Shattered Hearts

by Coral McCallum

  “Come on, son,” said Jethro softly. “We need to talk. No arguments.”

  Once out in the lounge, Silver Lake’s white-haired manager gestured towards the exit.

  “We’re going for a drive,” commented Jethro. “We need some privacy for this talk. No debate.”

  Knowing it was pointless to argue with the older man, Jake silently followed him out to the car. They drove down the highway in silence. While Jethro concentrated on the road in front of him, watching for the exit he was heading for, Jake sat staring out of the window, not seeing the landscape that sped past.

  He barely registered what direction they were travelling in and only realised that the car had stopped when Jethro declared. “We’re here. Let’s walk.”

  “Where are we?” asked Jake, gazing round as he climbed out of the car.

  “Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge,” replied Jethro as he locked the car. “Lots of nice peaceful trails to walk. A good place to walk and talk without interruptions.”

  “Don’t think I’ve ever been out here,” mused Jake. “Might have been here on a field trip as a kid.”

  “Follow the signs for the Pine Grove Trail,” instructed Jethro, pointing to a path that led into the trees.

  Nodding, Jake stuffed his hands in his pockets and set off along the trail. With dry crisp leaves crunching beneath their feet, they walked in silence for a few minutes. Around them, they could hear birds in the trees. Giving nature’s magic time to relax Jake a little, Jethro bided his time before saying, “If the story Jim and Grey told me is accurate, when we get back to the studio, we are calling the police, son.”

  Jake merely shrugged his shoulders.

  “How about you tell me when this mess started,” prompted Jethro, his voice warm and the tone even and non-judgemental.

  “Probably from the first day I met her,” sighed Jake without looking up. “I helped her with some chores at her apartment. Unblocked a couple of sinks. Put a new fuse in her AC unit.”

  “Was she coming on to you back then?”

  “When I fixed her AC unit, I guess she was,” admitted Jake quietly. “I just thought she was lonely. A bit lost. She said she was new in town. Said she was mid-divorce.”

  “So, will you be if we can’t sort this mess out,” stated Jethro bluntly. “I love you and Lori like my own. I don’t want to see you two tear each other apart in court.”

  “Me neither,” whispered Jake.

  They walked on towards Fleetwood Pond in silence. As the still pond came into sight, Jake said, “The day that hornet stung me, she was out at JJL. I was icing my hand in the lounge and she came in. Tried to force herself on me. I pushed her away or at least I tried to. She got her hand down my jeans and…… well, long story short…. jerked me off.”

  “Did you consent to any of it?”

  Jake shook his head. “I repeatedly asked her to stop. Didn’t want to be too rough on her. Didn’t want a scene in front of everyone.”

  “She claims you had sex with her,” commented Jethro. “Told Jim it was consensual.”

  “That’s kind of stretching the truth,” began Jake. “But, yes, I had sex with her. Once. Once after she….”

  “After she what?” prompted Jethro. “You might as well tell me all there is to tell, seeing as how you’re going to be telling the same story to the police later.”

  “She came into the rehearsal room while I was out there on my own. It was the day Kaya was born,” began Jake, stopping to gaze out over the pond at two ducks swimming towards the shore hoping for a snack. “She said I looked tense. Gave me a shoulder rub then massaged my neck and my ears. I thought it was kind of weird to massage my ears.”

  “Your ears are one of the body’s erogenous zones,” Jethro informed him. “This woman knows all the tricks by the sounds of it.”

  “She does,” acknowledged Jake, his voice echoing with resignation. “She undid my jeans. My dick was enjoying the massage so I was kind of hard. She sucked my….”

  “I get the picture,” interrupted Jethro.

  “Well, before I shot my load, I told her to stop. She was encouraging me to fuck her. Begging me. No excuses. I did.”

  “Delicately put, Mr Power,” muttered the band’s manager sarcastically.

  “I told her it was a mistake. That it could never happen again. Should never have happened at all.”

