“Then there are healthier ways to go about it than not eating. Watching the calories and fat content of the food you eat, for instance. Your mom and grandma could help with that. And exercising. But losing weight takes time. And it sounds like you need to figure out a way to deal with these mean girls right away, so you can stop hating school.”
Jillian nodded.
“For that I think it’s best for you to talk to your mom or your grandma. Or even your uncle Shane. He’s smart.” And no doubt very skilled at stealth, which could come in handy.
Jillian started to argue, but Brooke held up her hand. “I will sit with you and whoever you choose to tell. I will participate in the discussion of what to do. But you need family on your side. I’m only here for a few days.”
“You’re so nice.” Jillian dove in her direction and Brooke caught her in a hug. She’d probably been hugged more in the last few hours than in the past few years.
She squeezed Jillian and felt her flinch as if in pain. Brooke loosened her hold immediately. “I’m sorry.”
Jillian looked miserable and ashamed and completely distraught.
Brooke touched the girl’s chin and lifted her face. “Did someone hurt you?” The thought made her sick.
Jillian tried to look away. Oh, no. Not going to happen. Something had to be done. Now.
Eventually Jillian nodded.
Then slowly she turned on her side and raised the hem of her shirt almost up to her armpit, exposing a huge, dark, painful-looking bruise that extended from the area lateral to her right breast almost to her back. “Two of those mean girls pushed me down in the locker room. I tripped over a third one and fell into the wooden bench.”
“Did you tell a teacher?” Careful to maintain Jillian’s privacy, Brooke moved a part of the shirt to get a better look. Outrage started to build. What type of animals would hurt this sweet girl?
“No,” Jillian said as the bedroom door flew open, slamming into the wall with a loud bang.
Jillian jerked down her shirt and held it, trapping Brooke’s hand beneath it.
And there stood Charlotte, looking ready to commit murder, her eyes locked on Brooke.
That’s when Brooke realized she, a woman currently under investigation for sexually abusing multiple minors, was half-lying on a bed with a twelve-year-old, with her hand caught under the girl’s shirt.
Chapter Twelve
“She’s too queasy to eat?” Ma whispered loudly, as soon as Brooke had disappeared up the stairs. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.” Her voice got louder. “Shane Alexander Develen, did you get that sweet girl pregnant? Is that why you brought her here?”
All eyes stared at him.
“What? No! I’ve been hospitalized or in physical rehab for eight weeks—a good chunk of that time unable to walk on my own—and you haven’t let me out of your sight for the past two. When exactly do you think I had the time or the energy to travel to New York to get Brooke pregnant?”
Silence.
Exactly.
Then Ma looked him right in the eye. “You told us the wrong discharge time. You left the rehab hospital before we arrived to bring you home. You disappeared for seventy-two hours. Three whole days.” He hated the anguish in her voice, still, after all this time.
In almost constant pain, facing an uncertain future, feeling weak and frustrated by his limitations, he’d been at his lowest point to date. So he’d filled his prescriptions before sneaking out, hitching a ride to the bank, where he hailed a cabbie to drive him to a liquor store and a roadside motel about an hour away. Loaded up with a month’s supply of narcotic pain medication, muscle relaxers, and sleeping pills, a couple of bottles of Jack, and enough cash to pay for a few nights, he’d checked in under a false name, with no intention of ever checking out—of the motel that is.
“You never told us where you went,” Ma reminded him. “Just showed up at our front door like you were returning home from vacation.”
How did a man tell his parents he’d sunk so low, been so pathetic and despondent, that he’d lost his will to live? That to avoid sullying their home and their memory of him he’d gone away alone, intending to kill himself. Only he couldn’t do it.
Because no matter how much he drank in his attempt to quiet her voice in his head, snippets of Brooke’s words from hundreds of conversations, letters, and e-mails lectured him. “You’re stronger than you give yourself credit, Shane.” “I have confidence you’ll make the right decision.” “Know that I’m here for you, always, thinking of you, praying for you.”
She’d saved him. Again.
