by J. Dallas
Instead of letting myself see the red, see the blood, I looked at his sweater instead, at his wrists, at his chest, at my own hand. “Is she okay?”
“I don’t know.” He looked for me, caught my chin. His hand was icy against my skin.
“Come with me. Please.”
Scream, little girl—
I wanted to. It was trapped inside me.
But I didn’t. Go with Drake. To Chicago. I wanted to say yes. I could handle going to Chicago, even if I had to walk through the doors of a hospital, relive the nightmare that crowded my head every time those familiar scents assaulted me. I could do it. I wanted to, wanted to be there for him.
One thing, so small as to be insignificant, stopped me. It was just a piece of paper. I could tear it up and forget I’d seen it. The mail lost it, the cat ate it—no, I didn’t have a cat, but nobody needed to know.
But those details had the name, the date, the time. I’d face him again, the man who’d fisted his hand in my hair and told me to scream, just so he could beat my father, my mother. Face the man who’d dragged me off the street and forced me into a dirty, stinking trunk. I’d been trapped in there for hours while he drove around, convinced I was going to die. I had to face the man who’d told his partner to do it, to kill my parents.
I opened my mouth, tried to force the words out. They caught in my throat and I just couldn’t speak.
I can’t. That was all I had to say.
Five days.
I only had five days.
Swallowing, I asked, “How long will it take?”
“It could take a few days.”
Turning away, I gripped the counter. “I can’t come until Monday evening.”
A humorless laugh filled the air. “Wow. Thanks.”
“Drake, I…”
“No. It’s okay.” Just like that, he turned his back on me. The action cut me to the very bottom of my soul. “Well…fuck. Here I go thinking we’re trying to make this work. But yeah. Monday.”
“Drake, wait,” I said, shoving myself toward him on stiff, awkward legs.
“No. My mom, my family needs me.”
My mom needs me. And beyond that, I had to do this…for me. Every time I faced him, I tried to pretend I’d get stronger, be less afraid. It never happened, I was always afraid. But I had to try.
Tell him. The words were there. They were there. But I couldn’t force them out. I was frozen. All I could say was, “Drake, please.”
By time I managed to unfreeze myself, even a little, he was already gone, striding out of the cottage like demons were at his heels. He didn’t slow down and I heard an engine roar before I even hit the front door.
Chapter Seven
My calls went to voice mail.
Part of me wanted to be pissed. But then again, I’d walked away in Philadelphia.
I tried texting him, half expecting him to ignore me. I didn’t go into detail, just kept it simple. I’d go right now, if I could. I have something I have to take care of first.
He did respond, to my surprise.
You don’t owe me explanations. I hope you understand, but I need to focus on my family right now. If you want to join me in Chicago, just let my assistant at the Cove know. She’s aware that you’re a friend of mine and I’ll leave instructions with her on where you can find me. She’ll get you a ticket once she hears from you.
I made a face. I could get my own damn ticket.
For now, I had to get out of here, though. The silence of the place closed around me and threatened to drive me mad.
It seemed the two of us might forever be dancing around the edge, never able to fully give the other what we both needed.
I needed to get in touch with Mom, make sure everything was set up for the trip to Florida. Staring at the phone, I thought of things I wanted to tell him, explanations I could offer. If he’d called, if he’d answered, I would have tried. But a text message wasn’t exactly the right venue for saying…I have to go to Florida and make sure one of my attackers stays in jail, make sure he pays for what he did to my family.
Besides, Drake really didn’t need that weight on his brain, did he?
Instead, I simply texted him a simple message: I’ll miss you.
It was nothing but the truth. I’d missed him every day for the past ten years. It didn’t matter that it would only be a few days before I’d see him. I was still going to miss him. At least I’d have something to look forward to, other than dread, as I thought about the upcoming week.
I watched my screen, waiting for a response.
There wasn’t one, though.
It left a void in me. An awful, gaping void.