  “Was that the only time you had sex with her?”

  “Yes,” replied Jake calmly. “Then yesterday happened.”

  “Who initiated that little scene?” quizzed Jethro.

  “She did.”

  “And that’s what Maddison walked in on?”

  Jake nodded, “Only what Maddison didn’t see was that crazy bitch wasn’t just sucking my dick. She was threatening to sink her teeth into it!”

  “Did she bite you?”

  “Yes, gently, but she also scratched me with her teeth. Deliberately marked me,” admitted Jake, still wholly aware of the red welts on his manhood.

  “Marked you? Deliberately?”

  Jake nodded.

  “Are those marks still visible?”

  Again, Jake nodded.

  “You’ll need to be prepared to show those to the police. Those marks are evidence of sexual assault.”

  “I am not showing my dick to the cops!” protested Jake sharply.

  “I think you’ll discover you are,” countered Jethro, his tone making it quite clear that there was no room for negotiation.

  They continued to walk along the trail for a few minutes, gradually winding their way back towards the parking lot. Just before they reached the end of the path, Jethro said, “I’m going to break a confidence Grey shared with me. I feel you need to know something.”

  “What? Is it about Lori?” asked Jake anxiously. “Is she ok?”

  Jethro nodded, “Grey tried to talk to her this morning. Pleaded your case for you. Lori showed him something. Swore him to secrecy.”

  “What?”

  “Obscene text messages. Four of them.”

  “From the lovely Nicole?”

  “From four different unknown cell numbers,” explained Jethro calmly. “Grey and Paul are heading over to your place just now. Maddison is collecting your kids. The boys are going to try to persuade Lori to talk to the police about the messages.”

  “Jesus!”

  “Listen, son,” said Jethro softly. “Even if they convince her, I suspect it’s going to take a while before she’ll agree to talk to you. You know how stubborn she is. You know how seriously she takes monogamy. After the affairs her father had….”

  “I hear you,” sighed Jake sadly. “Why didn’t she tell me about the messages?”

  “No idea. Knowing Lori though, she’d have thought she was protecting you.”

  “Probably.”

  Wrapped in one of the fleecy blankets from the sunroom, Lori was sitting down on the beach in front of the house watching the waves. When Maddy had called and offered to pick up the kids and take them to dinner, she had jumped at the opportunity for some time alone. The kids would be back after dinner but it gave her some much-needed space. Feeling trapped in the house, she’d come down to sit on the beach to think.

  Lost in thought, she never heard anyone approaching until Grey and Paul sat down either side of her on the cold sand.

  “You ok?” asked the band’s drummer, instinctively putting his arm around her shoulders.

  Lori shook her head.

  “We need to talk about this, Lori,” continued Paul softly. “I know there’s details you don’t want to hear right now. We respect that but we need you to hear us out here.”

  Silently, she nodded.

  Putting his arm around her from the other side, Grey said, “When we go back inside, we’re calling the police. You need to report those messages. No argument.”

  “No,” replied Lori quietly, keeping her gaze locked on the ocean.

  “Lori,” began Paul calmly. “You’ve no choice here. Those mess
ages are important. You need to call the police. They need to be reported and investigated.”

  “It’s complicated,” said Grey evasively. “But they are important evidence against that crazy ass bitch. Let the police look into it. Give them a chance to check out those unknown numbers. It's harassment if nothing else.”

  “Will they take my phone?”

  “Most likely.”

  “I’ve photos of the kids on there. Personal photos,” said Lori quietly. “I don’t want to share some of those.”

  “Look, I’ve no idea how these things work but I’m sure the police will take care of your photos,” reassured Paul, hugging her close. “You need to trust us here, Lori. This truly is the only option.”

  “Why?” asked Lori, turning to stare at him with tear-filled eyes.

  The two members of Silver Lake exchanged worried glances then Grey said, “As evidence against her. Jethro’s talking to Jake right now about this mess. They’ll be talking to the police too.”

