by Mae Harden
Great. So much for our relaxing morning. I'm heading back inside to wake Ben up when I hear his front door fly open and he steps out, looking panicked. My heart stutters at the worry on his face and the way his relief at seeing me washes it away.
"I woke up, and you were missing," he says as he joins me on the front porch. He pulls me in, holding me tight and planting a kiss on top of my head. I'd smile at the exasperation in his voice, but I'm more worried about the damage to his car at the moment. He loves that thing.
"Ben, your car..." I glance back at his car, a sick feeling in my stomach as his eyes shift from me to the ruined rubber and carnage. I follow him, rubbing his back and watch as his face shifts from confusion to fear so fast it's startling.
"Lilah, get inside," he says.
"What? Why?"
"Because someone slashed my goddamn tires."
"Well, yeah. I mean, that's pretty obvious,"
Ben pulls me towards the front door. "Please, just come inside," he pleads, half dragging me.
I pull back a little. He's being ridiculous. "It's not like it's going to explode or anything. It was probably just some teenagers being shitty."
"Look at the hood, Lilah." His voice sounds like he's being tortured. From this angle, I realize the scratches on the hood aren't random like the sides. The words "Stay away from her" are carved into the black paint in ugly, jagged strokes. It's barely legible, even looking at it head-on.
"Why would someone do that to you?" I whisper. Even as I say it, I feel like my body is being dunked in a tank of ice water.
He doesn't meet my eyes when he answers. "I can think of a couple reasons. Some might be my own fault, but... Jesus." He rubs his hand down his face. "Look, I've been meaning to tell you some stuff. Can you please just come inside?" Ice water, nothing. I'm treading water in the Arctic Circle.
I let him lead me inside, but there's panic bubbling up in my throat, choking me.
"Ben," I try to swallow. "What aren't you telling me?"
He closes the door behind us, locking it, before he scrubs his hands over his face with both hands. "I promise, I'll tell you everything, but you have to listen. You have to know that I'm going to fix it."
"Fix it? Fix what?" That hysterical edge in my voice? Yeah, I totally can't help it.
Ben takes my laptop bag and purse off my shoulder and sets them on the counter, pulling everything out of them. I'm frozen in place, wondering what the hell he thinks he's doing until he grabs the bottom of both bags, holding them upside down and shaking them out. A pencil, a tampon, two lipsticks and a couple paper clips skitter across the counter before hitting the floor.
"What the fu-"
"SHH!" He says sharply.
I'm so angry I'm shaking. "Don't shush m- Hey!" I exclaim as he pops the battery out of my laptop. He picks up my phone, making sure it's turned off. I watch, mouth agape, as he takes my laptop and phone and shoves them both in his fridge.
"What are you doing?!" I yell.
Ben holds his hands up, his voice placating. "Relax, I'll make sure they're clean in a minute, but until I know what we're dealing with, that's the safest place for them. It's reasonably soundproof and should block any signals."
"Oh... Okaaay. Are we talking about the CIA, little green men?" I ask. He's lost his damn mind. I briefly wonder if he's pretty enough to stay with, even if he's low-key totally nuts. No. Probably not. Right? I mean… maybe.
But then he turns back to me, rolling his chocolate brown eyes. "Don't be sarcastic, Princess."
My heart and my head are at war, but he's earned a little trust, right? "Start talking, Ben."
Chapter 29: Ben
My mind races as I lick my lips and try to decide where to start. This went from being a minor confession to a tangled shit-heap of secrets in just a couple of hours. Lilah looks like she's debating the best way to get me committed to a mental facility. To be fair, I probably looked a little crazy when I shoved her laptop and phone between the milk and a bottle of ketchup.
"I know from experience how easy it is to use a phone or laptop as a listening device or to log keystrokes. They both need to be bricked until I can go through them and make sure there's no malware."
"What are you talking about?" Lilah laughs, a hysterical edge creeping into her voice.
