Fall

by Katherine Rhodes

  “How abusive?”

  I paused. “The shortest one, the one when I was fourteen was the worst of it. I reported the father for sexual abuse. He didn’t rape me, but he did rape one of the other girls, and I got him send to jail. I was only in that house of horrors for four weeks before they hauled him away.”

  Wren stared down at the sheets for a moment, and let out a disgusted breath. She looked back up and motioned for me to go on.

  “The rest were physical mostly, and usually not the foster parents. It was some of the other kids, or so called friends at school. The last was a psychological nightmare. They were there for the checks and tried to blackmail me into lying about how old I was so I could have a roof over my head when I aged out. Money. I was only worth the check.”

  “You went to college…”

  “I went to community college, and worked as a waitress while I did. I rented a single room until I got accepted to a full university. Then I had a dorm room until the first summer when I was able to rent an apartment with three other girls. They didn’t like me and left me alone most of the time.”

  “After college?”

  “I worked in New York City with child services and lived in a one room shithole. When the chance to run a foster agency in Philly was basically handed to me, I took it. I got it up and running and met Alain less than a month later.”

  “You fell in love?”

  I pulled up on my answer, shaken by that question. “I fell in…something. He was there, he took care of me. In exchange I cooked and cleaned for him.”

  Wren cocked her head. “In exchange?”

  “That’s how it works.”

  “How what works?”

  “Love.”

  “Oh honey, no.” Wren shook her head. “Not even close.”

  “Then what the hell good is love?”

  “Love is not an exchange of anything. It’s knowing that person always has your back, always has your best interests in mind. It’s having a confidant, best friend, lover, fuck buddy, travel partner, and so much more. You align and aim for the same things in life. You can be next to them or far away and always know they are there. You trust them with everything, you want to tell them everything at the end of the day. Even when you walk different paths, those paths are all in the same woods, in the same direction. You’re never lost because they’ll always find you.

  “Love is a freedom, not a chain. It’s wings, not a weight. It’s like air when you realize you’ve been holding your breath for too long. It encompasses everything, it excludes nothing. And the only payment is that same love given selflessly back in immeasurable ways.”

  I stared at her. “You sound like a fucking Hallmark movie.”

  “They’re not wrong.”

  “You’re going to tell me you feel that with all three of your men?” I bit out.

  “Yes,” she said, but her voice was quiet. “It’s more complicated that I can explain, but yes. They all make me feel that way and I hope that I do the same for them.”

  Sighing, my eye focused on the ceiling again. “Do you really think that you’re the devil’s twin sister?”

  “We’re not talking about that right now, Paige. I’m trying to make you see that you don’t know what love is because life has fucked you over. When you can relate to Hallmark instead of disparage it, then I’ll know we’re working in the right direction.”

  Fine. She wanted my cynical bitch side, I’d accommodate. “What the hell good is love when it doesn’t clothe you, feed you, shelter you. Those are all negotiable goods that are necessary. If you have to give a little something to get those, who cares if it’s really love. Love doesn’t put food on my table. Love doesn’t buy me a coat in the winter.”

  “Love also doesn’t beat you and throw you down the stairs.” She watched me for a reaction. “Love can also be platonic. Asexual. Bromance. You don’t have to want to fuck someone to love them.”

  Her hand fell softly on my stomach and I lurched, hard, causing all kinds of pain to rush through me.

  …The bright happy little girl ran behind Tabitha, giggling while the grass tickled her feet.

  “Come on, angelica. We have friends waiting.”

  The girl bubbled and giggled, stopping to pull a flower from the grass. A little yellow buttercup, smashing it on her nose.

  “Smell, Mama!”

  I laughed and smiled. “Yes, baby girl. Flowers smell.”

  She looked at it cross-eyed and held it out. “Broken. No smelly.”

  “You have to get it under your nose, baby girl,” I laughed, moving her hand. “The tip doesn’t smell for you.”