  “Why?”

  “You sure you want to hear this, Lori?” checked Grey softly.

  “No. I don’t want to hear anything about how my husband threw away his promises to me and had sex with that female!”

  “That’s what I thought,” sighed Grey. “You’ll just have to trust us on this. Those messages need to be handed over to the police. She has to be stopped.”

  “Please, Lori,” pleaded Paul, his tone almost desperate.

  For a few long minutes she sat staring out to sea in silence then, hugging her knees tight, said, “Ok, I’ll do it.”

  “Thank you,” sighed Grey his relief evident.

  True to his word, as soon as they arrived back at JJL, Jethro called the Rehoboth Beach Police Department to report the series of sexual assaults against Jake. When two officers arrived to question the musician a short while later, they talked him slowly through the events leading up to the alleged assaults and to the assaults themselves. Much to Jake’s acute embarrassment, the officers told him he’d have to come down to the police station to allow a police photographer to photograph the intimate injuries inflicted by Nicole.

  The whole time he was in the police station, Jake went through the various events, playing them over and over in his mind, trying to fathom out Nicole’s motive. Part of him felt as though he had to accept some of the responsibility. Patiently, he answered all of the officers’ questions, on occasion wondering about the relevance of their enquiries.

  Eventually, he was thanked and informed that he was free to leave. It had been a humiliating few hours and he was relieved to return to the sanctuary of the studio house.

  Sitting at her drawing board, as the clock ticked closer to midnight, Lori endeavoured to shut out the events of the day. It hadn’t been easy talking to the two police officers; hadn’t been easy disclosing such personal details to them. As predicted, her cell had been taken as evidence but Grey had promised to pick her up a new phone to use until her old one was returned to her. One thing she was thankful for was that the kids hadn’t been in the house. When Maddy had eventually dropped them off, both of them were worn out. With a wink, her friend had said, “Two hours at the playground and then a trail hike helped.” Bedtime had gone smoothly until Melody had asked when her daddy was coming home. All Lori had been able to reply was “I don’t know.”

  Garrett’s album cover sat on her drawing board half-finished. After much discussion with him, Lori had convinced him that two hands would work better than the collage of hands he had initially proposed. The two hands that she had finally opted to use as her models were his and her daughter’s. She’d managed to get them to do a quick photoshoot before Garrett had retreated back to New York and now had the photo pinned to her board. He’d asked for a “traditional but realistic” feel to the design so, having experimented with various mediums, Lori had finally opted to paint the cover using watercolours. It had been years since she had adopted that technique but, now in the soft light of her workspace, she was finding the process therapeutic.

  As she worked, she replayed the conversation with the police over in her mind. There had been two officers, one male, one female, sitting in her lounge room for over an hour but it was a comment by the male officer to his colleague as they rose to leave that kept playing over and over in her mind.

  “Added to what Joe’s gathering, she’s looking at jail time.”

  Lori assumed that “Joe” was a fellow police officer but she had no idea what other information he could be collecting in relation to the four lewd messages.

  Unable to sleep, Jake had crept out of the studio house around three o’clock in the morning and walked across to JJL. Using Jim Marrs’ keys, he let himself in and wandered through to the lounge. There were a few night lights on that generated enough light for him to find his way about. Having lifted a bottle of juice from the refrigerator, he headed into the live room, seeking solace in his music. It took him a few minutes to get the studio lights on and, on a whim, he switched on the recording equipment before returning to the live room.

  The ordeal of the previous twelve hours was weighing heavily on his heart. He was still feeling humiliated at having his teeth marked manhood photographed and examined by the forensic photographer and the police doctor. Those two hours had been two of the longest and most embarrassing hours of his life. He had cringed as his dick, the four teeth mark scratches clear for all to see, had been swabbed and examined and photographed from all angles. In an effort to mask his embarrassment, he’d joked about it not being his normal form of photoshoot.

  Eventually, Jethro had driven him back to JJL, declining to come in, saying he had to meet up with Maddison.