Some days he still wondered if that was a good thing.
His throat felt clogged. He cleared it. “I apologized for making you worry.” He pushed his food around his plate. “I wasn’t with Brooke. As far as I know, she isn’t pregnant.”
If she was, she would have said something, right? Then he remembered she’d only picked at her lunch, and she’d slept for several hours during the trip home. Maybe she’d taken his lack of contact as a sign he wasn’t interested. Maybe she’d found someone else, someone interested in having a girlfriend, someone ready for a pretty wife, a house, and kids. Suddenly he felt queasy.
The thought of her pregnant with another man’s baby enraged him, which made no sense. She wasn’t his. She could do what she wanted.
“Mom, c’mere,” Matt called from the TV room, where he’d gone to play on his laptop after taking a few bites of ziti.
“What is it, honey?” Charlotte asked loudly.
“There’s a picture of Uncle Shane’s friend Brooke on my computer.”
Shit. Shane stood. “Don’t look at that,” he yelled.
Charlotte got up.
“I’ll handle this,” Shane said. Brooke would be mortified if his family saw her negligee picture.
Charlotte, being Charlotte, didn’t listen. While Shane fumbled to find his cane, she joined her son. By the time he reached them, his sister was too engrossed in looking at whatever was on the computer screen to notice.
“That woman is upstairs alone with my daughter.” Charlotte looked madder than he’d ever seen her as she jumped up from the couch. When she handed the laptop back to Matt, Shane caught a glimpse of Brooke’s staff yearbook photo, the one that’d accompanied all the news stories of her investigation.
Double shit.
Charlotte tried to push past him. He stopped her. “Calm down.”
“Don’t tell me to calm down,” she screeched, struggling against his hold. “This is the big secret? You brought a fugitive, a woman accused of molesting children, into Ma’s house?”
Fuck.
Someone at the table gasped. Silverware clattered onto a plate. A chair, maybe two or three, pushed along the hard wood floor of the dining room.
Shane was fast losing control of this situation. “No. Give me a minute to explain.”
Unfortunately, Charlotte had a crazed look in her eyes that told him loud and clear she was beyond listening. “You gave this woman access to my children?” She yanked her arm away with such force that Shane almost lost his balance. “And you said nothing?” She ran for the stairs.
“It’s all a big misunderstanding,” Shane called after her, hobbling as fast as he could, which wasn’t near fast enough considering Charlotte took the stairs two at a time. “Stop, damn it. Listen to me.”
She did neither.
Shane turned into Lucy’s room mere seconds after Charlotte, Ma behind him, Lucy behind her, all of them frozen at the sight before them, Brooke on the bed with Jillian, her hand under his niece’s shirt.
“It’s not what it looks like,” Brooke said.
Then all hell broke loose.
Without warning, Charlotte, who was much bigger and stronger than Brooke, lunged for the bed, latched onto Brooke’s forearm, and flung her, screaming, “Get your filthy hands off my daughter, you freak.”
Jillian yelled, “Mom, no.”
Ma yelled, “Charlotte, control yourself.�
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Shane didn’t waste time with words. He wrapped an arm around his sister’s waist and jerked her back. But it was too late. Brooke stumbled across the floor, falling, unable to stop until her right upper arm and shoulder hit the drawers of the desk, hard.
“Someone call the police,” Charlotte yelled. “I want her in jail.”
“Mom, please,” Jillian pleaded. Unable to penetrate her mother’s enraged haze, she jumped off the bed, tears streaming down her cheeks, and ran to Ma. “Grandma, I need to tell you what happened.” Without saying a word Ma put her arm around her first and only granddaughter and hurried her out of the room.
Brooke got to her feet and looked at Shane. “It’s not what it looked like.”
Shane wanted to believe her. But he’d seen Brooke’s hand up Jillian’s shirt with his own eye. His loving, innocent niece. Violated. He felt sick. He felt responsible. He’d brought Brooke here. He’d accepted her story, automatically assuming she’d been wrongly accused. He never should have allowed her contact with his niece and nephew without keeping a closer eye on her, until he was sure.
