Mended: A Salvation Society Novel

by Gabrielle G.

  Exhausted, I let out every sob I’ve held on to since she died, everything I hid under my compulsions and fears, every thought that I was to blame.

  “You don’t hate me?” I finally ask them, more afraid of the answer than I thought I would.

  Sue smiles and shakes her head.

  “If you would have told us the truth five years ago, while we were grieving, we might have reacted differently. But we grieved. It was hard, losing you both, but we worked on our loss, went to church, prayed, talked to people and worked hard. Sue even helps others dealing with grief now. We moved on. Not that we forgot, but we moved on. I feel a little mad you didn’t tell us, but I can understand why you didn’t. And now it’s time for you to grieve and move on. You have to for your son. I presume that’s why you came here?”

  My first instinct is to nod, but I know I didn’t come here for Aito. Thinking of her, I smile.

  “I think I’ve met someone,” I answer.

  Sue’s face lights up and drying the tears of her cheeks, she says, “Let me put some tea on and tell me everything about her. Also, I want to see pictures of my grandson.” She stands and walks toward me. Her hand reaches my shoulder and squeezes it in a loving way. “Go sit next to Pat. He needs a hug too.” She softly says before disappearing toward the kitchen.

  Still a little ashamed of myself, I sit next to who I’ve considered a father figure for years. Wrapping his hand around my neck, he brings his forehead to mine.

  “If you disappear again, Oliver, I’ll come find you and kick your ass. Don’t think the former Marine that I am is afraid of a SEAL turned barman. You have us. We’re family and nothing will destroy our connection. Don’t forget it.” He slaps my cheek in a loving way and stands to join Sue who’s asking for help from the kitchen.

  Sighing with relief, I look at the mantel and smile at Elaine. “Sorry, babe. It took me so long, but I finally did what I had to do.”

  I know it’s the product of my imagination, but I see her wink and I feel lighter, almost floating on a cloud of forgiveness.

  Exhausted, I lay back on the couch and close my eyes.

  And in a matter of seconds, I’m asleep.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  TESSA

  I’ve checked my phone more than an addict looking for her next dose.

  No news from Oliver.

  We were supposed to spend some time together after I was done talking shop with Dereck at the track, but he disappeared again.

  It’s something he does a lot.

  When we aren’t together, I have no clue how he occupies his time.

  I don’t think he hangs out much with Mark, and he can’t always be working.

  As I’m still without a car, I call the guys for a ride, but none of them answer. I’m about to call for an Uber when Dereck comes out and sees me.

  “Need a ride, kid?” Kid. I smile at the memory of my dad calling me so.

  “Do you mind? My friends took my car away. They want me to go to therapy a couple of times before I can drive again on public roads. Something about being sure I won’t try to kill myself again.” I shrug to try to dismiss my words. I’m not sure why I need to tell him, but something in me has changed since that day as if I’ve opened the door to my insecurities and started accepting them.

  “You’re okay?” he asks. My first reflex is to say yes, to lie. I haven’t been okay for so long, I forgot what it is to be okay. But lately, I’ve been craving normality, whatever it is. Oliver has made me want an ordinary life. A life where you can come home to someone and share your burdens. A life where arms are ready for you when you’re about to fall. A life where someone holds your hand on roller coasters.

  “No,” I answer, “but I will be.”

  Dereck nods, and we walk together toward his car. We stay quiet for a while, not having anything to say to each other until he breaks the silence.

  “I remember when you were a kid, you know. He was so proud of you. So proud to have you and to see you race like him, go-karting like him. You had his reflex, his way of doing things. I just hope you’re careful. If your father’s death taught us anything, it’s not to take your skill for granted. There was no reason for him to die that day. He slowed down when he shouldn’t have, and we lost him, or maybe that’s what he wanted.”

  “What do you mean by that’s what he wanted?” No one has ever talked to me about my father’s death. I checked newspaper clips at the library and researched it online, but neither my mother or Andre did.

