“STOP! For God’s sakes, STOP! She screamed.”
Lia felt all the blood leave her head as she began falling to the ground. Shocked over the unexpected assault by the men she thought were her friends, the world exploded around her as she fainted from loss of blood and shock.
Lia jack-knifed into a sitting position. She was in bed in her small, one story white stucco house near La Fortuna, Costa Rica. Lia pressed her hands to her perspiring face, sobbing, gasping for air. Her chest heaved and hurt. Heart pounding, she shook with terror. She heard desperate sounds coming from a wounded animal, and realized they were coming from her.
Her hair, once long and curly, was now short, but it still curled a little in the dampness. No matter what she did, that nightmare, the night she was attacked, stalked her relentlessly.
And no matter how often she dreamed, beautiful, colorful dreams from her idyllic rural childhood in Oregon, they always changed. First came the hint of pink in the sky, and then darker pink, changing and congealing into blood as it began to fall across her eyes until all she saw was dark, crimson blood. Her blood.
Lia could still feel every one of the knife slashes. Her only consolation was she had fought back and escaped her attackers. Her ferocity had stunned them.
She sat there her knees drawn up against her body as she pressed her back into the headboard. The past haunted her even though she desperately tried to forget the men who attacked her and the Army hospital where’d she recuperated.
They had known that the motor pool was shut down for the night and it would be hours before anyone else would show up. Lia could never figure out why they had chosen her to rape. There were other Army women who worked in motor pool, as well. In all the years she had been deployed at the base, nothing like this had ever happened to her. Sometimes, Taliban mortared the base outside the fence, but that was all. Why her? It ate at her, and she had no answer.
Later, as she lay recovering in a bed at Landstuhl Medical Center, she gave thanks that her father, a former Army instructor, had taught her Krav Maga an Israeli form of street fighting. He had taught her how to survive an attack. She had instinctively used what she knew when her life was on the line, and it had been enough to get her out alive.
Automatically, her damp, trembling fingertips brushed the left side of her neck. She felt the scar across her throat, the one that had partially nicked her carotid artery. She had been bleeding to death from that one cut, which was why she’d fainted in the middle of the highway. It was a miracle she’d gotten that far.
Luckily, the driver of the Humvee was a physician. She was just leaving the base hospital for the night and thanks to her speedy intervention, Lia’s life had been saved.
Lia had little memory of being taken to the Bagram hospital on the base. She did wake once in a fabric-draped cubicle in the emergency room. A half-dozen doctors and nurses were feverishly working on her, and she remembered the oxygen mask over her face and how the bright overhead lights had hurt her eyes.
She was still reliving all the details of that horrific night, the pain in her elbows, the weakness from losing four pints of blood. Later, a nurse told her that a body only held eight to twelve pints of blood, depending upon one’s height and size.
After she’d awakened from the surgery, the nurse had gently patted her blue-gowned shoulder and told her where she was and what had happened. But only later did Lia’s surgeon, who had used 150 stitches to close all the knife wounds, tell her she had nearly died.
The medical staff was mostly women, and for that she was glad. During her recovery, Lia would cringe whenever she saw men and would automatically tense if a male orderly entered her room to bring her a tray of food.
Her parents had flown in to be with her at Landstuhl Medical Center in Germany. The defensive wounds on her hands were telling. Her dad had held her hands and cried, knowing how hard she’d had to fight to get away. Her mother had clung to her dad, heartbroken over her daughter’s pain.
Lia kept asking herself why would someone do this to her? Why? She’d had a lot of time to lie in that hospital room, each movement causing her pain from her stitches being pulled, to ponder that unanswerable question.
NCIS investigators, both women, had come to take her statement. Just speaking to them had left Lia exhausted. Later, one of the investigators had returned to tell her that the two men she’d named had been apprehended and asked if she wanted to press charges? Hell, yes!
Lia remembered looking at the investigator as if she were insane. Why wouldn’t she press charges? Wouldn’t any woman? These animals had almost killed her. At age twenty, her life could have been erased.
