by Drew Sera
“Of course, we will come with you. You didn’t think we’d just let you wander around, did you?” Colin asked.
Colin helped me into some soft lounge pants, a sweatshirt and my slippers. I was ready. Before we left the room, I kissed Anthony’s scratchy face and told him I loved him. Taking hold of Colin’s hand, we walked slowly down the hall. Matt walked on the other side of me I’m sure as a precaution in case I got wobbly or something.
They took me down to the cafeteria and Matt got me a bag of M&M’s. I planned on sharing some with Anthony when we got back to the room. I was tired now even though I hadn’t walked very far. Matt said I have to build my strength back up slowly.
On our way back to the room, I started feeling weaker as I thought about the room Paul kept me in. I started thinking about lots of things, and the next thing I knew, I was leaning on Colin. He asked me what was wrong, but I didn’t know exactly. I just started crying.
Chapter 11
Thursday, January 30th
Colin
She was fine and then she was a wreck. She went from happy, or seemingly okay, holding her candy bag, to a completely different demeanor. She seemed stiff and slumped over a bit when I noticed. Matt asked her if she was feeling okay and that’s when she leaned her body against mine. With her face between my hands, I asked her what was wrong and if she felt sick. Her eyes darted around and she began crying. She started to slide down my body and I truly believe that she would have gone all the way down to the floor if Matt and I hadn’t stopped her.
I picked her weakened body up and frowned when I saw her hands grab at her stomach. As I carried her back to her room I asked her as calmly as possible where she was hurting, but I didn’t get a response.
Once we got her back in the room, I put her on her bed and helped get her undressed and back in her pajamas. Matt listened to her heartbeat as I sat next to her and wrapped my arm around her shoulders.
“Sydney, you need to try to calm down, sweetheart. Your poor heart is working hard.”
“Baby, what hurts the most? Matt will fix it, but you have to tell us.”
She held my hand against her tummy and looked up at me with sad eyes. She kept trying to curl up or bend her knees. Matt suggested that her behavior was pointing to a nervous stomach.
“Her heart’s pounding and stomach hurts. She’s scared, or worried.”
I looked down at Sydney and moved my thumb slowly over her tummy.
“Baby, what were you thinking about in the hallway?” She was quiet, but she didn’t have the disconnected look that’s she’s had in the prior days. She was still with me. “Sydney, baby I’m not going to be angry. I want to help you and ease your worries.”
“I was thinking about the room,” Sydney whispered.
“The room? The room that Paul kept you in?”
She nodded and I picked her up and sat in the rocking chair with her. I wrapped the throw from our house around her and held her head against my chest and my other hand on her hip. I encouraged her to calm down and relax. She needed to rest. Matt handed me her sock monkey and it quickly disappeared under the blanket. I held her all afternoon and turned the rocking chair so that it was closer to Anthony’s bed.
Matt and I were talking while Anthony and Sydney slept, but stopped and looked at Anthony’s monitor when the heart rate picked up. Seconds later, he jerked awake. He quickly brought his hand up to his chest and began rubbing and scratching at his tee shirt. Matt stood and tried to prevent Anthony from going at his bandages. He was breathing hard and I really thought he was going to lose it.
“Stop, Matt.” Anthony voice came out rushed.
“Then leave your chest alone.”
Anthony flattened his hand over his chest and Matt sat back down.
“Anth,” I started, but Anthony quickly threw in a phrase that I didn’t anticipate I’d hear him say this soon.
“I killed him…I don’t want to talk about it, but I had to make sure you knew.” His voice was quiet, but sounded strained. I had a feeling that he might have been dreaming about it.
“I know, and I don’t blame you one bit,” I said calmly to him.
I nodded at him so he knew that I supported him and I wasn’t going to push this conversation now. He was faced with a terrible decision in the woods and it was him or Paul. I had a feeling that this is the source for his sleep disturbances.
