For You

by Kristen Ashley

  I got you off and I couldn’t get untangled from the sheets, I was so muddled, and I just gave up and started crying. Craig was there then and he was so mad at Denny and I was lucky, for once, because Craig took care of me. He took care of you and me.

  That was hard but this is harder because you have to know why I didn’t say anything. Why I didn’t tell you or Feb what happened.

  The next day, my folks went to church and Denny came over. I felt sick, from what happened and from whatever he gave me and trying to figure out what I’d say to you and Feb. That’s why I didn’t go to church with them. But, even if I wasn’t like that, I still couldn’t have fought him. I did fight him, but I didn’t win.

  He hurt me, Colt. Right in the living room of my own home. He told me I couldn’t tell you or Feb what happened. “Don’t you fucking open your mouth,” he said. I’ll never forget it, those words, the way he said them. He wasn’t a Denny I knew. But I told him I was going to tell you and he got mean, then meaner, then he hurt me, Colt. In the worst way. The very worst way.

  Colt pulled in breath then sat down in a chair.

  He didn’t violate Amy and he didn’t have a son.

  He’d been right. Denny had raped her.

  The first didn’t make him feel better because he now knew the last.

  He ran his fingers through his hair and then curved them around the back of his neck, squeezing tight, his eyes closed, the papers in his hand, Amy’s words, written in pretty, neat handwriting. He wondered how many times she wrote and rewrote them. Or if she just poured it out and sent it to her parents. The writing was too neat and he knew she’d practiced.

  He bit his lip and pulled in another breath before he opened his eyes, slid the first sheet, which he’d read front and back, behind the other and started on the next page.

  He left me and told me there was more of that if I opened my mouth. He knew, when I came up pregnant, that he did that to me. He sent me a note, put it in my mailbox and all it said was “Keep your mouth shut.” I kept it and gave it to Mom and Dad with this letter. I don’t know if it helps at all, but I’ll ask them to give it you.

  Colt, I didn’t want that to happen to me again. That’s why I didn’t say anything. It wasn’t until he hurt Angie, put her behind the bar, that I knew I had to do what was right. Don’t ask me how I knew it was him, just that, I did.

  But I went to the bar and I couldn’t. The way Feb looked at me. I knew what she thought. And I couldn’t hurt either of you anymore than I already did. And I didn’t want him to hurt me.

  So, by the time you get this, I will have made it so he can’t hurt me but you’ll know.

  You can show this to Feb, I don’t mind. Promise. You were sweet together and I like the idea that maybe I did a little something to make it all right between you two again. I’m just sorry I left it so late, too late for Angie but maybe not too late for you and Feb.

  Please don’t hate me, Colt. I couldn’t stand that. I promise, I wanted to do right.

  And look into Denny. I can’t say I know that he did that to Angie except that I do. If he could do that to me, to you and to Feb, he could do that to Angie. He just could, Colt, trust me.

  And one more thing and I’m sorry for this because I’m asking a favor I don’t deserve to ask. But I had to do it, to protect him and I know you’re a good man and you might not want to protect me but I figure you’ll want to protect him.

  I lied on the birth certificate. I said the father was Craig. I thought, if my boy ever came looking, that he should have a father he’d want to find, not Denny. If my boy comes looking, you have to talk to Craig. You have to tell him to keep my secret. You have to help protect my boy. I know it’s a lot to ask, of you and of Craig, but I don’t want him knowing, if he ever wants to find out, where he came from. Tell him Craig and me were young, but we were happy and we were in love. We weren’t, but he was a good friend and he’s a good man and every child should think they have a good Dad and they came from love, don’t you think?

  My folks know what happened, they got their own letter and I know they’ll stand by me. I just hope you and Craig will too. Will you do that for me? Please?

  That’s all there is to tell except to say I’m sorry. Really, so sorry. You don’t know how much.

  Amy

  Colt read the last line again then again and he knew Amy was wrong. He knew how sorry she was, he’d seen her hanging from her ceiling fan. He knew just how sorry she was for something she fucking didn’t do.

