Hard to Hold

by Nicole Edwards

  Amy paused, took a breath. She looked up, meeting each of their eyes quickly.

  “The man I was dating was nineteen years older than me.”

  Lynx gave a whistle, Wolfe growled, and Rhys did his best not to come unglued. A fucking thirty-eight-year-old man had taken advantage of a naïve, grieving, nineteen-year-old girl. The fucker.

  “I was still a teenager, although I didn’t feel like one,” Amy continued. “Not until then, anyway. When my uncle tried to interfere, I felt the need to rebel. I argued, told him that everything was fine. I was an adult and could make my own decisions. I also told him it wasn’t serious.” She glanced over toward the door again. “But it was. Serious. He was already talking about marriage.” Her eyes dropped to her lap. “I thought I was in love with him. He’d wined and dined me, made me feel like I was something more than a kid, the way my aunt and uncle still saw me. He told me I was beautiful, made me feel like I was.”

  Rhys knew where this was headed and he only hoped he made it through the story without putting his fist through the wall.

  Then again, as he glanced at the dangerous expression on Wolfe’s face, he might be spending his time trying to keep the man from going postal.

  It was anyone’s guess who would lose it first, at this point.

  16

  __________

  Remaining in the chair was far more difficult than Wolfe was making it look, he hoped. Amy had hardly told them anything at this point, and already, Wolfe was vibrating with fury. What the fuck could an almost-forty-year-old man see in a teenage girl? They couldn’t’ve possibly had anything in common.

  “My uncle … he … well, to put it kindly, he didn’t like him at all. Said he was far too old for me, that he was using me. My aunt didn’t say much, but I could tell she wasn’t supportive of me dating him, either. She tried to talk to me a few times, but I always went off on these dreamy tirades about how great he was. I know she wanted to see me happy, but she didn’t want me to get hurt. My uncle never held back. We started to argue all the time, until one day, he told me—”

  Amy stopped abruptly when the door opened.

  Reagan stepped inside, her eyes instantly taking in the scene before her. Wolfe gave her a brief head nod, then glanced at Amy. “Let me talk to her for a second.”

  Amy gave a nod of agreement, her hands clasped tightly in her lap.

  As Wolfe was walking over to Reagan, he heard Rhys say, “Amy, the same goes for Reagan. Like Lynx told you. Family.”

  Wolfe glanced back in time to see Amy swallowing hard as she nodded.

  “Is she okay?” Reagan’s expression was one of confusion and concern.

  Wolfe nodded toward the door and Reagan preceded him outside.

  “When I got to her house last night, she seemed upset,” Reagan explained, her face etched with worry. “I heard her leave really early this mornin’. I guess I got concerned.”

  “It’s … complicated. When I got here, she was waitin’ in her car.”

  Reagan seemed to process that information and Wolfe suspected she was waiting for him to say something more.

  Finally, she met his gaze, held it. “Please don’t make me leave,” Reagan pleaded. “She needs a friend and I … I want to be there for her.”

  She did need a friend, but whether or not Reagan stayed was not his decision to make. “That’s up to her.”

  Reagan nodded, glancing at the door briefly, twisting her hands in her shirt. She seemed to come to a decision because she headed back inside. She walked right over to Amy, sitting in the chair beside her and reaching for her hand.

  “I was worried when I heard you leave so early,” Reagan explained.

  To Wolfe’s surprise, Amy clutched Reagan’s hand, watching the woman intently. “I’m…” Amy shook her head. “No. I’m not okay.”

  Wolfe moved farther into the room, coming to stand beside Rhys and petting Copenhagen when the dog trotted over to him.

  When Amy met his eyes again, he nodded. “Lynx and Rhys are right, Amy. The people in this room have your back. Keep goin’.”

  She swallowed hard, her attention on Copenhagen when the dog came and put his head in her lap again. “Like I said, my uncle didn’t like him. At first he said it was because he was so much older than me. I tried to tell him that age didn’t matter. That we were happy together. My uncle didn’t care. He held his ground.

  “One night, when he came to pick me up for dinner, my uncle met him at the door. They had a conversation that resulted in my uncle slamming the door and telling me that if I went out with him again, I wouldn’t be able to stay under their roof. He wouldn’t put up with it.”

  Tears welled in Amy’s eyes. Reagan reached for her hand again, holding it tightly.

  “Did you ever find out why he didn’t like him?” Lynx inquired.

  Amy nodded. “My uncle was a 9-1-1 operator. Apparently, he’d heard some things about him. He didn’t know him personally, but he said he had a reputation.”

  Wolfe didn’t need her to explain. If the man had a reputation and the uncle didn’t like him, he hadn’t been a choir boy, that was for damn sure.