  “I might be delusional, Tessa, but I always found that his death made no sense.”

  “Does death ever make sense?” I say, focusing on the road and trying not to think about King. He’s been less in my thoughts these past few days, and if I’ve felt guilty about it a little bit, I also feel lighter. “You know, when my fiancé died, I left. I told everyone it was to heal, but it was more because that’s what I was taught to do. When someone dies, you leave and you come back when everything is better. At least, I waited after the funeral. When dad died, Mother took me right away, and I couldn’t even say goodbye. I didn’t know he was dead until we were already in Belgium.” I wait a few seconds, watching him and then decide to ask what has been on the forefront of my mind since the meeting with the guys.

  “Have you ever met my mother?” After all, if he worked with my father and met me as a kid, he should know her. He flinches but keeps his eyes on the road.

  “Yes I know her. We’ve met a couple of times when she dropped you off.”

  Maybe it’s the tone of his voice or the fact that his hands are entirely still on the steering wheel, but I’m not buying it.

  “So, you don’t know how they met?” I try, turning my whole body toward him.

  “If I remember well, she was a groupie. They had a one-night stand. She came back saying she was pregnant. He believed it was his. You were born. End of story.” We fall in an awkward silence. His tone didn’t leave room for more questioning, and I’m a little tired of the bullshit I keep hearing about my parents. Something smells fishy, but I won’t get any answers from Dereck.

  Once at home, I throw myself into Google. There might be something somewhere about Andre, and my parents, but I can’t find it.

  It’s as if the life of Garett Fitzpatrick has been reduced to the bare minimum.

  Wikipedia doesn’t give me shit except for the guilt of using them without ever paying.

  Google has hundreds of images of him with the same girls hanging on his arms. The search for articles doesn’t give me shit either.

  As for Andre, it looks like I fell into Disney Channel.

  He’s polished and perfect with his thousand-dollar smile.

  Whoever that Dex Crawford guy is, he’s a pro, and he’s also not easy to find.

  Feeling my frustration growing, I try to call Oliver to ask him where he found the trail that my parents and Andre knew each other since childhood, but he doesn’t answer.

  Of course not. It would be too easy.

  Pushing my computer aside, I walk to the bathroom and start running a bath. Music blaring, I undress, and get into the bathtub. I try to push aside everything I’ve learned the past few days and relax. Something Dr. Saman said I should do.

  Relax, let go, allow all the suppressed feelings and anguish to take over and let my mind wander where it wants, without overthinking or controlling anything, without thinking about the reasons why my parents lied and how my father died.

  Closing my eyes, I immerse myself in the water and hold my breath until I can’t hold it anymore. With a gasp, I come up for some air and smile.

  That’s how I felt after the first time I spoke about King with Dr. Saman—gasping for air. Slowly, I do it again and enjoy coming back for breath. But this time, when I open my eyes, Oliver is there, pulling on his hair, his green eyes filled with worry.

  “For fuck’s sake, Tessa! You call me, don’t leave a message and when I call back, you don’t answer.” Without saying a word, I stand and ge
t out of the tub. Walking toward him with all my determination in the sway of my hips, I see his anger falter when he realizes my intentions.

  “Tessa, you made me rush here, worried sick, I had to break-in, I’m not going to forget it all because you’re naked in front of me and dripping wet,”

  I smirk. “But it would help. You were worried?” He nods, his distress still exuding from his body. Getting on my toes, I kiss the corner of his mouth.

  “You were not answering, but I didn’t worry, Green-eyes. I was annoyed, but I never thought something happened to you.” I kiss the other corner of his mouth.

  “But I’m not the one driving fast cars,” he mutters, wrapping his hands around my waist and bringing me closer to him. His clothes get soaked, but he doesn’t care.

  “Let me help you relax.” I undo his jeans and undress him quickly. Falling on my knees before him, I work his length with a firm hand, letting him grow under the swirl of my tongue.