  He slid the papers back into the envelope slowly and smoothed the clasp shut. Then he set it on the table and went to the door. He opened it to find the Harrises standing outside, Mrs. Harris holding a paper cup with a cardboard protector, the string from a teabag dangling.

  “Would you come back in?” Colt asked.

  They nodded and walked in, their eyes on the envelope.

  “Please, sit.”

  “Are you okay, son?” Mr. Harris asked instead of sitting and Colt looked at him.

  “No,” he answered truthfully. “You had a beautiful, kind daughter who is no longer of this world and never did a thing wrong to anyone and definitely not to me but she lived twenty-two years thinking she did. I’m not okay with that.”

  Mr. Harris’s body grew taller, his shoulders straightening.

  Mrs. Harris’s body grew smaller, her shoulders sagging.

  “We aren’t either,” Mrs. Harris whispered and Colt saw the tears trembling in her eyes.

  “It helps, though,” Mr. Harris said quietly, “to know you aren’t either.”

  “Please, sit,” Colt repeated.

  Mrs. Harris didn’t sit, she asked, “Will you tell February?”

  Colt nodded. “Yes, I will. Soon as I can.”

  “Will she understand?” Mrs. Harris asked, her voice slightly higher, worried.

  “She already does,” Colt assured her. “We figured some of it out already. She’s not okay with what was done to Amy either.”

  Mrs. Harris nodded, a tear slid down her cheek and she looked to her husband.

  “We heard things, since we been back to town,” Mr. Harris said. “Are they going to get him?”

  “Yes,” Colt said, knowing he shouldn’t. Anything could happen, you didn’t give assurances you couldn’t stake claim to, but he said it all the same.

  Mr. Harris gestured to the envelope. “Amy would want you to use that, if you need to,” he opened his jacket and pulled another envelope out, this one smaller, white, “and this,” Mr. Harris finished, putting the white envelope on top of the yellow one.

  “When did you receive these?” Colt asked.

  “The day Doc called,” Mr. Harris answered, running an arm around his wife’s waist and pulling her close. “We were out, didn’t open the mail, not until after he called. We thought it could wait until we delivered it to you, face to face.”

  Colt nodded. Amy had planned her death precisely and he hated it that those plans were the last thing she carried out in this world. As he nodded, he heard Mrs. Harris’s breath hitch.

  “You need us anymore?” Mr. Harris asked, pulling his wife closer, wanting to get out of there.

  “No, sir.”

  Mr. Harris nodded and led his wife to the door. Colt followed and watched the older man stop at the door then turn.

  “Please don’t talk to Craig ‘less you have to.”

  Colt nodded.

  “She’d want you at her funeral. Will you do that for her?”

  Colt didn’t miss a beat. “Feb and I’ll be there.”

  “Mean a lot to Amy.”

  “We’ll be there.”

  “Tomorrow, three o’clock. Service before. Markham and Sons.”

  “We’ll be there,” Colt repeated.

  Mrs. Harris lifted her wet face to Colt and whispered, “You always were a good boy.”

  “And Amy always was a sweet girl,” Colt returned, she nodded, fresh tears falling from her eyes, both her lips disappearing around her teet
h.

  Her husband bustled her out and Colt followed them close like a guard down the hall, through the bullpen with police and Feds studiously avoiding looking at the grieving couple, down the hall, through the front doors, down the stairs and to their rental car on the street.

  Mr. Harris stopped, shook Colt’s hand. When her husband moved away, Mrs. Harris got close, wrapped her fingers around his upper arm, leaned up high and Colt bent low so she could touch her cheek to his.

  “Life lands blows you don’t expect,” she whispered against his cheek. “They wind you and there’s some you never get your breath back. We didn’t know, we asked, she never answered, but we suspected. Amy never got her breath back.” She pulled her face away but stayed close and looked him in the eye. “Get your breath back, Alexander, Amy would want that for you.”