  “I rebelled.” She sniffed, a tear falling down her cheek. “Told him I didn’t care. That I loved this man and I was gonna be with him no matter what. I went out to dinner anyway, and that night, he convinced me to stay at his house for the first time.” Amy seemed to fold in on herself as a sob broke up her words.

  Unable to help himself, Wolfe was instantly at her side. Reagan took the hint and moved, giving him space. Wolfe dropped into the chair beside her, then pulled Amy against his chest as she broke down, her body jerking from the strength of her sobs.

  It took inhuman effort to relax his arms, to not squeeze too tight. The thought of this bastard taking her virginity made every cell in his body gear up for a fight.

  While Wolfe consoled Amy, Lynx moved across the room to the coffeepot, Reagan right behind him. The sink ran, which meant they were making coffee as they spoke in hushed tones. Wolfe couldn’t make out everything Lynx was saying, but he figured he was giving her the CliffsNotes version of the story thus far.

  Wolfe made eye contact with Rhys. He had no idea what the man was thinking. He was angry, there was no doubt about that. But he was patiently waiting for Amy to continue. Wolfe knew he was keeping his distance because Lynx and Reagan were there. Evidently, he wasn’t interested in anyone finding out about their relationship. If what they had could even be called that.

  When Lynx and Reagan returned, they passed out coffee cups. Lynx resumed his position on the table and Reagan pulled another chair over near him and sat. Wolfe was reluctant to release Amy, but when she pulled away, he didn’t hold on.

  Resting his elbows on his knees, Wolfe dropped his head, staring down into his coffee cup. He got the feeling this story was going to get a lot worse, and probably never better.

  Amy hiccupped. “I’m sorry … I…”

  “Don’t be sorry,” Rhys said, coming to stand in front of her before dropping to his haunches. “We need to know what happened.”

  Setting his coffee cup on the floor, Wolfe watched them.

  Amy nodded, squeezing Rhys’s hand as she stared into his eyes. Her words came out on a tortured sob. “That night, my aunt and uncle died.”

  Once again, Amy cried, her hands covering her face.

  Wolfe saw Rhys’s face harden, the no-nonsense sheriff replacing the laid-back country boy. He knew Rhys couldn’t disconnect himself from his job. He’d taken an oath to protect people, and he took it seriously. No matter what he told Amy, Wolfe knew Rhys would have to look into this. Whether he’d do it officially or off the books, it wouldn’t matter. He’d do it, regardless.

  Rhys waited until Amy calmed down.

  She was wiping the tears from her face when Rhys asked, “How? How’d they die, Amy?”

  “A fire.” She sniffled. “It destroyed their entire house. They died. I was told it was probably smoke inhalation—I hope to G
od that’s true. Their burned bodies were found in their bed.”

  Wolfe realized his hands were balled into fists. He got up, pushing the chair back as he did. He couldn’t sit still.

  “They said it was an accident,” Amy continued.

  Wolfe spun to face her. “And you believe that?”

  If it was an accident, why were they in bed? Surely they hadn’t slept through it. What about smoke detectors? Or even the smell of smoke? Or the heat? Something should’ve woken them up.

  “No. I don’t believe it.” Her eyes locked with his. “Not anymore, anyway. Eventually, he told me that no one would stand in the way of us being together. I…” She sobbed again. “I don’t know how he did it, but he killed them. I know he did. He never openly admitted it, but it was the little things he said.”

  Rhys held Amy’s hand until she got control of herself again. Wolfe could tell she wanted to get this over with. Probably the only reason she pulled herself together.

  “Son of a bitch.” Rhys stood, pacing the floor. “Keep goin’, Amy. We need to know the whole story.”

  Wolfe agreed, although he didn’t want to hear any more. He wanted to go back to not knowing the hell that Amy had lived because it was eviscerating him. And he knew it’d been hell even without hearing the rest.

  Amy felt as though she had a four-hundred-pound weight sitting on her chest. That was how it felt every time she thought about her aunt and uncle and the horrific way they’d died.

  “The worst part about it,” she said, breathing deeply, “is I didn’t go home for two days after the fight with my uncle. I didn’t even know. He finally took me home and it was then I found everything gone. The house, everything in it, but most importantly, the only family I had.” She sniffed, refusing to break down again. She had to get through this. “Those few days were a blur. He consoled me, told me everything would be all right, held me while I cried. I remember the police station, someone telling me how they died, that they’d ruled it an accident. According to the fire inspector, there had been a leaky gas line.”

  “Convenient,” Lynx muttered, his voice hard as steel.

  “I lost my parents at sixteen, and three years later, I was burying my aunt and uncle. I had nothing. Nowhere to go, no one to turn to. I was all alone.” She looked at Wolfe. “Except for him. He was there. Always there. He made me feel safe, told me he would take care of me, that I had nothing to worry about. And from that point on, I lived with him.” Amy cleared her throat. “I lived with him for the next four years, seven months, and twenty-two days.”