My mother picked me up from the airport the next day, just before noon. My head still felt like it was stuffed with cotton, but less achy. My eyes protested the sunlight. My body protested movement and even touch, but as Mom wrapped her arms around me, I sighed and tucked my head against her shoulder. For a minute, I could pretend I was a kid again, and she was one of the few people in the world who could make everything better.
“You look like you haven’t slept well in a week,” she murmured.
Then I’d done wonders with my make-up because it had been a lot longer than a week. With an easy smile, I pulled back and shrugged. “It’s that time of year. Almost through it, right?”
She sighed and brushed my hair back. “Shannon, baby, sooner or later, you have to move past this. I…” She closed her eyes, took a deep breath. “In my gut, I think we have to face the truth. I don’t see them making Young serve his entire sentence.”
Bitter words brewed inside me. I kept them locked where they were. “I know.” Weariness dogged me as I edged around, pulling my wheeled suitcase behind me. “I’m surprised they didn’t let him go last year. That doesn’t mean I’m not going to try.”
“Of course not.” She helped me maneuver the suitcase in. Normally, I would have argued with her, but I still felt like hell and I didn’t want her to ask, didn’t want to go into detail about the fall, or anything. Especially Drake. “You wouldn’t know how to give up. You got that from me.”
I should have realized then, that she was going to meddle.
But she waited, until we were pulling away from the airport, until we were far away from the rush of the city and lost in the winding streets that led to the place she’d called home for the past few years. Forty minutes of peace, forty minutes of silence lulled me.
Then, her voice level and soft, she asked, “So…who is Mike?”
My hands, clasped in my lap, tightened until I’d made the knuckles go white. “Ah…just a friend.”
“Hmmm. My daughter who hasn’t had a guy friend that I’m aware of since…well…ever…has a guy friend she trusts well enough to help her out after a head injury, one she didn’t tell me about, might I add? And I’m supposed to believe he’s just a friend?” A serene smile curved her lips as she shook her head. “I’m not buying it. How long have you known him? Where did you meet?”
My mouth went dry. Panic crashed into me. How did I answer that? How would she feel? She’d never seemed to carry the rage inside her like I had, but how did I know this wouldn’t hurt her?
“Work,” I said, forcing the word out. “We met through my last job. I’ve known him a while.”
Her brow furrowed. “But I thought you weren’t there long. Didn’t you tell me you quit? Although, honestly Shan, I know you want to work, but you can’t settle. It seems like you have an awful time figuring out what you want.”
I didn’t respond.
“Honey?”
“Yes?” I squeezed my eyes closed, face averted so she couldn’t read anything there.
“Do you know what you want?”
An image of Drake, of that lovely, sprawling little place he’d created on the beach flashed through my mind. Both of the dreams I’d thought I’d lost. But if I could only have one?
I’d take Drake.
“I know what I want, Mom. It’s just…sometime
s knowing isn’t enough.”
She reached over and covered my fisted hands with one of hers, gave them a quick squeeze. “You have so much of your dad in you. Such a dreamer. But you’re smart, so much more determined. You can make your dreams come true if you want it enough, if you’re willing to fight hard enough.”
She let go and put her hand back on the wheel, her gaze still on the road. “So, you going to give me any more information on this…Mike? His voice was awfully familiar.”
I bit back a groan. “It’s still kind of up in the air.”
“So basically, you’re not ready to tell me.” She wrinkled her nose. “You never did like to talk about any guy you were interested in. Not that there have been many. The only one that ever caught your eye for longer than a minute was Drake Gallagher.”
Before I could stop it, my head spun around and I gaped at her.
She laughed softly. “Oh, come on. Are you really surprised that I saw it? I knew, from the get-go. I wanted to warn you, but I didn’t want you angry at me and your father…or even with Drake himself. I think it made him nervous. He was such a shy thing—you remember Stella, the girl we’d bring in to help with meetings? How she flirted with any man in pants? She’d teased him something terrible and he’d go almost as red as his hair and he acted so stiff and proper around her. Last I heard, she still works there, at the new place. He offered to keep on the old staff if they wanted. She’s worked her way up, helps manage the place now. Settled down, too. Got married, has a child or two.”
