by CM Deveraux
She was right. She always was.
Jess curled a finger.
“What?” I asked.
“The paperwork. I need to take it with me.”
“Why?”
“Damon always seems to find a reason to weasel his way inside the house when he brings the kids home, so let’s not take a chance that he’ll find them. I’ll keep them safe.”
I complied with her request, handed her the papers. It seemed logical, although I’m sure I could have thought of plenty of places to stash the documents where he’d never look. My underwear drawer came to mind. Even when we were married, he never looked in there. Why would he when he had his head in every other drawer in town?
“Is there something I should know about? I feel like the three of you are keeping something from me.”
She grinned, waited for me to realize what she’d been trying to tell me all along.
“Right,” I said. “Trust you.”
“Everything is going to be all right, Sasha. You’ll see.”
CHAPTER 5
I kissed my daughters goodbye and dropped them off at school a little after eight the next day. Then it was time for my morning ritual. I drove to the coffee shop, ordered a non-fat vanilla latte, and arrived back home at five to nine. A few minutes later there was a knock at the door.
Jess.
“What are you doing here so early?” I asked.
“Visiting you. I was on my way to the office and thought I’d drop by, see how you’re doing.”
She stepped inside but remained at the entryway. She wouldn’t be staying long.
“I’m guessing you’re here for a reason?”
She placed a hand on my shoulder. “It’s not a big deal.”
“What isn’t?”
“I wanted to give you a heads up.”
“About?”
“Damon.”
“Why?”
“There’s a chance he might make an appearance today.”
“Wait—here?”
She nodded.
“Jess—what’s going on?”
“He’s being served.”
“What?! When?”
She glanced at her phone. “Umm...right about now.”
“How do you know this?”
“I passed your divorce documents off to Gideon O’Shea last night.”
“Who’s Gideon O’Shea?”
“Your new lawyer.”
“An Irish lawyer?”
She bobbed her shoulders up and down. “I think so.”
“A ginger is working my case?” I asked.
“May I remind you that under the mop of black hair on your head, you’re a ginger too?”
Two gingers working together. I felt like my Wonder Twin powers had just activated.
Jess picked a business card out of her wallet, handed it to me. “I’ve scheduled an appointment for you today at one o’clock at his office. Okay?”
“Why have I never heard of this person?” I asked. “Damon introduced me to almost every lawyer in town over the years. I don’t recall ever meeting anyone named Gideon.”
Jess shrugged.
“He mostly deals with the big boys—the rich and sometimes famous.”
So did Damon. Or he claimed to, at least.
“Mostly?”
“He agreed to represent you. Why does it matter?”
“Yeah, but what I don’t understand iswhy he agreed to see me. I’m nobody.”
She wrapped her arms around me. I winced. I’d never excelled at female bonding. I loved my friends, but to me, a simple high-five worked all the same.
“You’re somebody to me. I’m proud of you, Sasha. This is a big step, and you’re finally taking it.”
She’d actually taken the step for me, but I let it slide.
“How do you know him—the lawyer?” I asked.
“Gideon?”
First-name basis. She didn’t just know him, she knew him well.
“He’s a friend of Richard’s.”
Richard was Jess’s well-to-do boyfriend. Made sense.
“How much is this Gideon person gonna cost me? If he’s used to working with clients with deep pockets, I assume he doesn’t come cheap.”
She swished a hand through the air.
“Don’t worry about it. Right now I want you to focus on taking care of you and your girls like we talked about. Are you ready?”
“I...guess so.”
“Is your alarm system on?”
I nodded.
“Good.”
“You said this wasn’t a big deal, and now you’re asking if my house is protected.”
“Damon’s a wild card, capable of just about anything.”
“I can handle him,” I said.
“If he comes here, promise me you won’t let him inside this house.”
“Why would I—”
“Promise me, Sasha.”
“I promise.”
CHAPTER 6
It was early afternoon when Damon squealed up the driveway in a flashy, brighter-than-the-sun-at-midday, orangish-yellow Porsche. So predictable. I separated the wood slats in my front window and peered outside, watching him slam the corner of his black suit jacket in the car door. The suit ripped but defiantly remained stuck. Damon sent two verbal expletives skyward and wrestled the jacket off, allowing it to puddle on the ground like a disheveled, unwanted newspaper. I heard my name shouted before he reached the front door, followed by, “We need to talk. Now!”
His childish I-will-get-my-way-or-else behavior summed up our entire relationship. I stood by the door, still, not making a sound, silently chastising myself for failing to take out a restraining order when I had the chance.
He breathed through the slit in the door jamb like he knew I was there. “Don’t test me, Sasha. I know you’re in there. Now open up.”
“What do you want, Damon?”
“You know what I want.”
“I’d like you to leave.”
“I don’t give two shits about what you want. I’m not going anywhere.”
“I’ll...I’ll call the police.”
“Do it.”
I contemplated his words, second guessing what would happen if I did. They’d show up, remove him, warn him, or whatever it was they did in this kind of ex-versus-ex scuffle. And then, thirty minutes and a hell of a lot madder later, Damon would just return again, except next time our kids might be here, making things even worse. I did what I had to do—I sucked it up and played nice.