  An all too familiar feeling of abandonment had swept through him as he watched Jethro drive off. A feeling he hadn’t felt since his time in rehab over five years earlier.

  Alone in the studio, his beloved acoustic in his hands, Jake played. With nothing better to do, he began to work on the acoustic arrangements for some of the songs off the new record. He had half a plan to suggest an acoustic fundraiser to raise awareness about mental health issues. He’d floated the idea past Maria, Rich’s older sister, who had suggested that they start a fundraiser in Rich’s memory. It was all in the infancy of early planning but the seeds had been sown and an acoustic show seemed a fitting way to start.

  Gradually, the music soothed his frayed soul. The familiarity of the instrument in his hands easing the burden of heartache that was ripping through him.

  Repeatedly, he had questioned himself on how he could have been so stupid, berated himself for being weak and succumbing to Nicole’s calculated advances.

  Cursing that he didn’t have his lyrics journal, Jake began to play a short angry song, singing about being broken, feeling betrayed. His emotions rang painfully true in the bare honest lyrics but working on the song helped him make some degree of sense of this current situation.

  A storm blew in from the south the following afternoon bringing torrential rain and strong winds. As she drove along E Lake Drive on the way home from school with the kids, Lori watched the trees swaying and prayed that none of the branches crashed down onto the car. In the back seat, both Melody and Jesse were quiet, scared into silence by the wind and rain.

  They had only just made it indoors when Lori heard tyres crunching on the deep gravel outside. A few moments later, there was a knock at the back door then Anna and Linzi flew in, closely followed by Grey.

  “Beautiful day,” he declared as he stood dripping water all over Lori’s tiled kitchen floor.

  “Gorgeous,” she replied with a giggle. “Didn’t expect to see you today in this storm.”

  “Promised I’d be over, didn’t I?”

  “Girls, go on into the sunroom. Miss M and Jesse should be in there already.”

  Hand in hand, the two little girls ran through the house shouting for Melody.

  “I can see them forming an all-girl band someday,” joked Lori, secretly loving how well the Silver Lak
e children got along.

  “Well, we can line Kaya up as their screaming lead singer,” laughed Grey. “That kid’s got some lungs on her.”

  “Still not settling?”

  Grey shook his head. “She’s getting better but she’s still got Kola and I up for over two hours every night. Screams from two till four. Nothing consoles her.”

  “Oh, not good,” commiserated Lori, her hand sub-consciously moving to her own slightly rounded stomach. “Coffee?”

  “Please,” said Grey. “I picked up a new cell for you. Think it’s the model up from what you had. Kid in the store set it up and I added in some key contacts for you. Wasn’t sure if you’d lost your numbers when they took your phone yesterday.”

  “They should be backed up but I guess I can’t link this to my existing account.”

  “I wouldn’t,” suggested Grey. “Just to be on the safe side.”

  Lori nodded sadly.

  As they sat at the kitchen table with their mugs of coffee and some soft-baked chocolate chip cookies, Grey said quietly, “She was arrested this morning.”

  “Arrested? For the messages?”

  “There’s more to this, Lori,” began Grey, avoiding her gaze. “I’m not sure you’re ready to hear it. Not even sure I should be the one to tell you.”

  “To tell me what?” demanded Lori bluntly. “Just spit it out, Grey.”

  “She’s been arrested on charges of sexual assault, sexual harassment and stalking. That’s over and above the issue of the messages.”

  “Sexual assault?” echoed Lori, her blood running cold. “Not one of her students?”

  Grey shook his head.

  “Who then or can’t you tell me?”

  “Jake,” said Grey calmly, his heart pounding in his chest.

  “Jake?”

  The bass player nodded, “He filed the charges yesterday. Was interviewed yesterday. As far as I know, the cops picked her up as she arrived at school this morning.”

  “But he admitted to having had sex with her?” said Lori, deliberately keeping her voice low to prevent the kids from overhearing.