All of that flew through my head, without connecting.
“You knew about Drake,” I said, my lips numb.
“That you had a crazy crush on him? Yes.” She shot me an odd look before focusing back on the road. “Why is that such a surprise?”
Shaking my head, I looked back out the window as fields flew by. What would she do, I wondered, if I told her that it was more than a crush I had on Drake—that even now the very mention of his name made my heart race, my knees melt and my brain just turn off.
I didn’t know.
And now wasn’t the time to think about it either.
I had to get through the next few days first. Then I’d go be with Drake. Then, if I could find the brain cells, I’d figure out how to handle telling my mom.
* * * * *
Life in jail hadn’t treated Todd Young kindly.
This was the first year I’d actually been able to see him clearly, though. To see him and realize there was something behind the monster from my dreams.
Ten years ago, when he’d been arrested, his lawyers had put him in a nice suit, cut his dark hair, so he made the impression of a nice, trustworthy, all-around good boy. He’d made a mistake, sure, but didn’t everybody?
The judge hadn’t bought it.
He gave a speech more by rote than anything else. He’d been long, lean and lanky before. Now he was solid, through and through, with heavy muscle. His cheekbones pressed against his skin like razors and I could see the prison tattoos peeking out from under his shirt, along his neck. His hair was greasy and thin, lines fanning out from his eyes.
None of that meant much.
His eyes were dead. That was the disturbing thing. Those eyes were like dead bits of glass in his face, uncaring and sharp. Looking at those mean eyes was enough to make my skin crawl, but I didn’t flinch.
I’d known so much fear because of this man.
I’d hated, so much, because of this man.
And there he sat, staring at me like I was nothing. He’d tried to make me into nothing. Worse…for so many years, I’d let him. I’d slid into the shadows and barely even made a pretense at life.
The hot, potent anger that I’d thought had died flooded me. It was the anger I’d felt when I thought of Drake, the anger that I’d thought had died. Anger that had been directed at the wrong people for far too long.
Now, as I stared at the man who’d helped destroy my life, I let the anger burn the fear until it was cowering inside me. I looked at him and I didn’t flinch. Not once as he stared at me. I didn’t look away as they called my name and not as I spoke about what had been done. To me, to my family, to my father. I told how he’d whispered in my ear, how he’d laughed the few times he’d made me scream.
“It’s still vivid, even now,” I said, looking from the people in their nice suits with their unaffected smiles back to Young. None of them would be touched by this, save for him, my mom and me. We were the ones who would feel this.
Just as we were the ones who still felt the ripples from that day long ago.
Ripples that even now were interfering with my life.
Abruptly, I started to laugh.
“Is something funny?”
I looked up at the man in front of me.
“No,” I said quietly. “This is all crazy and insane and tragic. I’m here…again, letting that monster dictate how I live my life. What I do with my life. Who I’ll be with.”
I was here, in a room with a man I hated, instead of being in Chicago with the man I loved, the man who needed me. “There’s a man in Chicago right now who needs me with him,” I said softly. “He wanted me with him. I had to put my life on hold.”
I looked away, stared at my mom for a minute and then looked at the bland beige walls, the bland, insipid pictures. “My life was spun around into hell the moment that monster over there grabbed me and threw me into a trunk. I remember every time he hit me—sixteen times,” I murmured. A phantom ache rose from my belly. “They hit my parents even more than that and they left bruises and broken bones. You’d think that getting out alive would be enough. That sooner or later, you can shut out the sound of hearing those bones break. That you might forget the sound of his voice in your ear as he told you to scream, just so he’d have a reason to hit your parents, beat them in front you.”