“What are you waiting for?” he seethed. “Make the call. Ask for Officer Morrell or Officer Hardy. Do me a favor and tell them I’ll be a few minutes late to basketball practice today.”
Name dropping, his attempt to incite fear, intimidate me, make me feel like everyone was on his side. I stood, frozen, like I always did in his presence. Mrs. Damon “Doormat” Chase. Six months apart hadn’t changed much of anything.
Banging started. Persistent, rhythmic banging. If his goal was to wear me down, as much as I hated to admit it, he was making slow but steady progress. Just when I thought the pounding would never stop, it did, and I heard something else: the sound of something sliding down the other side of the door.
“Why are you doing this to me, Sasha? To us? To our children? Our family? Why?”
Was he...crying?
He was crying, sniffling like a neglected child. He’d never cried before. Not in front of me anyway. I hardly knew what to think, let alone what to do about it.
“Please, Sasha,” he begged. “Let me talk to you. Just once. And then I’ll leave. I’ll leave you alone forever...if that’s what you really want.”
“I don’t think talking is such a good idea right now.”
“But why? Fifteen minutes is all I ask. You can give me that at least. Can’t you?”
“Damon. I...don’t...love...you anymore.”
So much for playing nice. I thought about adding “you ignorant bastard” as the cherry on top, but he’d c
almed down. I didn’t want to stir him up again.
“Yes you do, you love me. You always have and you always will. You just wish you didn’t because you’re hurting right now. I understand what you’re going through. Truly, I do.”
He understood what I was going through? The only thing he understood was his brainless lapse in judgment had led me to discover his secret life, which led to him getting caught.
“I’m not trying to hurt you,” I lied. “I’m really not. It’s just...I can’t go back to the life we lived before. You weren’t here for me. We weren’t a family. When I think about it now...the memories, the life we shared, it doesn’t even seem real.”
“I know. It’s my fault. I take responsibility for it all. I’m sorry.”
He was sorry?
I should have felt relieved, empowered. I didn’t. I felt pain, resentment. I resented him for all the times he should have said sorry and hadn’t. I resented him for making me feel like a fool. To me, he was nothing more than a thief, except what he took from me was far more precious than a simple possession. He’d stolen years—years I wanted back even though I knew I could never have them.
“Sasha, you still there? Say something. Please.”
I didn’t want to feel sorry for him. He didn’t deserve my pity. He didn’t deserve me. But I couldn’t shut down what I saw in my mind—Damon pouting outside my door, weak and helpless, with nowhere else to turn. I had to admit, it felt good almost, like for the first time in years he’d chosen me.
“Sasha?”
“I’m still here.”
But why? Why was I still here?
The only explanation I could manufacture was closure. I’d never had it. Maybe this was it. Stray dog or not, I’d resolved to move on months ago. It was what I wanted—to be free of him and the catatonic power he had over me.
“If you knew how much I’d been trying to change,” he said, “for you and the kids, then you’d understand why I got so angry before. I don’t want this—the divorce. And deep down, I don’t think you do either.”
He was wrong. I did want it, and I’d never go back to him. Maybe this simple truth was what he really didn’t understand. I’d never given him an explanation, not a proper one anyway. I’d been too caught up in finally catching him in his lies. Now was my chance, the one time he might be humble enough to take it, accept it, move on.
“Fifteen minutes,” I whispered.
“You’re...letting me in?”
“Fifteen minutes, and then you leave.”
CHAPTER 7
I unbolted the lock. Damon was free to enter. So why didn’t he? I cracked the door. One inch, then two. I peeked out, my jaw dropping when I met his gaze. I wanted to scream, cry out, but my lungs collapsed like a deflated balloon.
There were no tears.
No dried bits of saline on his face.
Nothing except a single, solitary look: rage, followed by the most maleficent grin I’d ever seen.
I’d been a fool. A damned fool. And he knew it.
His hand retracted back and then surged forward, striking me across the face. It was like the slap heard ’round the world, only it didn’t stop there. As I struggled to draw breath, to massage the slow burn rising on the side of my face, he came at me, pinning my body against the wall, his hand tight like a chain around my neck. He compressed his fingers and squeezed, tossing me with a gust of momentum to the floor.
Must. Get. Up.
I came to my knees, tried to stand but couldn’t. He gripped a fistful of my hair, yanked it back. This time I heard myself scream.
He was in my ear, growling at me like I was a bug he could crush because it pleased him. “You stupid bitch! Did you really think I would ever shed tears for you? Did you? You’re nothing. Nothing but a pathetic excuse of a woman. Do you want to know why I screwed around on you? Why I cheated? Because I can. Because they satisfy me in ways you never have.”
I’d suffered in the past, endured his rants, his tirades. But this...this was something else entirely.
“Damon...please.”