"The phone calls. The ones from unknown numbers. Did you ever answer them?" I ask her.
Lilah looks exasperated, her green eyes flashing. "I did. Once or twice when they started... but there was nobody on the other end." I can just see her picking up the call and shrugging it off when no one answered. Didn't I do the same thing the first time?
"There was," I say. My jaw clenching in anger. "Your phone was going off in the middle of the night last night. I answered it." Rage seeps through my body at the memory of the breathing and the grunt I heard. "I heard a man breathing and when I said 'hello' it startled him like he wasn't expecting me."
Lilah squints at me, confusion, disbelief and anger competing for control of her delicate features.
"Lilah, someone is stalking you. The calls and my car, that's not a coincidence."
Tears fill her eyes. "Oh shit," she whispers. "This is my fault." All the emotions I've been watching her battle disappear.
"No, Princess. It's not your fault. You didn't know."
Her face crumples. "No, but my brothers said they thought someone tampered with my Jeep battery. I didn't take it seriously. I thought they were just being paranoid. If I had listened..."
"Stop," I tell her firmly. I pull her into my arms. "There's nothing you could have done."
That's not entirely true. Had I known about the Jeep I would have gotten to the bottom of the phone calls right away but telling her that won't change our situation.
"Look, I need to check some things in my office..." I pause because there's no way around telling her the truth, even if this isn't how I wanted to do it. "Can you please come sit with me?"
I bring one of my kitchen chairs to the office and set it in front of my computer, pushing my comfy leather chair to the side for Lilah to sit in. She eyes me warily, and the sight of her distrust hits me right in the gut.
I sign in and pull up my security camera. The current feed shows a grainy image of Lilah's front yard, driveway, and front stoop. It only takes a second before it clicks and she opens her mouth, no doubt ready to unleash hell on me.
"Before you get mad," I say holding up a hand, begging for a little patience. "I had these before you moved in. I only use them to keep an eye on my own property, but after we found your door open, I moved them to watch your house. Just in case."
Lilah's looks at the screen through narrowed eyes, lips parted. Her cheeks are flushed and blotchy, anger practically seeping out of her. She takes a deep breath and says, "You've been watching me. For weeks." Her voice is almost calm, but I can hear the anger bubbling just beneath the surface.
"No, I had the cameras on your house in case something happened. I've been with you every night, here and over there. Since nothing else unusual happened, I never looked at the footage, I swear. I just didn't want someone hurting you."
Lilah looks placated but not happy, and she speaks through gritted teeth when she says, "You should have told me. If you'd been honest about it, I wouldn't have minded so much. Besides, if you'd kept them facing your own property, like you should have, we'd be able to see who vandalized your car."
She still won't look at me as I try to apologize. "I know. And I'm sorry." I really am. I know I should have told her before now but trying to explain the cameras was going to bring up more questions. I click through the timeline as she sits next to me in silence.
"Stop!" she yells, smacking me on the arm. I stop the footage and back up slowly. A shadow crosses the bottom of the frame at 3:18am. The shadow moves on and off frame for several minutes. I think we can be reasonably certain that's the jackass who destroyed my car. We watch as the shadow moves until suddenly a figure dressed in black steps into the frame
. The only thing that's clear is they have a black hoodie pulled up over their head. It looks like they have a slim build, but it's hard to judge height or anything else.
I'm livid. The thought of this piece of shit walking around my property, close enough to hurt Lilah, has me shaking with rage. Lilah places a hand on my arm, and her gentle touch is enough to calm my thunderous thoughts.
That is, until the figure crosses the yard and peeks in Lilah's front kitchen window before skulking around to the back.
Leave, I pray silently. Please, just leave.
But he doesn't leave. A minute later, a flashlight beam flashes from behind the blinds inside her bedroom window. Lilah gasps and grips my forearm, her fingernails digging into my skin as she covers her mouth with her other hand.