I shook my head, looking at Young. “You don’t forget. He’s spent all these years in prison. Whether he serves any more time or not, it’s not enough.”
Silence fell, heavy and thick. I felt the weight of their gazes on me but I didn’t look away from Young. He was staring at the table now. “Can’t you look at me now?” I asked, an edge cutting into my voice. “Can’t you look at the little girl you grabbed from the street and threw into a trunk? My life—the life I knew—ended that day. You shattered it. I wake up from nightmares, find myself on the floor, tucked against a wall because I’m afraid you’ll find me, you son of a bitch.”
He jerked, then, like somebody had hit him.
It was the first time I’d ever spoken to him.
“You can’t even look at me now. Coward.”
Feeling like I might puke, like my head might explode, I looked away. My hands shook, my belly pitched and rolled. Staring at the men and women who’d decide if he’d paid his debt to society, I shook my head. “You get to decide now, if he’s done enough. If he’s paid his debt, if he’s been reformed and if he’s sorry for what he did.” A bitter laughed escape me. “He’s not sorry. That coward can’t even look me in the face, can’t acknowledge what he did. You let him go now, he’ll just do it to another child, destroy another family. Sleep well, with that thought in your head. But I’m not going to let him control my life. Not anymore.”
Chapter Eight
A hot bath, a glass of wine, and I slept like the dead. My mother had been oddly silent on the drive from the prison back into town, her expression pensive, her face unreadable. We’d had dinner and then we’d both gone to our separate rooms at the hotel. We were both too worn out for anything more than that.
A bleary look at the clock on the table told me that had been some eight hours ago. It was early, too early. Four forty-two in the morning.
So why, pray-tell was there somebody knocking on my door?
I ignored the first knock and flipped onto my belly, shoving my face into a pillow.
The doombringer didn’t go away. The second knock was louder and I groaned, lifted my head up and glared toward the dark ma
w where I thought the door was.
If I got up, I just might hurt whoever was at the door.
It was just how it was.
A third knock decided the person’s fate.
Stumbling out of bed, I knuckled at my eyes and managed to get the door open. Just as Drake lifted his fist to knock again.
I gaped at him.
His hands came up and caught my face. Any questions I might have had died as he kissed me.
When I went to pull back, he just pulled me against him and moved us inside, kicking the door shut. Velvety darkness wrapped around us. With my mind still hazed from sleep, it was easy to think this was all a dream.
That is, until he hit the lights and lifted his head to stare at me, his eyes stark, almost haunted.
“Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”
I blinked, confused. I either needed more sleep or caffeine.
Pushing against his chest, I wiggled away from him and made my way over to the kitchenette and studied the Keurig. It was just as easy as the one I had at home, but just then, it struck me as very confusing. Water. Coffee. Cup. Button. Okay, I remembered now.
“Tell you what?” I asked once I pushed the start button. Hurry, I thought silently. I needed caffeine, so bad. Flicking him a look, I frowned. “Why are you here? Isn’t your mom in the hospital?”
“Yes. Her surgery is tomorrow. I fly back this afternoon. Now answer me.” He closed the distance between us with two long strides. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
I rubbed my eyes. “Tell you what? How did you know where I was?”
“Tell me about the parole meeting,” he practically snarled. His hand shot out, planted against the wall by my head. My heart jumped into my throat as I looked up, met his eyes. “As to how…your mom told me. I called, while you were in the middle of testifying. She went to silence the phone and accidentally hit talk. I practically had a front row seat for half of it.”
My stomach dropped out.
“Oh.” Turning my head, I stared at the little black coffee maker, the wisps of steam rising as the coffee began to stream out. But I didn’t need the caffeine any more. My mind was achingly, painfully clear. Swallowing around the knot, I continued to stare at the cup—the Harry Potter travel mug my mother had picked up for me when she went to Universal Studios a few months ago on a wild lark with Paul. That was what she’d called it. A wild lark. “When did she talk to you?”