MAYBE BABY

by ANDREA SMITH

  I needed to call Trey. I was not comfortable with going back there and certainly wanted to know what I could expect at this meeting. I grabbed my cell phone, pulling up his name and hitting the ‘call’ button. It was 4:30 p.m. so hopefully I wasn’t interrupting any court proceedings, depositions, or whatever.

  I heard his smooth and silky voice on the other end.

  “Tylar?”

  “Hi Trey, do you have a minute?”

  “Certainly,” he replied. “What can I do for you?”

  I told Trey about the letter that I had received from the Office of the Commonwealth Attorney, and my order to

  report to her office the following Friday. I asked him what I could expect while there.

  Trey explained that the Commonwealth Attorney is another name for a prosecutor or district attorney. He said that my statement would be reviewed with the detectives and C.A. They would question me as to the other events that transpired; they may show me any video-taped questioning that had been conducted with Charlie, and get my confirmation as to the validity or non-validity of his statements to date.

  Trey assured me that I would not have to come face-to-face with Charlie.

  “Will you be there?” I asked.

  “I’ve not been requested to be there. Do you need me to be there with you, Tylar, as your counsel?” he asked.

  “No, Trey – that’s okay. I will be fine.”

  I wasn’t sure about that at all. I was dreading this. I didn’t want to go back to Washington County.

  “Are you flying down, Tylar?”

  “I think I probably will, I don’t want to stay over and it’s too long of a drive not to.”

  “Let me know your flight information, and I will pick you up, okay?”

  I told Trey that I would as soon as the arrangements were made. I got off of the phone with him shortly after that. I really wished that I had my computer, but naturally, Mom had taken that with her as well, or sold it which was more likely.

  I drove to the local library, and accessed the internet from one of their computers. I made flight arrangements for the following Friday leaving Louisville at 7:05 a.m. arriving Tri-Cities Regional Airport at 8:17 a.m. My return flight left Tri-Cities at 6:10 p.m. arriving back in Louisville at 7:25 p.m. I went ahead and booked the flights using my debit card to pay.

  I texted the details of my flight to Trey. He texted me back in about an hour, saying that he would be there to pick me up next Friday morning. He would make sure that I had transportation back to the airport that evening.

  I couldn’t help feeling just a twitter of butterflies at the thought of seeing Trey again. It seemed like it had been forever instead of just four weeks since I had last seen him.

  I missed those beautiful eyes; his sexy chin dimple and the other one that appeared when he smiled. I missed his brown burnished hair that looked great when it was windblown or ‘just fucked'. I didn’t need my thinking going there I reminded myself. I would just work myself into a horny frenzy.

  I sighed. My mind once again returning to Trey, recalling the last time we had been together; that night in the stable. Regardless of the fact he had no recollection of it, it had been hot, really hot sex. I would never forget any moment of it. I would always have a token of his love or lust from that night. I ran my hand over my abdomen. It was still flat.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  The flight from Louisville was my favorite kind: uneventful. I had bought a bagel at the airport hoping it would ease my morning’s queasiness. I wasn’t sure if the queasiness was due to my pregnancy, or simply my nervousness about seeing Trey and dealing with the details surrounding Charlie Roberts’s assault.

  He had been charged with breaking and entering, burglary, felony assault. My understanding was that the C.A. was willing to go for attempted murder, and add aggravated menacing, conspiracy to commit fraud and several other charges relating to his involvement in the trust fund depending upon what Charlie was willing to admit.

  The plane landed on time at Tri-Cities Regional Airport in Blountville, TN. It was about a thirty-five minute drive from the airport to downtown Abingdon. It was a fairly small airport so it didn’t take long for the de-boarding to take place. I walked through the gate area and past the security checkpoint.

  I heard Trey before I saw him.

  “Tylar, over here.”

  I turned and saw him standing next to the baggage claim area. He was dressed casually in dark brown trousers and a tan sweater that accentuated his muscular arms and flat, taught belly. He had an oxford shirt on underneath his sweater, and dark brown casual loafers.

  The fall weather was still pleasant in southern Virginia. I was wearing a light gray wool skirt, with an oversized boyfriend sweater jacket in dark gray. I had a white oxford shirt on underneath the sweater jacket. I had light gray tights on with short dress boots.

  I saw Trey’s eyes flicker over me almost appreciatively. He made his way over to me, dodging a person here and there, finally standing in front of me.

  He wrapped his arms around me in a warm hug. I hugged him back, resisting the urge to press my body against him

  so that I could feel every muscle in his body.

  “You look great,” he said, smiling, holding me from him so that his eyes could sweep over me once again.

  “You, too,” I replied, smiling, suddenly feeling kind of shy.

  “C’mon,” he said, taking my hand. “I’m parked right out front.”

  I thought it would be uncomfortable during the ride from the airport to Abingdon. I thought there would be a strained silence between us, but initially, that was not the case.

  Trey wanted to know all about the house and what I had done with it so far. He asked if I had spoken with any of my neighbors to see if they had heard anything about my mother. I had not and told him as much.

