by Anna Sugden
“Forgive me? For telling the truth?” She didn’t even care anymore if he knew he’d gotten to her. She stared into the face of her personal Satan, refusing to look away until he blinked. “You know what you did. You should be in prison until the day you die for it.”
She turned to her mother. “And whether you’re willing to admit it or not, you knew that I was telling the truth. You just couldn’t lose your meal ticket.”
“Delia, you’re wrong—”
“Am I? I don’t think so. You know, I should thank you two since you’re the reasons I went into police work. I want to help take down child sexual predators and ensure that child victims have at least someone who believes them.”
Lloyd’s hands came forward, fisting at his sides, as the remarkable cool he’d been known for in office began to crack. “I don’t have to listen to this bullshit.”
“Well that’s good since you won’t have to.” Delia straightened, pushing her shoulders back. “In fact, I don’t want to see either of you again. Ever. Don’t call. Don’t text. I’ll help you with that by changing my number, but I don’t want you to visit, either. Don’t even write me a letter.”
“But, Delia, I’m your mother.”
“Yes, you are, Marian. Biologically. You also made your choice a long time ago. And it wasn’t me. Now you have to live with that decision.”
“I’m sorry,” Marian said in a small voice.
A knot immediately formed in Delia’s throat. As much as she wanted to throw those words back in her mother’s face, she couldn’t. After every mistake Marian had made, she was still her mother, and her tiny admission would cost her dearly.
“If you ever leave him—” she paused to glance at her stepfather “—call me then. Leave a message for me at the Brighton Post. But until then, you’ve chosen your life, so stay out of mine.”
Lloyd shifted closer to his wife, wrapping an arm tightly around her shoulders. “You see, I told you she wasn’t worth the effort. We extend an olive branch, and this is what we get?”
With each word, his hand appeared to tighten on her mother’s shoulder, though with the quilted parka, it was difficult to determine if he was hurting her. Delia pulled her gaze away from that gloved hand and focused on Marian’s tight expression.
She reached into her purse and pulled out her cell phone. “If he’s been hurting you, I can call—”
But Marian shook her head to interrupt her. “No. I’m fine. He would never hurt me.”
Delia nodded and slipped the phone in her coat pocket, strangely disappointed that her stepfather hadn’t abused her mother. That reaction was messed up on so many levels. Even after all of those years, she’d reached for the flimsy hope that her mother hadn’t deserted her willingly.
“You said it yourself,” Lloyd said. “My wife made her choice. She knows who’s good to her.”
Having just announced his claim much as he might have on a car or a big-screen TV, Lloyd patted Marian’s shoulder.
“Quite a prize you got yourself there, Marian.”
Lloyd slowly lowered his arm to his side. He hadn’t threatened, hadn’t moved any closer to Delia, and yet his stance seemed menacing.
“You think you’re something now that you have that uniform and a gun.” He made a scoffing sound. “You must believe you’re untouchable, but you’re the same nothing you always were.”
And suddenly Delia understood why her parents would try to reenter her life now.
“This doesn’t have anything to do with my mother wanting to see her daughter, does it?” She took the surprise in Lloyd’s eyes as a yes and kept going. “You can’t stand it that I’ve pulled my life together and have made a career for myself as a state trooper.”
“Oh, you, little lady, just think—”
“That’s it.” She raced over his comment with a confirmation of her guess. She hadn’t missed that he’d flung words back at her that he’d used during her childhood. Words that still made her skin crawl. Still, she continued to smile so hard her cheeks ached.
“You perceive the strength and confidence associated with my job as threats to the hold you once had over me. A terrified little girl.” As much as she wished she could speak with calm, even tones, her last words became a growl. “Of course you’d feel threatened. You need me to stay weak because you’re so weak. Only a powerless man would have to force himself on little girls, you sick bastard.”
The bald rage on Lloyd’s face had her touching the side of her purse just to ensure that her weapon was still there. His gaze moved over her as if he was sizing up an enemy. Maybe he recognized determination where physical strength might have failed her, or maybe he just assumed she was armed because he didn’t take a step forward.
“Go ahead and feel bulletproof behind that little metal badge, but if you repeat any of your false allegations to anyone, I’ll sue you for slander faster than you can—”
Delia planted her feet wide, straightened her shoulders and crossed her arms. “Go ahead and try. Those reports are a matter of public record, anyway, if anyone digs enough. But I’m putting you on alert that if you have other victims, and most sickos like you do, I will make it my life’s work to ensure that you die behind bars.”
His wide eyes and the flare of his nostrils told her all she needed to know. Gooseflesh appeared on her arms as she thought of all the research, all the pain ahead of her. Though Delia had been focusing only on Lloyd until now, she swallowed when she saw the horror on her mother’s face, the woman’s blinders having been violently ripped away. But Delia couldn’t think about that now. She couldn’t recall anything ever striking her stepfather silent before.
“Now get out of here, or I’ll call for police backup.” She pointed toward the parking lot. “And don’t come back.”
“Trying to come up with some more trumped-up charges?” His words didn’t have the power they used to carry.
