blowups.
"No more secrets, remember? I don't care if it's my job, I'm going to tell you every time I encounter him. I think he's going to steer clear of me and the medical wing from now on though. I sort of…hurt his feelings, I think. If he even has any." She snorted, doubting it, and snuggled down against his arm, enjoying being with him again after a long day. "Enough about him, I just thought I'd let you know. Tell me about your day in the forge and why did you bring Malcolm up here?"
"Oh, because we were going to have a late snack up here and write down some theories. He's been taking mental notes all day and I offered to let him use my stuff and my own notes. I think he's wishing he could write some brilliant book about Mythril."
Taker chuckled, but it was also bittersweet. Back in the day, when education and universities, novels, and all that had been a thing, Malcolm had loved it. He had penned out several papers that were published on theories. There was definitely no market for anything like that anymore.
"And, his dumbass ground off the tip of his left pinky."
"Ouch." Abigail winced, hoping there was a way to fix his pinky because that had to hurt. "Shit, he didn't need medical assistance, did he?" She breathed a sigh of relief at Mark shaking his head and snuggled further against him. "I would say I'm sorry for chasing him off, but I'm not. We don't know what the future holds or how much time we have together, so I want to spend as much of it with you as I can. I know we have to leave soon to face Bray and the DOV. So I'm gonna be a little selfish when it comes to you at night."
She kissed him soundly, wishing they didn't have to go and they could just stay here in the safety of Wonderful. However, that wasn't reality and reality was a cruel, ugly thing. The DOV and Bray had to be stopped and, if they survived it, then they could have their happily ever after. Taker didn't bother explaining to her that Malcolm had cauterized and 'healed' it on his own, sort of. He had offered to take him to the medical wing, but… Malcolm had said it would be a great reminder to not put his fingers where he shouldn't.
"Abbie, quit worrying; we're going to beat him, we're going to win, darlin'."
They had drained the last of the blood required and Malcolm had transported it. Everything else was ready to go, though there had been gossip about taking his own army, Wonderful's army, to deal with the soldiers. It was a war. He was just hesitant about leaving Wonderful defenseless, again.
He sounded so confident, there wasn't arrogance in his tone, only truth and love were in his voice. "You really believe that, don't you?"
Resting her forehead against his, Abigail shifted a little to get more comfortable, since they weren't leaving this bed for the night. They wouldn't leave Wonderful defenseless because they would be the wall of defense. They would take the fight to the DOV and Bray and put an end to this once and for all. There would be no more fear of the DOV or their vicious beliefs. It would be war, but Mark was right, they would win and make it back to Wonderful together.
"I trust you, so if you say we're going to win, then that's what will happen."
"Good." Taker pulled her against his large body, hugging her tightly, and began to rain kisses along her hairline, inhaling Abigail's sweet scent. "We're more prepared now, darlin', thanks to you." Which was the truth…her stubborn ass had actually saved his life. "We know what we have to do, we got this."
They would start arming men tomorrow and, during the days in the forge, he had been making weapons and bullets. Showing Malcolm the dark side of Mythril, as it were. If there were any good properties to it, they wouldn't know until this fight with the DOV was done.
"You know me, I'm a worrier." Abigail remarked, sighing as he pressed kisses against her collarbone on each side, his hands caressing her sides.
She definitely enjoyed the softer side of him, the loving side. In a way, her defying and disrespecting him had saved everyone because it was the only way they found out Bray had a protection spell on him. If Abigail hadn't gone with Dean to get that invisibility cloak and rescued Malcolm, Mark would've been slaughtered trying to take the DOV and Bray out. Everything worked out as it should, they both compromised instead of letting their egos run rampant.
"Jeff did mention something about stringing me up though. He said that'll be too much to bring with us since we're going to war." His eyes looked up at her, her hand caressing his scarred face. "He thinks you should keep me close to you and a knife at the throat would do the trick, or a sword, whatever you wanna call it. Even a gun, but stringing me up…there's not a lot of trees where we're going, and he also pointed that out too."