Matt was sitting on the side of Anthony’s bed and I was still rocking Sydney when Anthony spoke again.
“Where was she?”
I took a deep breath and lowered my head to kiss the top of Sydney’s head. Before I spoke, my mind was lost again in that disgusting room Paul kept our girl in. While I knew that I needed to tread carefully with Anthony and this conversation, I wasn’t going to keep anything from him.
“She was in a room that was off the living room…The door had a few deadbolts on it, but it was open…It was dark. Pitch dark.” I let my mind race while I looked at Sydney sleeping in my arms. “She was curled up on the floor lying in…a lot of blood.”
“Fuck,” Anthony said under his breath and encouraged me to continue, only I couldn’t. I couldn’t seem to move forward past the blood. There was so much blood. I heard Matt pick up where I left off.
“The other woman from the other case was there. Dead, and hanging in the closet. The bottoms of her feet had been cut open and blood was seeping out of her body onto the floor. Sydney was lying in the other woman’s blood.” Matt paused and looked up at me trying to see if I wanted to continue. I shook my head and he nodded and continued. “Sydney was facing the closet and in shock. At first, we feared she wasn’t breathing because she hadn’t moved a muscle when we walked in. I knew it was either death or severe shock that caused her to not even flinch when she heard someone enter the room. But Colin started saying how we were too late and Sydney started moving a chain that she was attached to trying to get our attention. She wasn’t in good condition; blood everywhere, she shook, she was cut and weak. She was so cold and thirsty. I found the keys and got her out of the chains and she locked her arms around Colin.”
I watched Anthony’s face turn red as Matt retold the conditions in which we found Sydney. When Matt stopped talking, Anthony let his head slump back against the pillow and his hands covered his stomach and chest. I knew his head was working on trying to figure out if Sydney saw Paul murder that woman. That was something he and I needed the answer to, but neither of us could ask her that yet.
Sydney woke up about an hour or so later from a bad dream. She was scared and jumpy and I felt so bad for her.
“Shh, baby. Just a dream.” I stroked her hair and looked over her head at Anthony.
Anthony pushed himself up in bed, fluffed the pillows behind him and held his hands out like he was ready to receive a basketball pass.
“Let me hold my sunshine.”
I set her down carefully on the bed next to Anthony and he wrapped her up in his arms and kissed her forehead.
I watched him hold her, soothe her and listened to him say all of the things Sydney needed to hear. My heart swelled as I watched the two of them; each of them dealing with their own hurt, but Anthony shelving his to console Sydney.
Matt’s folks arrived and I let them talk me into dinner. Matt said he would stay with Sydney and Anthony and I wasn’t as nervous leaving today because I knew Sydney was safely tucked inside the arms of a man that would take a bullet and kill for her. Somehow, that calmed me.
Chapter 12
Thursday, January 30th
Anthony
“Where’d you get the M&M’s, sunshine?” I asked Sydney.
She was curled up to my side and the longer she lay there with me, the better I felt. Colin had told me about their walk and how she just started crying while they were out. He knows it’s going to take time.
Matt sat in the rocking chair and I asked him to pass me the candy. He looked cautiously at me but handed it over.
“Not too many, Anth.”
>
Seriously?
“Sydney and I have been through hell, Matt. M&M’s; a few, or the whole fucking bag, isn’t going to kill Sydney or I.”
Against better judgment, I stretched to reach a tissue on the table next to the bed and instantly regretted it. Pain shot from everywhere and of course, Matt saw it. He stood, but I held my hand up that had been resting on Sydney’s back, asking him to just give me a second. I caught my breath and spread the tissue out over my t-shirt. I opened the bag and poured a few out onto the tissue before I popped a few in my mouth. I left the green ones for Sydney.
“Now, where’d you get these, sunshine?” I asked her again. “I hope it wasn’t from some other guy,” I lightly joked with her.
Sydney let loose a small laugh. “Matt.”