  “I don’t get it Tylar, you puzzle me.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “I don’t understand why you have no desire to seek justice for what your mother has done to you.” I considered what he said momentarily.

  “Which one of her crimes should I seek justice against, Trey? When I was eleven and she fucked my best friend Jenny Marcotti’s dad in her bedroom, with me standing outside her door, hearing everything? Or when she allowed Charlie Roberts to wander into my bedroom giving him the opportunity to rip my pj’s off and digitally assault me? How about when she fucked my boyfriend on my prom night and made him promise to drop me because she wouldn’t share? What about the lifelong lie about my father being married to her and then leaving her for someone else? Her stealing my trust money was minor compared to the years of her neglect, duplicity and lack of love or compassion she had for her own child, for me Trey. Tell me what king of justice will take those scars away?”

  Trey immediately pulled the car over to the side of the road, putting it in ‘park.’ He unfastened his seat belt and leaned over to me, taking me into his arms.

  The hormones were causing a flood of tears to run down my face. He took my face in his hands, doing what he always did when I cried; he kissed my tears away, softly, tenderly. His mouth found mine and in an instant our lips met with the hunger and passion that was so familiar to me once again. I lost myself in his kiss, fisting my hands in his hair; probing his mouth with my tongue.

  “Oh baby,” he moaned, continuing to press kisses on my lips, my face and my throat. “I have missed you so much.”

  “I’ve missed you too, Trey.” I continued to sob, burying my face in his neck.

  “Why did you leave me, Tylar?” he asked his voice husky with emotion.

  “I couldn’t be what you wanted me to be, Trey. I didn’t like having an agreement that prevented us from loving.”

  “But you fucked Mark soon enough and claimed no love between the two of you,” he argued, more than a hint of anger in his voice.

  Now I was pissed, totally pissed. There were a hundred different things that he could have said in response to why I had left
him; to accuse me of fucking Mark in a loveless relationship as justification for my not leaving him was simply unacceptable.

  “And now,” he continued, still irritated and totally oblivious to my anger, “You have saddled yourself with his brat for the rest of your life.”

  I pushed him away, too angry to speak. I got that he didn’t know the truth and had he known, would likely not have referred to the child I was carrying as a ‘brat,’ but his insensitivity to the situation in general was deplorable.

  A look of surprise crossed his face as I pushed him

  away, turning my head away from him.

  “Let’s go Trey; I need to get to Abingdon. I don’t have time for your abusive recriminations.”

  The temperature in the car immediately dropped several degrees. Trey straightened his sweater, rolling the sleeves up on his forearm, put the car in gear and sped back out onto the highway. The rest of the trip was extremely uncomfortable. Trey pulled the Lamborghini up to the curb in front of the courthouse, and got out. He opened the passenger side door and helped me out onto the sidewalk.

  “Text me when you are ready to be picked up. I will send a limo for you. Good luck, Tylar.”

  With that he circled back behind his car, got into the driver seat and sped off.

  Once inside the courthouse, I went to over to a window that was for witness check-in. I told the officer at the window that I was expected for a 10 a.m. meeting with someone from the Commonwealth Attorney’s office. He checked a daily roster sheet for my name.

  “You’re a little early, Ms. Preston. Please have a seat and someone will call you back in a little while.”

  I did as instructed, noting that there were quite a few people sitting in the waiting area of the courthouse. I wished that I had thought to bring something to read to pass the time. There were signs for public restrooms, so I decided to go ahead and take a comfort break unsure as to whether I would have an opportunity to later on.

  I finished up in the restroom, washing my hands and doing a repair job on my makeup as best as I could.

  I saw a drinking fountain in the hallway on my way back to the waiting area, so I stopped to get a drink of water. Just as I finished, I heard my named called from a uniformed officer standing with a door that opened out into the waiting

  area. I headed to the doorway and he stood aside to let me through.

  “This way, please,” he directed, leading me to a conference room off of the hallway.

  “Please have a seat, Ms. Preston, a detective and one of our deputy C.A.’s will be with you shortly."

  The room had a long conference table with cushioned chairs on wheels on both sides of it. There was a white board on the wall at the end of the room; and the front wall had a glass window that looked out into darkness. I was betting it was a two-way mirror on the other side.

  A moment later, the door to the conference room opened. I recognized the man as one of the detectives that had questioned me at the hospital. He was followed in by a female in a navy blue business suit. She had reddish-brown hair and was probably in her late thirties by my estimation. She spoke first.

  “Good morning, Ms. Preston. I’m Beth Denniston, deputy C.A. with Washington County,” she said, holding her hand out to me. I shook her hand.

  “Do you remember Detective Ryan?” she asked. I nodded, shaking his hand as well.

  “What we are going to do this morning, Ms. Preston is to review the statement you provided to the detectives on October 5th of this year, as well as go over some of the additional evidence that has been provided to our office subsequent to October 5th, okay?”

  “Yes,” I replied nervously.

  “We understand that you suffered a head injury, so it’s possible that things could actually be clearer now than when you initially provided your statement to the detectives. Just relax, and relate exactly what you remember about the night of October 3rd of this year, okay?”

  I nodded.