"Oh my god," she whispers.
Despite her frustration and anger with me, she lets me pull her into my lap. I wrap my arms around her as we silently watch the little light dim and move to another room.
After a couple minutes, the figure reappears outside, slinking back around the side of the house, disappearing towards the street. I fast forward a couple seconds at a time, but there's nothing else. I turn off the video, saving the clip to my hard drive and cloud storage. I don't know how much it will help, but I'll look through it again later.
Lilah sits in my lap, her shoulders hunched miserably. I put a hand on her cheek, looking at her. She's pale, and I'm a little worried she might vomit. Her green eyes look glassy and she's staring vacantly at the screen. I wish I could absorb her pain, siphon it all away.
"Wait," she says, finally turning to look at me. "Why do you even have these cameras in the first place?"
There it is. My girl isn't stupid.
"That's... the other thing I need to tell you," I say as I look down at my hands. I hate myself right now. I've kept this from her so long and now I have no choice but to break it to her when she's already hurting. If I had just been a goddamn man about it and told her weeks ago, we might have prevented all of this from happening.
"My sister Ella..." I start. Fuck, this is hard. Lilah listens, still perched on my thigh, her back stiff and straight as a board.
"When I was 21, Ella married this prick she met in college. My dad didn't like the guy much, but he couldn't stop her. They moved to El Paso just after the wedding. I was still doing my time working for the FBI. I was so self-absorbed that I didn't realize how hard it was to get ahold of her until the next Christmas when she didn't come home to see us. She told us she couldn't make it, but she wouldn't say why or even answer her phone when we tried to call her."
Lilah's eyebrows draw together. As close as she is with her siblings, I'm sure she's imagining the worry that would cause.
"We didn't hear from her for days and then I got a call from her. She called me on a borrowed phone. All she said was she needed me to pick her up at a bus stop in North Austin before she hung up. My dad and I raced out to pick her up. When we found her--"
My voice breaks, my chest ripping apart all over again at the memory of my big sister, slumped in a bus stop waiting area. She had the hood of her coat pulled up and she was hugging herself. Even from across the room I could see the bruises, the dried blood on her forehead.
"She was in bad shape. We took her to the hospital, and they said she had three cracked ribs, a concussion, minor facial fractures. The hospital called the police and Ella told them everything while we watched. She couldn't make eye contact with anyone. She told me later how humiliating it all was. She's smart. She came from a good home. She had an education. She felt like she should have known better."
Lilah smooths her hands over my arm and over the muscles of my clenched fists. I watch the way her delicate fingers stroke my skin, focusing on that little motion to calm myself. It's been ten years, but I think a hundred could go by and I would still be filled with rage about what my sister went through.
"We all should have known better, but not one of us caught the warning signs. Ella's husband isolated her once they moved to El Paso. He emotionally abused her, she said. Little things at first but escalating until Ella demanded they spend Christmas at home in Austin. She was planning to use the trip to get help, but he refused and when she pushed back, he snapped. He beat her half to death."
Tears are streaming down Lilah's face when I look back up at her.
"I'm so sorry," she whispers. Her green eyes search mine like she's trying to assess the cracks in my soul so she can patch me back up.
"The police took a report. They kept calling it a domestic dispute. Can you believe that? They were useless. Worse than useless. Her husband had family ties in El Paso. They pulled a bunch of strings and, in the end, he was only charged with "Simple Assault." A class B misdemeanor. He did 60 days in jail and paid a $2,000 fine. That's it."
Lilah curses softly under her breath.
"He called her daily while he was in prison, not that she answered, but he wouldn't stop. His release date got closer and closer, and Ella started panicking. She knew he wouldn't leave her alone. She wanted to leave town, start over somewhere, but we didn't want her out there on her own."
"Part of my plea agreement with the FBI was that I agreed not to hack anything that wasn't assigned to me by my superiors. I'd followed the rules for years, but I wasn't about to let Ella's tormenter walk free after what he'd done..."