“Not at all. Heard of stalking laws? Just remember that I’ve kept recordings of most of those messages you left me. The ones that have become increasingly threatening.” She tilted her head to the side and shrugged. “But I’m sure we can sort all of this out at the Brighton Post if that’s where you want to go.”
Lloyd didn’t even look at her as he ushered Marian toward their car. “Let’s go. Your daughter isn’t worth it. Never was.”
Delia turned and called after them, “If you change your mind, Mom, the offer still stands.”
Marian’s shoulders jerked as if she’d just been struck by the title that should have brought her comfort, and Delia grimaced over tossing another rock at someone who’d already been beaten down. A woman who’d made her bed and was too tangled in the piled blankets and stained sheets to escape it now.
Delia waited until the car pulled from the complex parking lot, but as soon as those lights disappeared, she hurried to her apartment. How she’d been able to handle the cold before, she didn’t know, but she was freezing now. She couldn’t stop trembling, and her teeth chattered no matter how hard she gritted them. With shaky hands, she unlocked her apartment building’s exterior door and stepped inside.
Every creak startled her as she climbed the stairs, and as she stopped by her apartment door, she couldn’t help but look behind her. Someone really had been following her this time. She opened the door just wide enough for her body to fit through and closed it behind her. Her heart pounding so hard that it had to be chiseling its way out of her chest, she flipped both dead bolts into place.
She should have turned on the lights, should have checked out the place before she entered and certainly before she locked herself inside, but she couldn’t bring herself to reach for the switch. Instead, she turned and pressed her back to the door, allowing her body to slide down until she landed with a thud on the floor. And then she sat there, her limbs fluid and seeming to stretch in all directions, as she stared into the dark.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
BEN GROUND HIS fists into his gritty eyes, the words on his comp
uter screen shifting in and out of focus. He’d read every article he could find. More than once. Now the sun was threatening to bleed over the increasingly brightening sky, and he was no closer to answers than he’d been hours ago when he’d rested his first cup of coffee on his desk and flipped open the laptop. He lifted his mug with a shaky hand, but only the dregs of his fifth cup remained, so he set it aside.
He hadn’t even bothered going back to bed. It wasn’t as if he could have slept anyway, with thoughts of Delia lingering, tantalizing, just outside his conscious reach. On the other hand, wide-awake, he didn’t even bother trying to get her out of his head. She’d arrived and had made herself at home there, and he was getting comfortable with this new tenant.
Glancing back at the screen, he clicked on another article, this one he’d read a couple of times already.
Jackson Charged with Racketeering
What had he expected? That archived newspaper articles would vomit up the answers they’d been holding back previously just because Delia had finally opened up to him about her history? And after he’d connected with her in a much more personal fashion.
Ben scrolled farther down the list of search engine hits. What were her birth father’s obituary and stepfather’s jerk moves as a politician supposed to tell him about her anyway? She hadn’t known the first, and she’d had no contact with the second since middle school. He’d looked at information about her mother again, as well, but the woman hadn’t been mentioned at all except as Lloyd Jackson’s spouse in a few links and on the telephone directory website.
Ben had even completed a general search on “Delia Morgan”—again—and this time, he’d paid one of those ridiculous records sites for additional details. Of course, he hadn’t learned anything he wouldn’t be able to find for free. Nothing about any relationships Delia had ever had, though he wasn’t sure he wanted to know about those. Had a past boyfriend hurt her somehow? Was that the reason for her tears earlier?
It had seemed odd that Delia didn’t have a social media presence, something he should have noticed before, but given the private person she was, it shouldn’t have surprised him. He’d even searched for information on beautician/legal guardian Helen Miles and found nothing more remarkable than her obituary. The article hadn’t even mentioned Delia, the girl she’d helped raise, though he suspected that Delia herself had helped to write it.
Charges against Commissioner Dismissed
Sure, he’d discovered a few details he’d missed the first few times he’d looked into her background, but Ben had also hit a lot of dead ends, and he’d hit them hard.
“Come on, Dee. What are you hiding?” He posed the question he should have asked her, and would have if she wouldn’t have shut him down.
He hated to admit that so much of his curiosity had to do with her reaction to their lovemaking. But something about it continued to eat at him. He could accept that he hadn’t blown her socks off, but the tears still didn’t make sense. Why had she been so ashamed about it? Because it happened with a fellow officer? Because she had at least played a role in initiating it? Okay, there were a few reasons she might have been embarrassed, but that had not been an embarrassed cry. Mortified was more like it.
He didn’t understand why she’d been embarrassed when she’d seemed to want it as much as he had. He might have misread her signals once before, but he couldn’t have been wrong this time. And as for the part about her initiating, he’d been more inclined to celebrate that moment—that didn’t usually happen to guys like him.
He didn’t regret any of it. Well, most of it. Yet Delia was too humiliated to even talk about it in terms more specific than the “thing” between them.
For those reasons, he had to keep looking. He rubbed his eyes again and closed one internet browser only to open another. This search was probably as useless as any of the others he’d tried, but he had the sinking feeling that the answer was out there to find.