“You don’t believe me,” she said quietly, staring up at him, the fingers of one hand rubbing her pearl necklace, the other hand holding her right upper arm, and an expression of such hurt and despair it ripped through him.
“You’re damn right he doesn’t believe you!” Charlotte yelled. And before Shane knew what she had planned, she drew back her arm and slapped Brooke across the face. “Because you’re a damn liar, looking all prim and proper.” She gripped a handful of Brooke’s sweater with one hand and a hunk of her hair with the other, pulling her close, pushing her away, thrashing her around like a rag doll.
“Are you insane?” Shane tried to get control of his sister’s hands without hurting Brooke further. Thank goodness Lucy stepped in to help. This time when he restrained Charlotte he held her arms, too. There would be no getting free until he set her free. “Settle down.”
She didn’t.
Until Ma came back and yelled, “Charlotte Alice Develen, you calm down this instant or I’m going for the spoon.”
Charlotte went still.
Shane didn’t let go of her, just in case.
Ma bent to help Brooke, who’d fallen to the floor again. Her hair was a mess, her prim pink sweater stretched in spots. She held her hand to the cheek Charlotte had slapped, staring at nothing in particular, looking very much in shock.
Regardless of what he’d seen, Shane’s first urge was to take her into his arms and comfort her. But his arms were full of his out-of-control sister.
“This is all your fault, Charlotte,” Ma said.
“What?” Charlotte asked, completely outraged. Shane held her firm. “It’s not my fault. It’s her fault.” She thrust her chin in Brooke’s direction.
Ma guided Brooke to the now-disheveled bed. “Sit down before you fall down, honey.”
Brooke did.
“You jump to conclusions,” Ma told Charlotte. “You fly out of control at the slightest provocation. You’ve been doing it since you were a teenager. It has to stop.”
“Hold on,” Charlotte said. She turned to look at Shane. “Let go of me…Please.”
Ma nodded, so he did. But with a warning, “You touch Brooke again and you will regret it.” He moved to stand between them.
Charlotte scanned the occupants of the room, looking from Ma to Shane to Lucy. “You all saw what I did. You all came to the same conclusion I did. Don’t you dare deny it.”
Ma said, “But you’re the only one who flew into an attack without giving Brooke or Jillian a chance to explain.”
Shane realized they’d all reacted just like the parents at Brooke’s school. In his opinion, actually seeing what looked like sexual abuse of a child, especially of one you love, had to be much worse than hearing or reading about it, but in all three instances the immediate emotional response of parents and family members was to think the worst of Brooke without ever giving her a chance to explain.
He was a total idiot, so much worse than his family, because he was her friend. He should have given her the benefit of the doubt, if nothing else he should have done a better job of protecting her like he’d promised. …You’re safe with me, Brooke. I promise.
He turned to check on her. She wouldn’t look at him.
Ma continued talking to Charlotte. “Now your daughter is downstairs, curled up in her grandpa’s lap, hysterically crying, worried you hurt the only friend in the world she feels comfortable talking to.” She turned her attention to Brooke and softened her voice. “A friend who told her she needed to confide in a family member she trusted because her problem was too big for her to handle on her own.” She leaned in to give Brooke a gentle hug. “Thank you. Jillian gave me the quick version, but she promised to tell me everything if I’d come back in to save you.”
“I’m glad” was all Brooke said.
“What are you talking about, and why the hell is my daughter talking to some stranger instead of talking to me?” Charlotte snapped.
To everyone’s surprise, Brooke pushed off the bed and stood tall, facing Charlotte, not showing a speck of fear, as she said, in what Shane suspected was her teacher voice, “Because she was scared you’d go barreling into school all out of control and crazy—and, for your information, ‘out of control’ and ‘crazy’ were her exact words—and make everything worse. Based on your recent display of bad behavior, I see she is a smart girl with a valid concern.”