“Matt’s okay. You can accept candy from him. He’s not another guy. He’s family. But, you’re going to have to share these with me otherwise, he’ll freak out that you’re eating too much candy.”
She laughed and then said something and made the candy feel like rocks in my stomach.
“I haven’t had them in a long time.”
I looked up at Matt and could tell he felt bad too. My chest ached. She put her head on my shoulder and continued picking up M&M’s and putting them in her mouth while I stroked her hair.
“I know, sunshine…I know.”
She was quiet and after the M&M’s were gone, she told me she was tired.
“Sleep, sunshine. I have you.”
“I can stay here?”
I glanced at Matt and he nodded.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way, Sydney.” I swallowed hard as she settled back down against me. “I haven’t had this in a long time either.”
I could feel her moving around under the blanket and remained quiet until she was satisfied with everything. I stared up at the ceiling while her hands moved. She lifted my t-shirt, pushed the sock monkey under the shirt against the huge bandage over my chest, and gently placed her hand over my scar. I closed my eyes. This was the best I’ve felt in weeks.
Chapter 13
Friday, January 31st
Colin
Today brought a lot of visitors and progress from Sydney. She was talking more on her own and was continuing to recover. Anthony even seemed to be doing a little better, too. Sydney was sitting on the bed having her toenails painted by Gina and Matt’s folks quietly sat off to the side.
Sydney was being discharged today. I was very happy about that and wanted badly to get her home where she belongs, but Anthony still had to stay even though he tried to get discharged. My concern over him has been growing this week since he’s been in the same room with Sydney. He hasn’t been sleeping well, and it could all just be the medication, but he’s also on edge. I was hoping now that we had Sydney back, he’d start feeling better and would sleep and eat better. Maybe he just needs to get home and for things to return to normal.
While Gina and Sydney finished up with their coffee cake, Matt, Blake and I went for a short walk out to the patio with Anthony. He was being encouraged to get up and move about even though he gets tired after walking longer distances, but he’s trying. He’s been doing better, but still has a way to go. He seems to get winded easily, but Matt said it’s to be expected right now. His mood has even improved and has been joking around some.
“How are you feeling?” Matt asked Anthony as we settled in at the patio furniture in the pavilion.
“Fine. I want to go home, Matt.”
“Patience. You’re almost there.”
Anthony sighed loudly and leaned his head back against the chair and then looked over at me.
“Take good care of her, man. Hold her as much as you can. You aren’t going to the office until I get home at least, are you?”
“Fuck, no. Anthony…” I wasn’t sure if this was the place for this conversation, but I needed to ease his worries. I wasn’t going back to work until Sydney and Anthony were feeling comfortable and were settled. I had decided this many nights ago. “Anthony, I’m going to take a leave of absence until things are settled and you and her are both doing better. I’m going to talk to Mitch and James.”
“Col, the Cheng deal is going to be needing attention soon. Delivery is coming up. It’s important. You’ve worked so hard for it.”
Business didn’t even rank on the chart of importance to me right now.
“Business is just that, it’s business. Work. You and Sydney are my life. Life is so damn precious, Anthony. Don’t you get that yet? Fuck, a bullet was pulled from your chest and your lung collapsed. You could have died! Sydney was ripped from our clutches and held captive for two weeks. He could have killed her or taken her out of the country! You and Sydney are everything. Everything. Mitch can handle work.”
I tried to calm myself down and stop ranting, but he needed to understand that they are my priority. I don’t think any of us fully understood the emotional and psychological toll that these few weeks was going to have. As much as I didn’t want to upset him or put any stress on him, I wanted him to understand my concern and why I wasn’t going to the office for a while.
“Anth, I carried our girl out of a room where she was tortured for weeks. Blood dripped from Sydney’s body as I carried her. She was lying in blood facing that closet where the woman hung. We don’t know if she saw him kill that woman. All we know is the shit Paul sent to my cell phone. There is some serious stuff we’re going to have to deal with.”