The DOV cut them all down for their own selfish needs and reasons. They would be doing this on DOV soil, which meant they would have to be prepared for the rough terrain. It wasn't flatlands by any means.
"And here I was looking forward to hanging you from my symbol." He chuckled, smirking at Abigail's confused look. "I would never hang you from a tree, darlin'. I'd go with something more dramatic." Trees were for nameless, unworthy… no, she would have had a great mock execution. "I'll use a dagger."
Hopefully, they wouldn't get that far. Just her presence would be enough to get Bray to leave his walls, expectantly. Of course, if Wyatt was secure in the knowledge that he was invincible, it was entirely possible his hubris would have him strolling out the front door, regardless.
"No wait, you said a symbol…"
What was he talking about? Abigail couldn't recall seeing a symbol and then…suddenly, she remembered one just outside of Wonderful's gates. It was a T with spikes through the middle of it and it was some kind of emblem, right in the middle, on top of the archway of the gates.
"That emblem on the gates…with the T and the X…that's your symbol, isn't it?" Where was the U though? She knew the T stood for Taker, but what were the spikes for? That didn't make sense since his nickname was Undertaker and it started with a U, not an X. "You have one of those built to execute people?" Abigail saw him hesitate and touched his face, letting him know she wouldn't think ill of him because not everything could be wine and roses in Wonderful, no matter how great the town was. "Let's do that then. That'll send a clear-cut message to Bray about who has me and what will happen if he doesn't come out of hiding. I like that idea a lot better than holding a dagger to my throat because a lot of things could go wrong." Hell, the symbol idea and being strapped to it could go wrong too, but at least it would be a secured situation.
"Wait… you want me to string you up now?" Taker asked in surprise, arching a slow brow.
Abigail had been very hesitant about it before and now she was all for being strapped to his symbol to put on a show for Wyatt. He knew why too; a lot could go wrong, even with the dagger bit. But he hadn't been planning on just stringing her up and dropping her, no, there would be all the pomp and circumstance that went with executing a prisoner of war of her stature, which would include a list of her crimes. Basically, all showy and letting Wyatt know she was about to suffer. He figured if Wyatt was as obsessed with her as she believed, the man would be down there before he had even reached the end of her 'crimes'.
"Well yeah because you're not gonna put a noose around my neck, which is what I thought you meant by 'stringing me up'. I didn't know you had a symbol for this kind of thing and, as I said, it would send a message to Bray. I need to find a white dress too." Abigail hated the color because that's ALL she was allowed to wear in the castle, scowling at the thought. When he looked at her questioningly, she sighed and figured an explanation was in order. "White is the color of purity, according to Bray. It was the only color I was allowed to wear in the castle. Everywhere I went, I was dressed from head to toe in white…and I hated it. But me in white, strapped to your symbol…it'll be more than enough to make him come running." Bray was in for a rude awakening once he realized Abigail had completely turned on him and sided with the 'enemy'.
Originally, he had thought red or black, but… Bray might see that as she was tainted, no longer pure, and might change his mind about her worth. That was so jacked up, Taker didn't even know where to begin. If he were a psychologist, he bet he'd have a field day with Bray Wyatt and his mental problems.
"I might put a noose around your neck, but we won't walk you off to hang, darlin'. All about theater. I won't allow harm to come to you." Or for her to go off seeking it…his emerald eyes narrowed at the possibility.
"Okay, I understand. And you already know I trust you and your judgment."
Taker didn't have a CLUE just how messed up Bray's mind was and would probably have nightmares if he EVER delved into the monster's mind. Bray wasn't Bray to her anymore. Bray was a monster that had to be destroyed, at any and all costs. Would it hurt to watch him die? Yes, but Abigail would stay strong and let it happen. There was no redemption for him, not after all the hell and cruelty he'd forced upon this world. Vesperia would be better off without him alive…because, without him, the DOV crumbled.
