Page 8 of Anathema
Eli cleared his throat and straightened, moving his eyes from the envelope to mine. He looked as though he had seen a ghost—his breathing bordering on erratic.
“The fact that you’ve never heard of them should give you a good idea of who you are dealing with. This group is darker than Charlotte and any other mercenary-for-hire agencies out there. They are—the elite—in a sense.” He rested a hand on his hip, mirroring my position while running the other through his hair. “Long story short, this is a group of sick and twisted fucks who walk the line between gray and black, often enough leaning more on the side of black. Hence, the roses they left for you.”
“Well, I don’t think they sell various shades of gray roses at the florist…” I joked, rolling my eyes in amusement, but he didn’t return the sentiment. His face was grim, and his lips were pressed into a hard line. This was genuinely bothering him. I was actually surprised for once. A group so dark that they set even Eli on edge.
“I’m not fucking around, Alexis. Anathema is not a joke to take lightly. What do they want with you?” He gestured his chin to the envelope in my hand.
I shut my mouth from my following sarcastic remark and pulled out the card, handing it to him.
Eli’s shoulders tensed as he looked over it and blew out a breath. Was he concerned for me? Not that it mattered, but his demeanorhad significantly changed since I got here, all because of this envelope.
“I don’t know what you’ve done, but whatever it was, it’s caught their attention, and from the looks of it, they are attempting to recruit you.” He bit his cheek, holding the card back out to me.
“That’s—a good thing, right?” I took the card from him and stuffed it back into the red envelope. “—that they would want to recruit me?” I slid the envelope into my pocket once again.
After all, I was a free agent and needed to get back in the game sooner rather than later. Without my laptop and Charlotte, I had nothing left.
“It’s not that simple, Alexis. Even if you accept the recruitment, they will test you and your loyalty, and even then, once you are a full member, the only way out is death. Why else do you think no one knows or talks about them?” Eli shook his head in disappointment, looking down at the floor. “And what part of morally black and fucked up did you not understand? I know you aren’t that dark.”
“You don’t know anything about me. How doyouknow about them if they are supposedly so secretive and hidden from the public eye?” I huffed and crossed my arms over my chest.
He was being melodramatic. Eli never saw the true me; I was his 'princess,'a vision of innocence in his eyes. But I did have to agree: Anathema was coming off far more daunting than I had initially considered them.
Who the fuck kills their members instead of letting them leave or quit? The thought alone was out there and ridiculous.
“The name Anathema comes from damnation and hatred. They adopted that term because that is the business they deal in—murdering people who are hated for a price, damning their souls to hell. The blood on their hands alone could paint this city red. It doesn’t matter if the person is seen as innocent or not; as long as there is a dollar sign attached to their head and a payment made in full, they will take the job.” Eli’s face was stern as he explained who this group was in more detail.
He still didn’t answer my question of how he knew about them. He was dancing around it with facts to deter me from learning anything more.
“Alright, but answer my question… How doyouknow so much about them?” I demanded. It came out more like an aggressive hiss, but it was a demand all the same.
Eli let out a sigh and stepped toward me.
“Do you remember Monika?” He asked, his features turning solemn as he looked just to the side of me as if remembering a long-lost memory of her.
Monika was his fuck buddy. I had run into her several times over the years, often leaving his apartment in a half-naked hurry. I know they were never serious; otherwise, she would have moved in by now, given how frequently they had hooked up. The man had needs, and she catered to every single one of them.
“I was about to ask where she was; if you were looking for an easy fuck this morning, you should have called her. But what does she have to do with your knowledge of Anathema?” I shrugged coldly.
“Monika worked with them for a time. That was until she outgrew her usefulness and was murdered.” He ground out the words through a clenched jaw, his eyes glistening with regret.
Clearly, she meant more to him than I thought she did because he seemed pretty upset at the loss of her. My best guess was that Monika had informed him about Anathema and who they were, leading them to brand her a liability and end her life. I’m sure she was the one who fed him all of the information he knew now.
“How long was she working for them?” I asked.
She never came off as the ‘secret cult murderer’ type. If anything, she reminded me of a Barbie doll with her plastic everything. That’s what Eli was into, though—the bleach blonde hair, fake tits, ass, and lips. Anathema must have paid her well if she could afford all of the work she had done to herself. I don’t know why he kept trying to fuck me when I was nothing like the women who shared his bed on a nightly basis.
“Years, I don’t know exactly how long. But I do know that she worked for them before I met her. She disappeared about a year ago, and I didn’t understand why until I put two and two together and...” His voice drifted with his train of thought.
I couldn’t help but wonder how someone could work for a group like this for years and then just outrun their use out of nowhere. There had to be more to this story that either he didn’t know or wasn’t telling me. It couldn’t have been that simple and cutthroat.
I chewed on my bottom lip as I studied him. A part of me was hoping that this was all some made-up bullshit story to scare meoff from them. But the hurt and pain in his eyes said it all—that Eli was being utterly candid about what had happened to Monika and who Anathema was.
Did I really want to dive into that rabbit hole with no escape but death?
“Don’t meet with them, Alexis. Not unless you are ready to surrender more than just your time to them.” Eli’s words were soft-spoken as he stepped closer to me and cupped my cheeks in his hands. I sucked in a sharp breath at his gentle touch and nodded.
He didn’t get to tell me what to do with my life, but I wasn’t about to make him feel worse by telling him what I already knew: that I didn’t have a choice in the matter.