  “I wanna ellie-phant trunk for smells!”

  Tabitha laughed, coming back to them. “Come on, angel. There’s cake at the table.”

  “Cake!” she cawed and dropped the flower, completely forgotten

  —As a dark shape popped into existence and tackled the three of them to the ground. Two bright blades appeared as the dark man shoved the baby into her arms.

  “Stay down, please. Cerdil.”

  Tabitha and the dark man—Dre, grown up, I realized—jumped to their feet and ran towards the terrible form that was stomping towards them.

  “Dre!”

  “We’re fine!” he called back. “This is our job!”…

  I sucked in a hard gulp of air and Wren lifted her hand.

  “What the hell, Wren?”

  She pursed her lips. “Sometimes, when I touch people, I see things. Sometimes, those things are shared. Sometimes, I’m just bombarded by images and possibilities.” She folded her hands in her lap. “Thing is, Paige, those shareable moments and visions only happen with people who are important to me.”

  She unfolded her legs and slipped off the bed. “I’m not going to get much further with you, Vanagloria. Bastian will be in later, and he’ll have some paperwork that Lincoln needs you to sign.”

  Methodically she started to put her things away, paper into files, files into folders, folders into bags.

  “You’re staying with us when you get out,” she stated. “No arguing. We have everything set up for you and the baby. You don’t have another place to go, and we have the safest place of all.”

  Putting on her coat and slipping her bag over her shoulder she walked back to me, and put a hand on my cheek. “I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy, Paige, and if I could change it all for you, I would.”

  She kissed my forehead, and I had thought that it was going to be just a cold, over the top gesture that didn’t mean shit to either of us.

  Instead, though, the press of warm lips on my cool, wrecked skin made something inside me tumble sideways and back again. It burrowed deep down, and rattled things loose I had no idea were there. It warmed me, and warned me, and welcomed me.

  It told me that Wren was a true friend. Maybe a sister of the heart. The first person I’d ever met who truly wanted nothing more from me than to just be me.

  The tears, from both eyes, trickled down.

  Sister, friend, lover, or something that none of those captured—I had someone who loved me.

  Bastian wheeled me through the door.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  “Yes, yes,” I said. “This agency is my baby. I’ve missed nearly two weeks here and everything is a mess. I need to be here and cleanup.”

  “Why don’t you hire an assistant?”

  “If you haven’t noticed, Bastian, my budget isn’t exactly huge.” I gestured broadly to the office, which was one front room, where I kept the desk and chairs, and a back room with a couch and files. That was it. And it was not cheap.

  “Just ask— ouch!”

  Unrepentant, I stared at him. “Do not finish that sentence.”

  “Did you have to wheel over my damn foot?” He pulled it up and rubbed at the top of it.

  “Don’t finish the sentence.” I repeated myself. “I am not asking anything from anyone.”

  “Pride,” he grumbled.

/>   “Lust,” I grumbled back.

  We both cracked up laughing as he pushed the door closed. I still felt a little…shell shocked by everything that I had learned in the past ten days. Not the least of which who Wren really was, and who I was.

  After they had laid everything out, I realized what I had been seeing things on people, and why it was getting stronger. Simply being around these men, and Wren, was opening something up inside me.

  When I gasped at someone in the orthopedist’s waiting room, Fischer had to explain that I was seeing the sins on people. It was part and parcel of being one of the sins myself.

  And boy howdy did my brain not want to hear that at first. But the strength of their convictions finally made me start to believe they were right.

  Then, the guys let me in on their Scooby Gang.

  I looked at all the paperwork Lincoln and Fischer had laid out around me, and grinned.

  “You really did this?”

  “We’re in the process of it,” Linc said.

  Fischer tapped another folder. “We have more, too. It’s probably better to do it this way since the last three times we had to incite justice—”

  Bastian coughed, covering up a laugh.

  “—we wound up with murder.”