The investigator told her it would be a long, drawn out affair and it would be brutal emotionally for her. Lia didn’t care. She remembered the outrage she’d felt toward Schaefer and Dominguez as they’d cornered and attacked her.
Shakily, Lia drew in a breath. Her mind racing, she forced herself to think about the present. She realized that her mouth was dry and that she was terribly thirsty. Throwing off the twisted sheet from her damp, gowned body, she eased her legs over the mattress, holding it tightly.
Since the attack, she always kept a night-light on down the hall, and her bedroom door open so she could see who was coming. The house was small but it was her private abode, a place of peace and safety.
She loved this little house. It sat near the Delos charity school building that was a classroom for children of La Fortuna, a small town near Arenal, a major volcano in northern Costa Rica.
Slowly pushing damp strands of hair off her sweaty brow, Lia sat there, trying to slow down her heartbeat and wrench her mind out of the toxic nightmare that hit her several times a month. That attack had happened five years ago. God, wouldn’t this nightmare ever go away?
Schaefer and Dominguez had gotten only four years in prison from the Army. Just four years! Lia thought they should have been put away for life and the key thrown away. But there were so many lies and innuendos the two men had used in their defense, saying that she was a flirt, that she had rubbed her breasts and hips up against them. Implying that she was asking to be raped.
All lies! God, all lies. Lia uttered a slight sound of anguish, remembering the ten-month trial at Bagram. The defense attorneys had blamed her for the men’s actions. Insane! They had claimed that if she hadn’t worn tight shirts that showed off her ample breasts, it wouldn’t have happened.
Worse, the jury of her peers, all male officers, listened stoically. Lia had only her parents for support, and although they were not allowed into the military UCMJ, Uniform Code of Military Justice, proceedings, they were there to hold her tightly afterward.
Lia never cried during the proceedings. No way was she going to break down in front of the two bastards who had nearly taken her life. They had, in fact, murdered a part of her soul.
Their handiwork was indisputable. They had sliced her seven times and she would have permanent scars across her body to remind her of that night for the rest of her life.
After getting out of the Army, she had joined Delos Charity, wanting a job where she could help the poor or under educated. She had landed the job and chosen the small village of La Fortuna in northern Costa Rica, to spend her life in quiet solitude. Delos had given her and the other two teachers small homes near the school and she loved what she did.
Pushing herself off the bed, her knees weak, she stood up, feeling the pull of every one of those scars, especially on her lower calves. She shuffled across the cool floor and headed for the kitchen at the other end of the short hall. There was another night-light beneath the cupboards. Glancing at the clock, Lia saw it was only 1 A.M.
She pulled a glass from the cupboard and turned on the faucet. As she drank the tepid water, the stench of her own fear swept over her and sickened her. How she hated that smell!
Needing a shower, the Venetian blinds drawn so no one could see into her home, she pulled the light, flowery cotton gown over her head. Dropping it into the wa
shbasin, Lia turned on the shower, anxious to get beneath the spray to wash away the smell of terror.
She picked up a pink cloth and dampened it beneath the slight warm spray, allowing the water to sluice across her shoulders and breasts. She tried to avoid looking at her naked body, now glistening beneath the bathroom’s overhead light. Seeing the scars brought back all the horror of that night.
She took the Plumeria scented soap, a favorite fragrance of hers sent by her mom every month, and lathered her body with it. Gradually, its scent overrode the odor of fear. She sighed and turned to the Pikake shampoo, also sent by her mother, to wash her hair. The fragrance was different from Plumeria, but Lia loved the tropical scents. She felt cleansed and refreshed by them, and inhaled them deeply into her lungs. No more stench of death.
Each time she wiped the cloth across those long, deep scars, she remembered exactly when the cut had happened. Her Army psychiatrist, a blonde woman of deep compassion, had told her it would happen, but assured her that over time, the association would stop.