Lilah's eyes grow larger in her face.
"Oh god, Ben. What did you do?"
I laugh, but it comes out cold and humorless.
"Honestly? A lot less than I thought I'd have to."
Chapter 30: Lilah
I feel numb. Or at least my body does. My head is a swirling mess of emotions, disconnected from a body that can't keep up.
Ben laughs low and mirthless, as his eyes shift sideways, and he scrubs a hand down his face for about the tenth time this morning.
"I wanted him to go away, but that wasn't happening as long as his crimes were local and his family had the influence to talk things down. When I hacked him, I really thought I'd have to plant something." Ben shrugs, his arm still around me. "I was prepared to manufacture enough evidence to get the bastard put away for life, but it was all right there. He didn't even try very hard to hide it. The smug shit."
Ben shudders, and I'm suddenly very sure I don't want to know what he saw. "You can skip the details," I say.
Ben rubs a hand up my back. "There was plenty for the Justice Department to get involved, but what really sealed the deal were his financials. In the end, most of his jail time is from bank fraud, tax evasion and money laundering."
"How long did he get?" I ask.
"Sixty-five years."
"Good. What a rat bastard," I say. I don't know Ella well. I've only spoken to her a couple of times when she called Ben and I was in the room, but I already adore her.
Ben chuckles, sounding a little more like himself, but he stops when I ask, "Why are you telling me this now?"
"Because I didn't do it just the once," he whispers as he runs his fingers over the back of my hand. "I've helped-- I've been helping women in bad situations, people like my sister, disappear for years. Some of them had to start whole new lives. I've probably hacked into every government system in the country ten times over to help them do it."
I think about it for a second and honestly, the idea of Ben hacking a DMV or whatever to help someone live a safe life doesn't really bother me that much. I shrug as I search his eyes.
"Ok. I mean yeah, you're breaking the rules but it's for the right reasons, right?"
Ben swallows audibly.
"That's... still not all. I outed a senator last month for sexually harassing his subordinates and taking bribes."
I backhand his chest, not hard, but fast enough to catch him off guard. He makes an "oof" sound as I half yell, "That was you?! I read about that! The bastard got what he deserved if you ask me."
Ben grins. "He probably deserved worse. But Lilah, I do that kind of stuff all the time."
"Aren't you worried you'll get caught?" I ask. The thought of him being arrested and taken away from me is terrifying.
"Honestly, not really. In my experience, nobody complains when you take down a terrible person. The authorities concerned don't look too hard when someone anonymously sends them all the evidence they need to do their job. Plus, I'm really good at covering my tracks. If worse came to worst, I still have contacts in the FBI that owe me huge favors."
Something about all of this is still making my stomach churn. I've got a headache and my chest is squeezing uncomfortably. There's something icky about charging desperate women money to help them.
"Is this how you make money?" I ask. "Were you lying about the corporate jobs you were doing?"
"God no," he replies vehemently. "I really make my money off the corporate stuff. I don't charge for the... the gray area stuff."
The tension in my chest eases a bit. "I'd ask you why you do it, but I think I get it. No one should have to go through what your sister went through." His fingertips flex against the small of my back and a small, hopeful smile turns the corners of his mouth up.
I try to figure out what's eating at me, talking my way through it. "I don't care about the legality. I really don't. People like that deserve to be punished, but... I wish you would have trusted me with this."
Ben meets my eyes, and he looks tortured. He opens his mouth to say something, but I hold up my finger.
"I'm not finished," I say, pushing away from his chest and standing. I already feel the loss of his strong arms around me, but the distance between us is much colder than just the loss of body heat. He stays sitting, letting me have the upper hand, at least for now.
"You got your turn to talk and now it's mine. I told you how hard it is for me to let people in. I flat out told you. And you still pushed your way in, feeding me half-truths and lying through omission the whole time."