  Lincoln laughed this time. “This is way more fun. If they have victims of their sins, we get to clear them from the blast zone while we set up the dynamite for the sinner.”

  “And this is only for the really bad ones.”

  Fischer pulled out a picture of a woman, and lifted his eyebrows. “Check her out. Don’t try to stop the vision, it’ll come in in a second. Pictures take just a moment.”

  Even though I’d kind of known what to expect, when the image shifted, I squealed and dropped the photo.

  She was hideous. Utterly grotesque.

  Even crazier was that the personifications of the sins on her were moving like I was reading The Daily Quibbler.

  I’d really begun to believe everything Wren had said that day in the hospital. Watching her and her men work together was amazing. They were all in sync, and the house ran perfectly. It was a lively home, with Ellie, Ben, and the twins. They made me happy.

  Ben was just thriving now that he was in the house. He had a privacy curtain on his door and as soon as he woke up each morning, he cheerfully tied it back and sat in the doorway for a few minutes. It was like his own little meditation, and it couldn’t have been cuter.

  Tim and Tabitha—Bits as she insisted—loved having him there and they would often just chase each other around the house.

  Ellie was the doting older sister who was easily annoyed, but not really.

  I discovered the hard way that Wren wasn’t kidding about loving all three of her men. I was sure she didn’t see me in the hall, but I stayed still just in case.

  She and Fischer were hot together, and it was a hell of a thing to accidentally stumble up on. Worse, I caught her and Lincoln in the laundry room the next day, and Bastian locking the door on the way into the library the day after.

  There was only one kind of research going on there.

  For all that, though, they really didn’t have a problem with me being there. Occasionally I’d remember how close I’d come to screwing all of it up for them, but they didn’t care. The household had what it wanted and needed and didn’t even flinch with the addition of another person.

  I’d still been away from the agency too long. I had another week in the chair before Doctor Goodrun was going to let me on to crutches. I wasn’t looking forward to that at all.

  Bastian sat in the chair and pulled out his laptop. “I have plenty of stuff I can catch up on here, so just let me know if you want me to get anything, or leave, or whatever. I’m agreeable to almost everything.”

  “Almost?” I quirked an eyebrow.

  “Almost.” He nodded. “I’m not very good at art and you don’t want to trust me with your laundry.”

  Shaking my head, I started sorting the piles on the desk.

  I felt…good. Living around Wren, the guys, and the kids did something to me. I had never felt so welcome, or cared for in my life. In just two weeks they had all started to really change me, and unwind me. I had always been coiled so tight around Alain that I was ready to pop. I had to prioritize him over everything—and when Ben stuck his head in to show me his art from school the day before, he’d seen my computer on and apologized. When Wren came home from a truly shit day at CHoP, she listened to me bitch about the fact I couldn’t get my pants on before she said a word. If anyone got a drink from the kitchen, they’d pass me one if I was in sight.

  All without the expectation of compensation. No negotiation. Nada.

  They just did.

  And it was hard to stop asking what they wanted, but after a week I started shoving the thought away. They didn’t want anything but for me to be healthy and happy.

  That was the repayment.

  It was weird and wonderful.

  Bastian stood from his chair and I realized that nearly four hours had passed while I sorted and cleaned and started making notes on what I had to do.

  “I’m going to run to the Starbucks. Anything?”

  “Mm, yes. Iced mocha.”

  “It’s forty degrees out?” Bastian lifted a brow.

  “Your point?”

  “Wouldn’t hot coffee be better?”

  “My drink, my way.” I mockingly slammed my hand on the desk. “Please. Two sugars and a shot of hazelnut.”

  Rolling his eyes, he grabbed a Post-it and wrote down my order. At the end he added cake pop, chocolate if possible.

  Laughing, I shook my head and shooed him away. They knew me too well already.

  I’d made some serious headway on the mess. If I could keep this momentum up, I would probably be able to start working on cases again as soon as Goodrun cleared me for crutches…and someone was willing to drive me.