  “Fuck,” he says, his jaw clenched while I continue working. I haven’t done this for a while, but it’s not something you forget how to do. I want Oliver to lose control, to stop wanting to be on top of everything, and to let himself go.

  “I don’t let women do that to me, usually.” I’m not surprised. The guy thirsts for giving orgasms but barely lets himself lose it. He comes and then gets cleaned up right away.

  Shoving in deep, he taps the back of my throat while I twist my hand around his dick, pumping him with all I have.

  “Tessa, stop,” he tries, but he’s already too far gone to stop me. His head falls back, and when I bring my hand to his balls and gently squeeze them, he grunts.

  “Tessa, I’m not going to last long,” he says with urgency in his voice. And in a way, thank God because if I want him to lose it, my knees hurt with the hardness of the bathroom floor, and my jaw gets tired sucking on him.

  I twist faster, lubing him more with my mouth, and my tongue cradled to receive his cum. And when he comes, I feel him losing the little constraint he still had about us. As if I’ve broken the last string tying him to Elaine.

  Swallowing, I stand and embrace him. Knowing he needs me to get through whatever feelings are emerging. To my surprise, his hands lift me up to his waist. I wrap my legs around him and let him kiss me.

  It’s a kiss full of passion and as crazy as it sounds, with no heartache.

  Every kiss we shared before seemed a little forced and a little complicated, but with that kiss, he abandons himself to me. And so to do the same, I ask him the last thing we need to share. The one thing I said no to before because only King had ever gone down on me.

  “I want you to fuck me with your tongue,” I murmur against his lips. Impetuously, he bites my lips and walks me to my living room. Setting me on the sofa, he widens my legs and settles his face mere inches from my pussy. Without a word or a warning, his tongue brushes me, making me fly right away.

  “Oh, fuck!” I moan. I feel him chuckling against me while his tongue peeks out again and plays with my clit. Slowly as if I was touched for the first time, my apprehension leaves me with each whirl of his tongue.

  “Oliver, shit!”

  He doesn’t listen and takes me between his teeth. He nibbles gently until my legs shake, never stopping, never changing the rhythm, never letting my nub go. Fast, with hunger, he literally eats me out alternating between licking the ice cream and devouring the cone, and I melt from head to toes.

  When he takes my clit between his lips and dives two fingers inside of me, I rise above the clouds and fall in ecstasy, contracting around his hand that is pumping me hard. Biting my clit, he rides my orgasm with his mouth until I can’t take it anymore and squirm out of reach. Oliver lets me go and climbs above me, his dick nestling against my entrance but not pushing in. Bringing his lips to mine, I lick myself from him in a desperate moan for more. He shakes his head and kisses my nose, sweetly, beautifully and I hope, lovingly.

  “Hi,” he says with a smile.

  “Hi,” I answer, butterflies swarming my chest.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t answer. I went to see Elaine’s parents and told them about her death. I was so tired, I fell asleep on their sofa for a little while and missed your call. Then I freaked.”

  My hand caresses his face. “It’s okay. I was just frustrated not able to find anything about my parents and Andre online and wanted to know what you found.” I kiss him gently and shiver, the heat of the orgasm slowly leaving me.

  “Why don’t you get dressed while I fix us some dinner, and then we can discuss a little more what I found. We didn’t have much time to talk about it?” Pecking him hard, I slide from underneath him and run to my bedroom to get dressed. Overthinking what to wear, I take my time going through everything I own. I set my mind on a pair of leggings and look everywhere for a comfortable top. On the chair in the corner, King’s T-shirt reminds me of his existence. But my heart doesn’t squeeze like it used to.

  Taking the old piece of clothing, I fold it and put it away in the back of my closet, the same way King is now in the back of my mind at times.

  Finding a T-shirt from grad school, I put it on and go back to my living room only to find it empty. My heart breaks but I can’t say I’m surprised that Oliver has disappeared again, leaving me as confused as the first time as we had sex.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  OLIVER

  The click of a gun behind me reminds me how much I fucked up.