  “We are going to record this interview for the purpose of preserving your testimony for evidence later, okay? We have to make sure that you understand that this is being

  taped and say so for the record.” I nodded.

  She turned on the recorder, stating today’s date, time, who was in the room and the case the interview pertained to. She asked me to state my name for the record.

  “Tylar Jamie Preston.”

  “And Ms. Preston, you have agreed to allow this interview to be taped as future evidence as required is that true?”

  “Yes,” I answered.

  “Okay, in your own words, just take us back to what you remember about the night of the attack in your cottage at Sinclair Stables.”

  “I remember that it was a Wednesday night. I wanted to stay up and watch the season opener of a television show, ‘Revenge.’ I maybe watched the first fifteen minutes of it and then dozed off. When I woke up later, the show was off, the eleven o’clock news was on, so it was sometime after 11 p.m. I turned the television off, and switched off the lights in the living room of the cottage and went to bed.”

  I paused momentarily collecting my thoughts from that horrible night.

  “I remember that the window in my bedroom was opened because it was still fairly warm out and I liked the feeling of the fresh breeze coming in to my room. It was a clear night; stars were out. I fell asleep fairly quickly.”

  My mouth was getting dry which often happened when I was stressed or nervous. Detective Ryan got up and went to a small refrigerator in the conference room, grabbing bottle of water for me. I thanked him, opening it up and taking a drink.

  “I recall that I thought I was dreaming. In my dream I thought it was a former . . . lover touching me on my thighs and my hips,” I said, blushing.

  “I was dreaming of him or at least I thought that I was. I was kind of lucid. I felt my panties being pulled off, but again, I thought it was part of my dream. At some point, I realized that I was not dreaming; that someone was in my bed with me."

  My hands were shaking as I lifted the bottle of water to my lips, taking another drink.

  “He was assaulting me with his fingers . . . down there.”

  “Where Ms. Preston?”

  Oh, God, she was going to make me spell it all out in technical terms. Shit. I could get through this. I would get through this.

  “He was thrusting his fingers in and out of my vagina, scratching me.” I said pointedly.

  There it was out. The worst part of it was out.

  “Go on,” she prodded.

  “I was still kind of half-asleep, still kind of thinking it was someone else.”

  “Who, Ms. Preston, who did you think it was in your bed that night.”

  Oh, God. This was humiliation I didn’t need. I hadn’t gone into all of that in my statement at the hospital. Why had I chosen to do so now?

  “Like I said,” I continued, “I was half-asleep and when I realized it wasn’t a dream, I considered that my boyfriend who I had recently broken up with, was there with me, touching me. Trey Sinclair.”

  “Did your boyfriend or ex-boyfriend make it a habit of coming into your cottage while you were sleeping and crawling into your bed?”

  (Bitch, why did she have to make it sound like that? I wasn’t on trial here, was I?)

  “No, not at all,” I answered tersely. “I suppose in my half-dream state, it was simply wishful thinking.”

  (There, did I answer your question?)

  “Then I heard the voice. He, Charlie, asked me if I liked it. He called me a bitch, I think, and then he called me ‘Sissy.”

  “Does the name ‘Sissy’ have any importance to you, Ms. Preston?”

  Oh, God. Why did I think she was asking me questions for which she already knew the answers?

  “Yes. I had received some threatening notes from someone calling me that name.”

  “Anything other than that?”

  “Yes, about eight years prior to that, one of my mom’s boyfriends had called me by that
name. He came into my room when I was sleeping and took my pajama bottoms off and started touching and putting his finger inside me. I screamed and my mother came into my room and made him leave.”

  “Why had he called you ‘Sissy back then?”

  “Because my mom had said I was her little sister when I unexpectedly came home from a friend’s house where I was supposed to be spending the night on her date night.”

  There, the shame was out, I presumed she was going to make me detail out my mom’s date night now.

  “Date night?”

  There it was, just as predicted. I was sick of this already.

  “Yes, my mother was a prostitute you see. On Saturday night’s she had a ‘date night’ where one of her tricks would come over for dinner and would spend the whole night. I was supposed to stay overnight with a friend whose mother had her date night on Friday’s and she stayed with me on those nights. I ended up coming home because I didn’t want to go out in a car with teenage boys at thirteen years of age that night.”

  I took a swig of water before I continued.

  “My mother heard me in the bathroom and came out of her darkened bedroom to see why I was home. Her ‘date’ Charlie Roberts as it turns out asked who I was.

  He didn’t get a good look at me nor I him. My mom said I was her little sister who had come home unexpectedly early from a date. She told me to go to bed. I did, and then I’ve already told you what happened after that. That is where the name ‘Sissy’ came from.”

  I took another long drink of water trying to wash the nasty taste of the truth about my mom out of my mouth.

  “So when you came to work at the Sinclair Stables, you didn’t know that Charlie Roberts was in fact the same man who molested you eight years prior?”

  “That’s correct. That had happened in Radcliff, Kentucky. I had no reason to think Charlie was in fact the same guy from Radcliff Kentucky now in Bristol, Virginia working at the same place that I was.”