Brooke had an inner strength, a quiet confidence. Without cursing, raising her voice, or lifting a finger in violence, she had put his sister in her place. Shane couldn’t help but be impressed.
Then Brooke moved around the room collecting her things. “I’ll be gone within the hour.”
What? No.
She took out her phone.
“What are you doing?” Shane asked.
“Calling Aaron,” she answered, still not looking at him. “It was a mistake to come here.”
Shane’s heart shriveled in his chest. He’d been a total moron, doubting her when she’d needed his trust the most. He had to talk to her in private to explain, to apologize and fix things between them. “Please—” he started, but the sound of police sirens stopped him.
Brooke sucked in a breath and held it, and Shane watched as all the color drained from her face.
“Who the hell called the cops?” He took a step toward Brooke only to have his mother block his way.
Lucy spoke up. “I’m sorry. It looked so bad. Charlotte went crazy. When she yelled out for someone to call the police I did.”
Ma looked directly at him. “You should have told us what was going on with Brooke when you brought her here. And you,” she turned to Charlotte, “made this entire situation a thousand times worse than it had to be. Now you both need to go downstairs and talk to the police to fix it. I’ll stay up here with Brooke.” Ma glared at Charlotte. “If she wants to press charges for assault I won’t try to stop her.”
“Don’t let her call Aaron.” Shane couldn’t lose Brooke now, not like this.
“Go,” his mother ordered.
Familiar with the tone in her voice, Shane knew arguing would do no good. So he went.
—
Later that night, Shane yanked open yet another drawer in the kitchen looking for the key to Lucy’s room.
His mother came up behind him. “You’re not going to find it.”
“You develop some psychic abilities while I was away?”
“It’s not hard to figure out what you’re looking for.” She leaned her hip against the counter and watched him. “You’ve dragged yourself up those stairs at least a dozen times in the last few hours, knocking on Brooke’s door, begging her to open it.”
“Not begging.” Definitely begging.
“You’re looking for the key to let yourself in, and I happen to know you won’t find it,” she crossed her arms over her chest, “because I gave her both copies.”
He turned to face his mother. “You what?” Wasn’t she supposed to be on his side?
“Calm down,” she said. “Brooke has had a very traumatic day. She asked for some time alone. I’m making sure she gets it.”
But she’d locked herself in that room through his telling the entire story of her situation to his family and the police and then retelling it to Ma when she finally came downstairs, earning himself a whack on the back of his neck with the wooden spoon—which hurt just as much as he remembered—for guilting Brooke into sending him sexy pictures. And Brooke had still refused to acknowledge him, even hours after everyone else had left.
How was she feeling? What was she thinking? Planning?
Shane needed to know. Now. He was done waiting. He needed to see her, to talk to her, to apologize and explain. “Fine.” He turned toward the stairs. “You leave me no choice. I’m going to ram that door off the hinges.”
“I warned her you might try,” Ma said, sounding amused. “Which is why I suggested she wedge the desk chair under the doorknob to shore it up.”
He stopped. Wanted to hit something. Un-fucking-believable.
“You really like this girl,” she said.
Shane shrugged. It didn’t matter if he really liked her or not. “We’re friends. Don’t make more out of it than there is.” They had no future together. That didn’t mean he wanted her hating him for the rest of her life.
“I had a long talk with Brooke. She promised not to run off in the middle of the night.”
So trusting. Unlike Shane. Brooke was a smart woman. And a smart woman would get as far away from him as fast as she could, as soon as she could.
“Use this time to calm down,” Ma suggested. “So when she does come out—and she will come out—you don’t pounce the minute you see her and scare her back in.”
He did kind of feel like a caged animal. Pacing. Waiting.
“She hasn’t eaten dinner.” Ma turned off the kitchen light and walked toward the stairs. “I told her to help herself when she gets hungry. My guess is she’ll wait until she thinks we’re all asleep.” She bent to flick on the night-light at the base of the stairs. “If you insist on waiting for her, sitting right there,” she pointed to his dad’s recliner, which faced the kitchen, “in the dark, is probably your best bet.”
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