“Why?”
“Because Benjamin said it wasn’t mentioned during Assembly. He didn’t know until he got to the lab. Then when I couldn’t find her, he took me out to the pole barn.” She muffled a cry. “I prayed, but sh-she wasn’t there. Oh, Brother, I’m so scared.”
My left hand held a fist of hair as I tried to think. “Talk to me, Raquel. Tell me what you’re thinking. Because right now, all I can think is I need to get in the damn plane and confront Timothy and Lilith, the Commission, hell, even Father Gabriel. If Timothy came up with another reason to have her banished, a reason to get at me . . .”
“Brother Jacob, what if they didn’t do it? What if it had nothing to do with Brother Timothy?”
Her words reverberated in my head. “What do you mean?”
Raquel took a deep breath. “I should have said something. I just knew she wanted—”
“Tell me!” My desperation sounded foreign, even to my own ears.
“I know Benjamin will punish me when he learns I didn’t say anything.” She swallowed, suddenly sounding more composed. “And he’d be right too. I should have told him, but . . . Sara’s my friend. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to get her in trouble with you or the Commission and because I understand her desire for children.”
I couldn’t make sense of her words. “What are you saying?” My voice echoed against the dingy white walls.
“A little over a week ago, she and I were talking. She told me that the two of you were discussing children.”
I nodded. “We were. She said she wanted one, but I’m not ready, not with my new responsibilities.” Among other things that I can’t explain. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Sara said she hoped you’d change your mind if she became pregnant.” Raquel paused. “She confided in me that she stopped taking her birth control. She didn’t tell you . . .”
Her words trailed away as I doubled over, holding my stomach.
I was going to fucking throw up.
“When? How long ago?” My questions were barely audible over the mayhem in my head.
She’d stopped taking her birth control. It wasn’t just birth control. It was the drug that specifically suppressed her episodic memory while allowing new memories to form. It was the unique creation of The Light and the foundation of why she believed she was Sara while having no recollection of being Stella Montgomery.
“Over three weeks now.”
My heart fell to my feet and tears blurred my vision. “Oh, God, do you think? Did she say anything to make you think she remembered?” I couldn’t even say it: I couldn’t say her life before me, before us.
I hadn’t wanted a wife. I’d avoided it, but from the first time I saw her, before she was brought to the Northern Light, before Abraham and Newton hurt her, before I lied to her, I fell in love with her. I fought it with all my might. That day in the cold, her injuries were supposed to be worse, but I couldn’t let him keep going. I had to stop him. And then when I arrived at the hospital and her neck was bruised, I knew that Newton had hurt her more, and I refused to leave her again. I couldn’t.
Raquel was speaking. “. . . didn’t, not that I picked up on at the time. Now I’m not sure. And there’s one other thing.”
I nodded, trying to quiet the voices in my head, trying to still the chaos. “What?”
“When we went to the hangar this afternoon, Brother Micah said that Xavier’s replacement, Thomas, had recently left.”
“What are you saying?”
“Well, he’s been in the community, unlike Xavier. I’ve seen him a few times.”
I couldn’t speak. Sara wouldn’t risk punishment by speaking to a man she didn’t know. She surely wouldn’t leave the community with a man. My head moved dismissively from side to side. No, she wouldn’t do that. She was just talking about children, about wanting us to be a family.
God, I was really going to be sick.
Sara had said she loved me. That was the last thing I’d heard her say. “Raquel, are you saying Thomas may have taken my wife?”
“Technically, yes, but I’m wondering if it wasn’t an abduction.” Silence filled the room. Finally she continued, “Brother Jacob, I’m afraid Sara may have gotten her memory back, or at least some of it, enough to confirm that she wasn’t Sara. Benjamin and I haven’t said anything to anyone. We know what Sara’s leaving will do to you with the Commission. They’ve already met today. Tomorrow Benjamin said he’d have to say something if Sara wasn’t back. But when he does, Benjamin said he’d remind the Commission that you requested permission to take her.
“Do you think you can find her and bring her back?” Hope came back to her voice. “If you do, you can tell everyone that you took her. They won’t know she left.”