  I acted harshly, ran when I heard suspicious noises, didn’t think of the precautions I should take, or how I was trained to perform while facing danger.

  I know what I should have done, I know how I should have reacted, but I didn’t.

  Without a second thought, I went toward the suspicious sound of locks being picked and loud whispers and got hit in the temple faster than I can make a woman come with my mouth.

  I swallow a chuckle remembering how Tessa came on her couch. Now is not the time to think of Tessa’s pussy, and to the taste of her on my lips. My dick can’t get hard while I’m bound to a chair, a gun to the back of my neck.

  It presses hard on my first vertebrae sending a shiver down my spine. I haven’t felt cold hard steel against my skin in a long time.

  Not something I missed though.

  “We came to get the girl who’s asking too many questions, and we get the guy who likes to toss shit around. Much better catch.”

  I’m not sure where they are from, but they aren’t American; that’s for sure. There is a slight Germanic accent, but they aren’t German either. Maybe Dutch?

  If only I could see their faces and study their body language.

  They’ve put a bag over my head and confiscated my glasses.

  I woke up wherever they wanted to take me, which meant they drugged me at some point. The hit wasn’t strong enough for me to lose consciousness and be brought somewhere without me being aware of it.

  “Shouldn’t he be awake by now?” There are two guys. Or at least two speaking. I pretend to be asleep, my head hanging a little, my muscles relaxed, forgetting the gun pointed at me. If they don’t know I’m conscious, they can’t start whatever they’re being paid to do.

  “It depends on how much you injected.”

  Injected. My arm feels the pinch of a needle when I hear the word. Good old chloroform on a handkerchief isn’t good enough anymore. Everyone has seen episodes of CSI. They certainly infused something intractable — some good knock-out drugs. The fog of my brain lifts a little more. I pull out my tongue to recognize the material of the bag over my head.

  Paper…

  As if I was a fucking McDonald meal.

  They didn’t tape it under my neck. And I’ve certainly been with this over my face for more than a minute already.

  Those dickheads are going to asphyxiate me.

  Trying to take a big breath in an undetected way as possible, I hold it as if I was underwater. I have three minutes. Or I used to. Slowly I focus on the white sounds of my ears a
nd visualize time stopping. Focus on the point. I still listen to their voices, but I need to block them out. Survival mode is kicking in. The echo of their voices tells me we’re in a relatively empty place. The smell gives away the fact we aren’t in a disinfected area. Maybe someone’s basement. It’s flowery and moldy at the same time.

  “What have you got?” The voice I hear is a surprise, and I’m glad the two goons have my face hidden. I need to figure out real quick what the actual fuck I’m tangled into.

  “He was with the target, and because you wanted her to get to him, we just took him. For a former navy SEAL, that guy was easy to catch… Fucker didn’t even see us coming.” I snap out of my disbelief. My brain catching up to the pieces of information I needed to understand the situation. They were there for Tessa so they could get me.

  So they didn’t know who I was, but they knew I was sniffing around.

  They knew I’m a former SEAL and that Tessa was asking questions.

  I hope she didn’t ask anything to my captors directly, not that I know who was behind all this until now, not that I knew there was something to be behind.

  “Remove the bag and get me a bucket of water so I could wake him up.”

  I have no doubt who will stand before me. It’s always the one you expect the least who will be your element of surprise. The one that gets through the cracks. The one who can fool you the most. The goons finally remove the paper from my head and I snap my eyes open. I’m not ready to get drenched, or worse submerged because I’m pretending to be sleeping.

  I’m out of focus for a second, but when I can see better, I smile.

  Time to play my best moves.

  A common mistake people who hide something make is assuming you know more than you really do. They worry and slip up. Like kidnapping the guy who hasn’t found shit about their past except an old picture in a yearbook.

  Nervousness is your worst enemy when you have secrets.