“I fucking understand that, Colin.” The words rushed from Anthony’s mouth with anger as he stood and put his hands on his hips. “I saw the images too. I watched the video by your side of Paul flogging her and pressing the violet wand on her body against welts. Over and over and over.” Anthony turned to face me. “I’m sorry I didn’t go with you into the cabin, but I wasn’t going to let him get away. Not after what he did to her.”
I nodded at him and he flopped back down in his chair. What happened out in the woods, was also something we needed to handle with care.
“We will have a lot going on, Anth. Work will not interfere with her recovery or yours.”
Anthony nodded and put his hand over his chest and stared upwards at the cloud-covered sky. Matt began talking about Sydney needing to see Chris almost daily for a while. I agreed and thought that Anthony and I could also benefit from it. I just wanted to get all of us home and under one roof.
“Blake and I are going to stay with Anthony until he’s released,” Matt said to me but Anthony balked about it.
“You guys are not putting your lives on hold for me. Blake, you have a wife and two subs to take care of, and Matt your family has been through the ringer with us. Let your parents go home and you get back to Gina. I don’t need a babysitter.”
Matt, Blake and I stared at him. He hates being the center of attention and was scared to death to ask for help. He wasn’t going to win this battle and I think he realized that and stopped wasting his breath or working himself up.
While the four of us focused on talking football to lighten things up, Blake’s cell rang. He frowned and then answered it while walking a few feet away. He looked stiff and we picked up on some phrases. It sounded like he was talking to Detective Prestin. When he hung up, Blake sat back down and looked at Anthony.
“That was Detective Prestin.”
“And?” I asked.
“He and Detective Foreman need to speak with Anthony and I.”
I looked over at Anthony and could feel the nervousness radiating off of him. He sat still and looked down nodding.
“When?” Anthony asked.
“They’re stopping by later this afternoon.”
Anthony continued to nod and rub on his chest. What the fuck was this going to be about? They weren’t dare going to try to pin Anthony with anything, I hoped. They couldn’t. Paul would have killed Anthony.
“Col, you should leave with Sydney before they get here,” Anthony said to me without making eye contact.
My m
ind flashed back to yesterday while I held Sydney in the rocking chair and Anthony told me about shooting Paul in the woods. It was hard for Anthony. I think he was afraid of what I’d think of him. Truth be told, I couldn’t have been happier at the news that Anthony unloaded a gun into Paul’s body. Paul could have killed our fragile kitten.
“I’m not leaving, but I will keep Sydney away from your conversation with the police.”
The four of us talked about an attorney. Mostly it was Matt, Blake and I that talked while Anthony was off in his own world. It would be smart for an attorney to be here while the police are here. Just as a precaution. I had a legal team from work but they were all corporate attorneys. Will and Evan were both defense attorneys and we all knew they’d help out in a heartbeat. Blake vocalized that he thought we should call Will. We weren’t leaving Anthony unprotected. Minutes later Blake was on the phone with Will and within the hour, he was here at the hospital.
We were all sitting in Sydney and Anthony’s room when Prestin and Foreman came in. Anthony looked like he could be ill at any moment. Prestin and Foreman were nice enough though and I didn’t get the impression this was going to be a bad visit. They came over and greeted Sydney and asked how she was feeling. She answered their questions but remained quiet after that. I continued to rock her in my arms and eyed Will, hoping he knew how important Anthony was to Sydney and myself. Blake introduced Prestin and Foreman to Will and it pulled a laugh from Prestin.
“Blake, you never cease to amaze me, my friend. Already outfitted with an attorney.” Prestin slapped Blake on the back as they joked.
“You know how it is, Prestin. Can’t be too cautious. I thought it was best,” Blake countered.
Prestin nodded and asked if there was somewhere where they could talk. Matt was going with them and I knew he’d put an end to anything that stressed Anthony out. I felt better knowing that Blake and Matt would be with him.