  “All my life, had good people looking after me,” Colt promised her. “I get winded, I recover. Now, even with that, I’m breathing just fine, Mrs. Harris.”

  That last was a lie, but she didn’t know that.

  Though he wasn’t lying, he’d recover.

  She squeezed his arm, nodded again, let him go and turned away.

  Colt watched the street long after their car disappeared.

  Then he turned, took the front steps two at a time then the inside stairs the same.

  “Colt!” Sully called but Colt kept walking to interrogation one.

  “Not now, Sully,” he called back.

  He hit interrogation one, grabbed the envelopes, headed out, dropped the white envelope on his desk and went back down the stairs at a jog. Then out of the Station. When he hit the sidewalk, he was running.

  He pulled open the door to J&J’s and Feb, behind the bar, looked at him.

  “Office,” he said before she could do the jaw tilt.

  He watched her head twitch as he covered the ground in less strides than it normally took him. As he went she hurried down the bar. She hit the office barely a second after him. He took her arm, pulled her inside, slammed the door and then pushed her against it. He moved into her, fully invading her space, his arm with the hand holding the envelope went around her waist, low, pulling her hips to his. His chest leaned deep, pressing her shoulders to the door. His other hand went to her jaw and he dipped his face close.

  “I didn’t violate Amy and I don’t have a kid,” he told her.

  He watched her blink fast, twice.

  “What?” she asked.

  “What’d you see when you saw us?” he asked.

  She shook her head, jerky, back to blinking.

  “What?” she repeated.

  His fingers tensed on her jaw, “Baby, what’d you see when you saw me and Amy?”

  He knew by the look on her face she didn’t want to relive it but she was also looking at his face, she read it and she did it, for him.

  “You were under the covers, moving, you were on top of her, you were kissing. I could see her knees up, you were between her legs.”

  “Were we dressed?”

  Her eyes grew dazed, unfocused then she came back to him and she answered, “Yes. I think so, up top I could see, but you were under the covers. I didn’t –”

  He pulled slightly away and held the envelope between them.

  “Read this, Feb. It’s from Amy. Her parents gave it to me.”

  She stared at it like Ryan stared at the pad, like he suspected he’d looked at that envelope half an hour before.

  He ran his fingers down her jaw before his hand fell away and he said, “It isn’t easy to read, baby. Lowe raped her.” She gasped, her eyes flew from the envelope to him, he gave her a squeeze with his arm and went on. “It’s ugly but it isn’t surprising. I thought it’d hurt you anymore than he already has, I swear, Feb, I wouldn’t let you touch it. But Amy wanted you to see it.”

  She stared at him for awhile before she nodded and took the envelope but Colt didn’t make her read it on her own. His arm went around her and he pulled her lower body close until it touched his and he kept her there while her eyes slid back and forth across the page. She flipped the first paper then she moved to the next, flipping that too. Colt watched as she read and her eyes filled with tears, her bottom lip quivering, but she held them back.

  When she was done, she tilted her head and whispered, “I’m so stupid.”

  He pulled the papers from her hand, turned and tossed them on the desk and came back to her, his arm still around her, his other hand going to her jaw, he dropped his forehead to hers.

  “Don’t go back there, Feb, that wasn’t where I was taking you.”

  “I was drunk… I saw –”

  He touched his mouth to hers to stop her words then said, “Baby, don’t go back there. Stay here, with me. You’re goin’ where Denny’s leading you, not me, not Amy.” She pulled in breath, fought the train of her thoughts and nodded. “She wanted you to know.” Feb nodded again. “She wouldn’t want any more pain.” Feb nodded yet again. “She’d want you to let it go.”

  “Yeah,” she whispered.

  “She gave all she could so we could let it go.”

  The tears slid down her cheeks and she repeated softly, “Yeah.”

  “The Harrises want us at her funeral.”

  She nodded again but her breath snagged.

  “They need to see Amy didn’t die for nothing.”