  Which, in the Manyunk house, was not a problem.

  House. I giggled to myself. Nothing that had a den, a study, a library, a conservatory, a gourmet kitchen, fifteen bedrooms, and eighteen bathrooms could ever be called a house. But it was the best shortcut I’d come up with for where I was staying.

  The door creaked open and I glanced at the time on my phone. “That was fast, Bastian. I didn’t expect you back—”

  “Who’s Bastian?”

  I snapped my head up and found Alain in the doorway.

  “Who is Bastian.” This time it was a statement and not a question.

  He stalked into the room, and slammed his hands down on the desk and leaned in. “Who the fuck is Bastian? Didn’t even wait for the paint to dry on that pussy, did you.”

  “Alain,” I finally managed to hiss his name. “What are you doing here? You can’t be here.”

  “I can be anywhere I want.” He stood and started to walk around the desk. “You’ve been avoiding me. Hiding out in that ridiculous house. Faking all this bullshit. Get up out of that chair and come home.”

  “No,” I whispered, my throat closing around the word.

  “No?” He laughed. “You don’t get to say no. I’m your husband, and you’re going to do what I tell you to. Stop faking and get out of that chair.”

  “I’m not faking.” The words were choked.

  “You are such a liar. You were always a liar, and you never understood how important it was that you just listen to me for your own good!”

  Slowly, he made his way around the desk to where I was seated in the wheelchair, the smirk on his face was angry and insane.

  “Did you get the abortion?”

  “No.”

  He snatched my shirt, and hoisted me out of the chair just a bit. “Why the hell not. Didn’t I tell you to? You need to. Get that parasite gone, bitch. Get it gone. I won’t take you back otherwise.”

  “You’re not taking me back,” I ground out. “You’re not even supposed to be within a hundred feet of me. Let go and get out.”

  “Or what, liar
?” His face was twisted into a possessive, cruel smile. “I’ll give you this one chance to get up out of that chair and follow me out that door. And if you don’t, you’ll breathe your last.”

  The sharp point of a knife pricked against the skin of my bruised rib. Gasping, I glanced down and found a huge Bowie knife in his hand.

  “Alain!”

  “Don’t try me, bitch,” he hissed. “Get up. Move. Now.”

  Tears I couldn’t stop slipped out. “I can’t get up! I can’t walk! I have pins in my ankle, and I can’t walk on it yet!”

  He grabbed my arm and yanked me up out of the chair. “Stand up!”

  My desperate need to steady myself overrode the knowledge that I couldn’t stand on the foot, and put half my weight on the cast. I screamed in pain, and dropped to the floor while Alain didn’t lessen his grip at all. He wrenched my shoulder up and I screamed again.

  “Put her down.”

  Bastian was back.

  Alain dropped me and self-preservation overrode everything, and I landed hard on my hand, wrenching my shoulder again. Another little scream escaped me.

  “Who are you?”

  “You are in violation of your restraining order, Alain Domingues. Get out of here, right now.”

  “My wife is—”

  “Your soon to be ex-wife is in the middle of divorce proceedings against you. Take your ass out of this office and out of this building. Before you make me take you out.”

  “Is that a threat?”

  Bastian folded his arms. “Yes.”

  In a smooth motion neither of us expected, Alain swooped down and slipped the knife between my ribs.

  I barely felt it.

  Bastian leapt over the desk and full body tackled Alain, slamming his head against the wall. He grabbed the front of his shirt and hauled him back away from the wall, then slammed him again. Then, Bastian’s fist flew up and nailed Alain in the eye. He threw him on the ground and straddled him.

  Alain tried to buck him off, but every time he moved, Bastian punched him again. And finally, Bastian wrapped his hand over Alain’s face, pulled it up and slammed him hard against the tile flooring.

  He went limp.

  Bastian was back over to me and I slumped down to the ground. My hand fluttered at the knife handle, but the blood was making everything slippery.