by ANDREA SMITH
“I guess not. I'll be fine.” 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. I'll pick you up.”
With that, we hung up. I drove to the local library, and accessed the internet to make flight arrangements for the following Friday. I texted the details of my flight to Trey. He texted me back saying that he'd be there to pick me up. I couldn’t help feeling butterflies at the thought of seeing Trey again. It seemed like it'd been forever instead of just four weeks since I'd last seen him.
CHAPTER 34
The flight from Louisville was my favorite kind: uneventful. I'd bought a bagel at the airport hoping it would ease my morning sickness. I wasn’t sure if the queasiness was due to my pregnancy or simply my nervousness about seeing Trey and dealing with the details of Charlie Roberts’s assault.
Charlie was charged with breaking and entering, burglary, and 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, Tennessee. 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. 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. “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 took my hand, “I’m parked right out front.”
I thought there would be a strained silence between us during the ride from the airport to Abingdon, but initially, that wasn't the case. Trey wanted to know all about the house and what I'd done with it so far. He asked if I'd 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 this. “Which one of her crimes should I seek justice against, Trey? When I was 11 and she slept with my best friend’s dad in her bedroom and I heard everything? When she allowed Charlie Roberts to wander into my bedroom and assault me? How about when she screwed my boyfriend on my prom night? 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. What kind of justice will take those scars away?”
Trey immediately pulled the car over to the side of the road and parked. He unfastened his seat belt and leaned over to me, taking me into his arms. A flood of tears to ran down my face. He took my face in his hands and kissed my tears away. His mouth found mine and in an instant our lips met with the hunger and passion that was so familiar to me. I lost myself in his kiss.
“Oh Tylar,” he moaned, continuing to press kisses on my lips, my face, and my throat, “I've missed you so much.”
“I’ve missed you too, Trey,” I buried my face in his neck.
“Why did you leave me, Tylar?” he asked, his voice husky.
“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 slept with Mark and claimed no love between the two of you,” he argued, anger in his voice.
I suddenly filled with rage. There were a hundred different things that he could have said in response to why I'd left him; to accuse me of sleeping with Mark in a loveless relationship was simply unacceptable.
“And now,” he continued, still irritated and totally oblivious to my anger, “you've saddled yourself with his brat for the rest of your life.”
I pushed him away, too angry to speak. I accepted 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.
“Let’s go, Trey, I need to get to Abingdon."
The temperature in the car immediately dropped several degrees. Trey straightened his sweater, put the car in gear, and sped back out onto the highway. We drove in chilly silence the rest of the way. Trey pulled 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're ready to be picked up. I'll 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 the witness check-in window. I told the officer that I was expected for a 10 a.m. meeting with someone from the CA’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.”
Finally my name was called out 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.
“Good morning, Ms. Preston. I’m Beth Denniston, deputy C.A. with Washington County,” a woman 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're 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's 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 to us, okay?”
I nodded.
“We're going to record this interview for the purpose of preserving your testimony for evidence. We must make sure that you understand that this is being taped and say so for the record.”
She turned on the recorder, stating today’s date, time, people present, case number, and parties to the case. 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, tell us 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. I maybe watched the first 15 minutes of it and then dozed off. When I woke up later, the show was off and the 11 p.m. news was on. I turned the television off, 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 fresh breeze coming in to my room.”
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,
retrieving bottle of water for me. I thanked him, took a sip, and continued.
“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 wasn't 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. I'd have to push through this. “He was thrusting his fingers in and out of my vaginal area, scratching me.” I said pointedly. There it was out. The worst part of it was out.
“Go on,” she prodded.
“I was still 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 no. 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'd recently broken up with, was there with me; that it was him 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?”
No! Why's she making it sound like I'm the one on trial?
"No, not at all,” I answered tersely, “I suppose in my half-dream state, it was simply wishful thinking.”
There does that 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’ hold any significance to you, Ms. Preston?”
Why did I think she was asking me questions for which she already knew the answers?
“Yes. I'd received some threatening notes from someone calling me that name.”
“Anything other than that?”
“About eight years ago, 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?”
Once again I found myself explaining the events which had occurred when I'd come home unexpectedly on one of my mom’s date nights.
“Date night?”
There it was, just as predicted. I was sick of this already. I skipped to the condensed version.
“Yes, my mother was a prostitute, you see. On Saturday nights she had a ‘date night’ where one of her tricks would come over for dinner and would spend the whole night. On this particular night I had the misfortune of coming home unexpectedly,” I took a swig of water before I continued. “Apparently her date that night was Charlie Roberts. I didn’t really get a good look at the man. Mom tried to pass me off as her little sister. Then what I’ve already told you happened after that. That's the story about the name ‘Sissy.’”
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'd molested you eight years ago?”
“That’s correct. That had happened in Radcliff, Kentucky. I'd no reason to think Charlie was the same guy from Radcliff now in Bristol, Virginia working at the same place that I was.”
“Do you find that fact more than just co-incidental, Ms. Preston?”
“I guess I haven’t thought of it as anything other than just bad luck up to this point.”
“Please continue about the night you were assaulted, Ms. Preston.”
“He just kept touching me, and calling me ‘Sissy.’ I was thrashing around in my bed, trying to get away from him, trying to push him off of the bed. I remember him saying—”
I stopped myself right there. This was something that I'd just remembered Charlie saying to me the night I was attacked. Oh God, I didn’t want this to go on the record. It was too late.