  “But she did,” Feb whispered, her lips catching tears and her tongue slid out to clean them way.

  “They need to think she didn’t.”

  Feb nodded yet again. “We can give them that.”

  He pulled her in both of his arms, she stuffed her face in his neck and wrapped her arms around him, holding on tight.

  “I hate him, Colt,” she said into his neck, her voice thick, clogged, sounding choked.

  “I know you do, honey.”

  She bunched his blazer in her fists at his back, yanking down on it hard before she sobbed, “God, I hate him.”

  He held her until she cried it out and pulled her face out of neck, tipping her head back to look at him. She let him go with one of her hands and wiped her face.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Will be, when this’s over.”

  She nodded again and whispered, “Maybe wrong, seein’ as it was the way it was with Denny raping her, but I’m glad you don’t have to live thinkin’ you did what I thought you did.”

  Colt helped her wipe her face before he said, “That isn’t wrong, baby.”

  She dropped her forehead to his shoulder, sucked in a deep breath that expanded her whole body, Colt settled a hand around the back of her neck and when she let out her breath, she asked his chest, “We still on for Frank’s?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it for anything.”

  Her breath hitched again and she said, “Missed too much already.”

  Colt closed his eyes before he opened them and ordered, “February, look at me.”

  She did what she was told and tipped her head back.

  “Just as much a waste of time thinkin’ about what life might have brought as it is thinkin’ you can turn back the clock and change things.”

  She bit the side of her lip as her eyes slid to the side then she tilted her head and looked back at him. “But you’ve missed dozens of frittatas.”

  There she was. There was his girl.

  “Just dozens?” he asked.

  “You haven’t had my homemade waffles yet. Or my Omelet a la Feb.”

  Colt smiled. “Damn, baby, look at me. I’m a forty-four year old man who’s got a life of breakfast delights waiting for him.”

  She smiled back, it wasn’t bright but it was something. “Don’t think you don’t have to earn them.”

  “I’ll earn ‘em.”

  She got up on her toes and touched her lips to his before looking him right in the eye.

  “You better.”

  * * * * *

  When Colt hit the top of the stairs at the Station he went directly to his desk to drop the envelope
on it but nearly stuttered a step when his head swung right and he saw her.

  Sully was right. At a glance, Cheryl “Candy” Sheckle was the spitting image of February.

  Closer inspection showed she was younger by at least a decade, maybe more and life hadn’t been kind. It also showed her hair was dyed, not natural like Feb’s. She’d had her breasts enhanced, they were larger than Feb’s, didn’t fit her frame, which was tall and attractive. She didn’t have Feb’s style either but she was trying and this was likely because Lowe made her. She had a choker, not like Feb’s or even close, but it was there. The tangle of silver was at her neck and wrists, rings, hoops in her ears. Feb selected her jewelry for a reason that was individual and it stamped her personality on her. This woman had hers selected for her and it was both not as high quality and she didn’t carry it right. Her clothes were too tight but it was the t-shirt, jeans and boots. Again, not the same quality but near enough and she wore these, Colt suspected, because her man liked them, not because she did.

  Her brown eyes caught sight of him and surprise flooded her face before she quickly averted her eyes and Colt felt his jaw get tight. She’d been given the same story as Ryan. She knew him and she knew him as a dirty cop.

  Sully slid up to him as he dropped the envelope on his desk.

  “Everything go all right with Amy’s parents?” he asked.

  “Good as it could, considering she sent her suicide notes to them and in them they learned their daughter had been raped by Denny Lowe.”

  Sully reared back a few inches before he breathed, “Fuck me.”

  Colt got closer and his voice dipped lower. “Kid’s not mine, I didn’t touch her, never had my clothes off, either did she. Kid’s Denny’s.”

  Sully’s face got red before he said, “This guy’s like a freakin’ tornado, devastation in his wake.” He looked at the envelope and back at Colt. “The note?”

  “Yep, the one to me.”

  “Can we use it?”

  “Parents’ve given permission.”