“Damon, please,” he mocked. “Shut your mouth! I talk. You listen. There will be no divorce. Understand? I allowed you this...separation, this time to come to your senses, to accept our relationship for what it really is. But you still don’t get it. It’s not up to you. It wasn’t ever up to you. What I do and who I do it with is my business. Your only job is to sit here and wait for me to come home to you. If I ask you to wipe my ass, you wipe it. If I ask you to clean the lipstick stains some other woman smeared on my shirt, you clean them.”
He tightened his grip and continued.
“I’ll tell you what’s going to happen. I’m moving back into the house tonight, and tomorrow you’re going to resume your marital duties like this little hiccup we had never happened. And you will never, ever question me or humiliate me like this again.”
He paused, waited for a response, waited for me to accept the one and only offer I was ever going to get from him. I didn’t care what he did. I’d rather be dead than live the life of a programmed robot. Hell in all its infinite, scorching-hot layers couldn’t even be this bad.
“I...can’t.”
I barely squeaked out the words, but he heard me.
“What did you just say? Because it sounded to me like you still haven’t accepted what’s going on here.”
I found my voice and didn’t just speak the words, I screamed them. “I haven’t accepted it, and I never will! You aren’t a husband, and you’re certainly not a father. I want you out of my life, out of the girls’ lives, and I’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen.”
He snorted a laugh. “All right. Fine. I see I’m still not making my point. Let’s try this another way.”
I guessed what was coming next, and I wasn’t prepared. I thrashed my body around in a failed attempt to regain my freedom from his grasp, but I wasn’t strong enough to fight him. Using my hair as his personal whip, he thrust my head forward, my face colliding with the cold, hard surface of the tile floor in front of me. It stung a little, at first, the pain feeling like a small scratch, nothing more. The next blow hit harder. Once more and then twice, and then again and again until I’d been flung around like a rag doll. A chunk of my hair ripped out, strands floating to the ground like whimsical feathers. I wanted to be strong, to fight him off. I reached back, clawed at the flesh on his arms with the edge of my nails. It did nothing but fuel his lecherous rage.
My nose began to bleed. Or was it my head? Or both? My face was dripping, spattering. Red misted the air, slid down my face. The tin-like taste of blood oozed into my mouth. In the back of my mind I could hear Jess as if she was right there in front of me, even though she wasn’t. She prompted me, urged me on, saying, “Stand up! Defend yourself! Be the woman I know you can be!”
He may have had the strength, and he may have had the desire, but I had the will. Ten long years of it. I drew my knee to my chest and kicked back with everything I had, my foot ramming its target. He released me, staggered back, cupped a hand around his groin. I hoped I’d broken it, impaired the damn thing forever.
Damon nursed his prized possession, allowing me just enough time to arm myself with a glass vase, the closest potential weapon in sight. As my own pain heightened, surging through every orifice of my body, he came at me again. I clutched the vase, swung...and missed. He didn’t. The vase surged from my hand and whooshed through the air, shattering into tiny fragments when it crashed on the surface below. Damon plowed into me, and I fell, a shard of glass stabbing my hand in the process, piercing my skin. I heard a click and turned my head just far enough to see the open blade from a pocketknife he held in his hand.
“Damon...no!” I screamed.
The knife plunged into my side. Not far, two, three inches maybe. I felt its sharp edge slice through my skin and get yanked out as the knife entered me again. On his third attempt, I used what little energy I had left to dodge the knife just enough for it to slice off the to
p layer of my skin. Though I doubted it mattered.
He’s trying to kill me.
He’s going to kill me.
Outside I heard voices. Two, maybe three. Familiar. Tears stained my bruised, bloodied face as the realization hit me—I wasn’t alone. Not anymore.
“Get off her, you son of a bitch!”
Kenna’s face hovered over me, her hands gripping Damon’s arms, fighting to set me free. He grappled for her, missing by no more than an inch or two. Kenna had five brothers. She didn’t slap, and she didn’t pull hair—she punched. And when her fist collided with Damon’s face, she made damn sure it counted.
“Kenna, look out!”
Callie’s voice rang out beside me.
There was a sound, like aerosol maybe. Something being sprayed from a can.
Through blurred eyes, I glanced up, and that’s when I felt the stinging.
CHAPTER 8
“It’s a bit late to scold me now,” I said. “If I said I’d learned my lesson, it still wouldn’t change what I did. I wasn’t thinking, Jess. I’m sorry.”
The irked looked on her face didn’t change. Apology received but not accepted.
Jess rubbed her temples, something she did when she was two seconds away from a massive explosion, like the one she was about to have now. I suspected some small percentage of her anger was directed at me, but the lion’s share belonged to Damon.
“I told you not to let him inside the house,” she said. “You agreed. You promised me you wouldn’t.”
“I don’t know what you want me to say. I screwed up.”
“No, Sasha. I screwed up. I should have never left you there in the first place.”
Guilt. It wasn’t her fault and it wasn’t mine. It was his. And yet, here she was, blaming herself for something she hadn’t done.
“I’m alive, and I’m fine. That’s what matters. If I had to do it all over again, I still would have had the lawyer file those papers.”
“I’m just glad we got to you when we did,” Kenna said. “And glad that Callie never goes anywhere without her mace key chain.”