“What did he say, Ms. Preston?”
I sighed, not wanting to continue, but knowing she would badger me for withholding information if I didn’t. “He said something like ‘Sissy likes it rough.’ He asked me if I wanted him to fuck me like the boss man did in the stable that night.”
“Who was he referring to, Ms. Preston.”
Oh God, Oh God, Oh God.
“Trey Sinclair. We'd made love once in the stables back in mid-August.”
“How would Charlie Roberts have known that?” she asked.
“He would have had to have been watching us,” I replied, blushing.
“Not necessarily,” she replied, “is it possible that Mr. Sinclair boasted about having sex with you in the stables to other workers there? Perhaps bragging to the other guys, that sort of thing?”
“No,” I responded, my anger showing, “it’s not possible.”
“Why are you so certain about that, Ms. Preston?”
“Because Trey has no recollection of that night,” I answered softly. I finished relaying the rest of what I remembered about the assault that night. I told her that I'd screamed for help until his fist had knocked me unconscious. I'd awakened two days later in the hospital.
Beth Denniston rose and walked over to a box that Detective Ryan had brought into the conference room with him.
“Ms. Preston, we have some evidence here in this box that we want you to identify on the record in this investigation, please.” She pulled out the plum silk camisole top that had been cut, along with the ripped plum silk shorts.
“Do you recognize these?”
“Yes, those are the silk pajamas I had on that night in Radcliff, Kentucky when Charlie Roberts came into my bedroom when I was 13 and sexually assaulted me.”
“Do you know how these items got torn and cut?”
“The bottoms were ripped off of me. I've no idea how the top got cut.”
“Do you know how Charlie would have been in possession of these items?”
“I've no idea. The only possibility is that my mother may have given them to him.”
“What would the purpose be in her doing that?”
“You'd have to ask her,” I answered.
She then pulled out the piece of paper that had typing on it reading, “I believe these belong to you, Sissy.”
“Do you recognize this piece of paper?” she asked.
“Yes, that's the note that was pinned to the camisole top that was left on the porch of my cottage.”
“And when did this happen, Ms. Preston?”
“I don’t recall the exact date, it was on a Sunday; I do remember that. Trey and I'd gone to eat at Morelli’s outside of Bristol that afternoon. He walked me back to my cottage, and the clothes and the note were in a shopping bag, hanging on the knob of my front door. I thought Trey had wanted to surprise me with a gift…” my voice trailed off.
“So Mr. Sinclair was with you when you found these on your porch?”
“Yes. He'd just had the locks changed. I think it was the end of June sometime.”
Ms. Denniston held up the two blue velvet jewelry boxes. “Can you identify these Ms. Preston?”
“Yes. These are the two blue velvet jewelry cases that were left in my cottage. I recognize the earrings and necklace as those previously given to me by my mother the night of my senior prom. I actually hadn’t seen them since the night of my prom. I thought I'd lost them at one of the after-prom parties. They showed up here in my cottage underneath my bed covers a day or two prior to the PJs being left on my door.”
“
Was there any note left with these?” she asked.
“No, just the boxes. I remember that I'd walked back to my cottage from the racetrack over at the Belle. It was dark, and my horse was…scratched from the last race. I noticed lights on in my cottage that had not been on when I left for the track earlier. I was looking through my own windows, when Trey came up on me. He went in the cottage to check it out before I did.”
“So Mr. Sinclair was there when you discovered these boxes under your bed covers?”
I didn’t like the tone her questioning was taking regarding Trey.
“Yes he was. We were discussing the matter of my horse being scratched from the race that evening. We weren’t entirely in agreement on it.”
Ms. Denniston pulled out another folded piece of paper from her box of goodies. It was inserted into a plastic sleeve like the other one. “Do you recognize this note Ms. Preston?” It was the one addressed to ‘Sissy’ stating the sender missed the sweet taste of her cunt and promising to find her.
“Yes. It was shoved underneath the door of my cottage.”
“Do you remember when that was?”
“Not the specific date, no. It was after the PJs were left.”
“Was Mr. Sinclair at the cottage when you found it?”
“No, actually Trey was in Atlanta where his law firm is located. My friend Gina was with me at the cottage. I wasn’t staying at the cottage; Gina and I were staying at the Sinclair manor. I had to go and get more clothes and stuff, so Gina went with me. She saw it on the floor inside the door and gave it to me.”
“Ms. Preston, is there any particular reason that you didn’t mention of lot of these incidents in your statement previously given to the detectives at the hospital?”
“Ms. Denniston, with what I've shared with you here this morning, you must see how ashamed, embarrassed, and humiliated I am about my past, about my mother, and the type of person that she was and still is for that matter. I know that there is a link between my mom and Charlie Roberts; to what extent, I've no way of knowing. I know that my trust was emptied out shortly after I arrived in Bristol. Trey believes that Charlie may be a co-conspirator in that as well. I only recently came to terms with the fact that my mother was and possibly still is a prostitute; that my heritage is a total mystery. So if I’m not particularly eager to discover whether my mom actually wanted me dead, and paid Charlie to do the job, it isn’t because I’m trying to obstruct justice in any way, it’s only because I’m not sure I could handle that much hate in one lifetime from my mother.”