The headlines looked the same. He’d seen them so many times now that they all ran together in a tragic collage, the unraveling of the picture-perfect family. He clicked through several pages, but just as he was about to close the browser, he stopped on one that didn’t look familiar.
Jackson Faces New Allegations
The date appeared to be more recent than some of the other articles, so he clicked on it and scanned it. What he read turned his stomach.
Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office officials confirm that Jackson will face the additional charge of criminal sexual conduct involving a minor.
“Oh, God. No.”
Ben covered his face with his hands, pressing his fingers over his eyes. He didn’t want to read more, and yet like bystanders at an accident scene, he couldn’t help himself. He removed his hands, his heart pounding, as he scanned farther down the article. It was unbearably vague. Of course, the victim’s name wouldn’t be listed. Print and television media were usually good about protecting victims’ identities.
The dread welling inside him, though, told him he already knew who it was.
Farther down the page, the article was stingy with details. When had it happened? Where? Even the release of the announcement appeared to have been premature as the prosecutor hadn’t determined what degree of the criminal sexual conduct charge Jackson would face. Was it first-degree? That one involved the worst of the nightmares and carried a penalty of up to life in prison. Or could it have been second-, third-or even fourth-degree? Those all carried horrors of their own but had lesser penalties. And the victim could have been anyone, right? It didn’t absolutely have to be Delia.
He wasn’t sure he wanted the answers to any of his questions now, but he’d been searching for so long, he had to follow through. When that article refused to cough up more specifics, he narrowed the search. A few headlines appeared.
As he combed through the articles, he found isolated details until he could piece together nearly a whole story. The charge was first-degree, meaning penetration. The location was in their home. The timeframe was a year before Jackson left town in disgrace.
Other details were equally compelling. Suggestions of false allegations. Suggestibility in child witnesses. Tainted evidence. Dismissed charges.
Ben scanned down to the last article. This one seemed to offer no more promise than the others. Just a brief from one of the newswires, yet it contained the one detail all of the other articles had held back. The one that Ben had been searching for all along.
“The case, involving a stepdaughter...”
Covering his mouth, Ben ran for the bathroom, all of that coffee backing up to his throat. But he could only retch over the commode for several minutes, finding no relief for his body or his mind. Finally, he sat back on his haunches and grabbed the hand towel from the sink, wiping at his sweaty forehead.
Retrieving his glasses from the counter where he’d tossed them, he shoved them back on his face, though at the moment, the last thing he wanted to do was to see clearly. Never in his life had he wanted more for a hunch to be wrong.
On rubberlike legs, he returned to his office and dropped into his desk chair, defeated. His laptop had gone dark, but as soon as he touched the keys, that last article popped up again, those telling words reaching out to him like a fresh strike. He closed all of the screens and shut down the computer.
He’d wanted answers. He’d looked for them even when she’d told him to stop. Now that he had them, what was he supposed to do with the heartbreak of knowing her truth? What could he do with the rage?
Planting his elbows on his desk pad, Ben pressed his hands together like a prayer and touched his fingers against his lips and nose. He squeezed his eyes shut, wishing he could exorcise the images his mind had conjured, yet realizing he couldn’t escape them. Just as Delia couldn’t hide from memories that were undoubtedly so much worse.
Finally, he opened his eyes and stared at the closed computer. So many things he hadn’t understood about Delia, from the fierce independence on the job to her st
range reactions in private moments, made sense in the light of this revelation.
Of course she would have a tough time believing that other officers would have her back when the people she should have been able to rely on had hijacked her innocence and ability to trust. But Delia hadn’t only been betrayed by Jackson and by the woman who gave her life. The system had failed her, too, allowing her abuser to go free.
Not for a minute did he question whether she’d been telling the truth. He believed every word she hadn’t said to him. Yes, she should have divulged this information during her training and interview process, but she’d probably buried the truth so deep that even she couldn’t see it.
Her competitiveness, her ambition, her determination to take down child predators, all of it made sense. Delia was a survivor. She’d walked through hell and emerged on the other side with only minimal help. But no one ever said survivors prevailed unscathed. While some wore their scars like badges of honor, Delia buried hers like dirty little secrets. Private wounds he only wished he’d known about earlier.
“Stop it!” He pounded his fist on the desk. “Don’t make this about you.”
No matter how hard he tried to push aside those thoughts of the two of them together, the images lingered there, accusing, convicting. He’d interviewed victims before, even knew some of the signs to look for. From Delia’s strange reaction to that electric first kiss, he should have realized there was something wrong. But he’d been so busy wanting her, needing her, that he couldn’t see it.
Love is blind. The old saying echoed like a social media meme replaying in his thoughts. With a jolt that had him sitting up in his seat, Ben realized it was true. Somewhere between that moment at the station when she’d become for him as much of a sexy, intriguing woman as a colleague, to the instant where they’d shared the most intimate thing two people could, he’d fallen in love with the beautiful and indomitable Delia Morgan.