When? It was now five years later, and Lia had gotten so she hated her body. Her cells, her bones, her organs, remembered the assault upon them. Why couldn’t she block it out?
Every day for five days a week, she worked from dawn to dusk at the school. She was tireless in her activity with those twenty-five Costa Rican children. She loved each and every one of them just as much as the two women teachers that taught them.
Working as an assistant to Maria and Sophia, Lia was the chief cook and bottle washer. She was responsible for the children’s snacks, their main meal at lunch, and another snack before the yellow school bus, owned by Delos Charity, took them home each afternoon.
But now she had to sleep. Tomorrow was a busy day like all the rest, but she was grateful for the activity. The children of this country were a priority, and getting them educated was a national concern. In some remote areas, charities such as Delos had put schools on the ground, backed by the government.
Shuffling out of the kitchen, she wandered down the hall and back to her large bed. Lia saw that she’d torn the sheet from where it had been tucked in, and leaned over to tuck it back. As she straightened, she felt a deep fatigue in her bones. Lying down on the bed, she shut her eyes, waiting for the fan in the room to move the sluggish, humid air. She draped her arm across her eyes and released a tremulous sigh. So much pain, the memories swirled around in her brain, she wanted to forget all of it. And yet, that one moment had defined her life from age twenty to today, five years later.
Now, as the breeze from the fan cooled her, she buried her head in her pillow. Her greatest loss had been her hopes for a loving relationship. Since the assault, no man had wanted her. Lia, a natural team player, missed having a relationship, but after she’d been cut and scarred, her traumatized boyfriend, a soldier named Jerry, had walked away. It had been too much for him, and she’d seen it in his eyes when he’d visited her in the hospital, trying to be supportive. Once he’d seen the extent of her injuries and the stitches, his mouth had tightened. She sensed that he just wanted to get the hell out of the room. She had loved him and she thought Jerry had loved her, but that event had shown her differently.
Would this ever end? Lia was tired of wasting “poor me” tears on herself. Fortunately, her parents were wonderful. Her mom and dad, talked to her weekly. She really looked forward to sharing that link with them. Often, they asked her to come home to live with them, but Lia didn’t want to do that. It would be admitting that she’d given up on ever having a normal relationship, including marriage and children.
Unconsciously, she reached up with her fingertips, moving lightly down the two-inch jagged scar on her left cheek. The blade had gone through it, scoring her gums and ripping it open. The surgery on that one scar had been the worst and the most devastating to Lia. Plastic surgeons paid by her parents to repair the damage only took out the puckers and scars that had been created as it healed.
The knife had sliced through thin, delicate muscles that helped her smile, helped her face be normal to someone looking at her. Unfortunately, it hadn’t quite worked out that way. Now she felt like the monster from Notre Dame in Paris, France. She was, as she saw herself, an unnatural-looking woman, a hunchback of sorts, without the hunchback. Her face implied there was a terrible story behind the scar, and she felt everyone’s eyes upon it, when meeting her for the first time. Although she could cover up the other wounds beneath her clothing, her face was there for everyone to see.
She remembered what had happened with a man who had been interested in her two years ago. Lia wished she could blot out her memories of that night. She had been very apprehensive, worried about what Manuel would think as he undressed her to make love to her.
It had been so hard to talk about her assault, about what had been done to her physical body, and she’d tried, but as he peeled off her clothes and saw the devastation across her body, he had stepped back from her.
Manuel had stood gazing at the scars, and Lia had felt as if a chasm was now separating them. He slowly shook his head, said, “I’m sorry,” and slowly walked out the door. She knew he would never return.
Lia had sat on the bed, fighting tears of humiliation, knowing her body had disgusted him. Luckily, she was unlikely to run into him again because he wasn’t a local. In fact, she never did see him again.
At least, Lia thought, I can be grateful for that.
Since then, she’d given up thinking in terms of relationships, surrendering to the reality of a life alone, without love, and without a partnership.
She instead shifted her focus to Delos, a place that welcomed her hard work and her love of children. At least Lia could do some good for them by giving them her love, care and attention. And those little ones were like bright flowers, radiant under her care.
She smiled. The children were curious little things. The first time Lia had stepped into the Home School Foundation building in La Fortuna, she had tried to gird herself for the children’s curiosity about her scars. But unlike men, the children were simply curious and wanted to touch them. Lia had seen their sympathy in their large, wide eyes as she crouched down, allowing them to touch her scar, to feel it, to see sadness come to their tiny faces that never lied about anything.
The children had long ago accepted her as she was, and adored her because she was there for them. Her scars were never an issue; in fact, these children had seen their own share of misfortune, and it bonded them more closely with this American angel who was here to teach, love, and support them.
Finally, Lia fell into a light, restless sleep. She never slept deeply after a nightmare, and knew she’d wake up early, feeling ragged, tired and stressed out. But just the act of getting a shower, clean clothes, washing her hair and getting ready to go to the school that sat five hundred feet away from her small home, made her heart sing.
Tomorrow, they were taking the children in three rented vans to the Venado Caves, not far away. Because Lia’s dad was a spelunker, she had grown up crawling into and discovering caves and loving them.
She had the two young women, Maria and Sophia, on hand to help with the children on field trips. And tomorrow, with all the children’s lunches packed and in the vans, they would go on a wonderful adventure.
Lia knew the children would be wide-eyed with wonder as she led them into the large, outer portion of the massive cave system buried beneath the jungle terrain. They would see so many wonderful, natural sights…just thinking about it gave her heart a lift.
Those happy thoughts were the last she had as she drifted off to sleep. The past three years of living here in Costa Rica had begun to heal her wounded body and spirit, and brought her good dreams, like the one she was having now. They were filled with vibrant colors and fragrances as she dreamed of walking into the mouth of the Venado caves. That simple act erased the horrifying past as she focused on the natural beauty of this incredible country. She might not have a close, wonderful relationship with a man, but spe
lunking fed something in her soul.
Still, her heart yearned for the right man to walk into her life. She had just about accepted that the odds of that happening were so low, there was no point thinking about it. After all, who would want a carved-up woman with a jagged scar on one side of her face? No one…
CHAPTER 2
“Hey, Jordan! Get off your sorry ass!” Butch kicked his buddy’s bunk, a broken down affair in a grungy room where they had their base of operation. “There’s a call for you from a General Culver. ASAP!”
Cav Jordan groaned, his head pounding with a splitting headache. Sonofabitch, he’d drunk too many damn pisco sours last night at that club in Las Flores here in Lima, Peru. Covering his pounding head, he cursed at Butch, his ex-SEAL buddy. “Tell ’em to call back in an hour. I’m in no shape to talk to anybody.” He glared up at a grinning Butch.
“May be a PSD, personal security detail, buddy…”
“Fuck it, I can’t think straight. I gotta get a shower and some coffee in me….”
Butch shrugged his big shoulders and grinned. “General Culver’s been good to us over the years, Cav. Are you sure you can’t mumble ‘yes’ and take his assignment?”
“No,” Cav snarled, slowly pushing up on his unmade bunk. The place was the size of a damn refrigerator, with just enough room for a Peruvian army bunk. The damn things always had squeaky springs. “I need an hour.”
“Roger that.”
Cav growled again, pushing his long black hair off his heavily unshaven face. When was the last time he’d shaved? Blearily, he scowled at the morning sunlight slanting into the small window. His straight brows flattened. His eyes were barely able to stay open, the light hurting the hell out of them. Shit, he was still drunk.
His stomach rolled with nausea. Why the hell had he drunk that ex-Special Forces dude under the table at El Diablo, last night?
Pride, he thought grumpily, pushing his fingers across his dark, hairy chest. He sat there in a pair of blue boxer shorts that hadn’t been washed for almost a week. Curling his lip, he could smell his sour flesh, mixed with the alcohol on his fetid breath. His mouth tasted like something that had died a week ago, and the smell made him want to throw up.
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