  Yes, she had counted every painful day that she had suffered with him.

  Amy straightened her back, feeling the need to show them she wasn’t as weak as they probably believed she was. Not that it wasn’t true, but she didn’t want them to know.

  “During all that time, I suffered ten concussions, a broken ankle, elbow, three fingers, my right arm, left wrist. My nose was broken twice.” As she said the words, she realized how bad it looked that she had stuck around, continued to endure. She knew for a fact that Reagan never would’ve put up with a man hurting her like that.

  “There were no questions from the hospital?” Rhys asked.

  “A couple of nurses seemed concerned, but he was never less than two feet away from me. I couldn’t tell them anything. Then, he stopped taking me to the hospital. A couple of times he took me to an emergency clinic. When he broke my fingers, he splinted them himself, said I’d be fine.”

  Amy glanced down at her fingers, wiggled them as the memory took hold.

  “It’s your own goddamn fault, Amy. If you’d just listen, I wouldn’t have to hurt you.”

  “I’m sorry,” she told him.

  “You should be. Next time you won’t fight back.”

  That was always his excuse. If she wouldn’t fight back, he wouldn’t have to hurt her. It was a lie because the couple of times she hadn’t fought back, he’d still beaten her.

  God, she fucking hated him.

  Shaking it off, she sighed and sat up straight. “At first, he was nice afterward. He would hit me, then apologize profusely. A few times he even cried. I would forgive him, even though I knew I shouldn’t. As time went on, I wanted to leave, but I had nowhere to go. I had no one else. I would work myself into a panic, worried that no one would ever love me, that I would always be alone. So I stayed. I endured.”

  She didn’t bother to tell them about how he’d raped her damn near every day. After the first time she had tried to resist his sexual advances, he had demanded sex from her. Although she didn’t fight him off, she didn’t consent, either. That was rape; even she knew that. It got to the point she simply lay there while he did what he needed to do. In the beginning, he had tried to whisper romantic words, but Amy had closed her eyes and willed him to finish so he would leave her alone. Then, he stopped trying to make it good for her at all. He simply took what he wanted, whenever he wanted it.

  He was the only man she’d ever been with and sex had never been a pleasant thing. Still, Amy had never been disillusioned. She knew it could be good. With the right man.

  The only positive in all of it was that he’d insisted she be on birth control because he didn’t want children.

  The mere thought of a child living in fear the way she had…

  Amy felt the tears spill down her cheeks, but more importantly, she felt the anger that had become so much a part of her for so long. “I fucking hated him,” she said, her voice getting louder. “He was the devil. He beat me and beat me and no”—Amy looked directly at Rhys, the strength of her fury pointed at him—“I didn’t try to stop him! I did put up with it. I wasn’t strong enough.”

  “Bullshit!” Rhys yelled, moving right over to her.

  Amy wasn’t at all threatened by him. He wasn’t going to hurt her. She felt the strength of his anger as much as her own and she understood it.

  He squatted down before her. She sucked in air, her teeth clenched as she fought the tears back. She’d spent so many years living in fear, the hatred festering … sometimes she couldn’t hold it in.

  “That’s bullshit, Amy. You were strong. You fucking lived through it. You got out.”

  Amy shook her head, the tears pouring down her face as the sobs won, tearing from her chest as the truth ripped her heart apart. She wished she’d been strong, that she’d gotten out. But she hadn’t.

  Rhys pulled her against him and she threw her arms around his neck, letting it all out. “I wasn’t strong enough,” she repeated against his neck.

  “You’re stronger than you think,” he whispered, his hand sliding over her hair, cupping the back of her head, his lips pressing against her forehead. “It was never your fault, Amy. Never. The blame is on him. Never you.”

  Amy wasn’t sure she believed that. No, he shouldn’t have hit her, but she should’ve found a way out. Every time she tried to come up with a plan, she got scared. She’d convinced herself that she loved him. That he loved her. Deep down, she knew she wasn’t at fault, but sometimes it was hard to acknowledge.

  Amy pulled back from Rhys, sniffling and once again wiping the stubborn tears from her face. “I have to finish.”

  She felt Reagan at her side once again. Amy was glad she was there.

  She looked up to see Wolfe and Lynx standing beside one another. In that moment, she understood why so many people feared them. Individually, they were intimidating. But together…

  Shaking her head, she took a deep breath and looked at Rhys. “I didn’t get out. Not purposely anyway.” She swallowed past the lump in her throat.

  Rhys stood, then held out a cup of coffee. She waved it off. She couldn’t stomach anything right now.

  Forging ahead, she clasped her hands in her lap, her voice steadier this time. “One day, I decided I was gonna leave him. For an entire week, I planned it out in my head. How I would do it, where I would go.

  “Then on Friday, he went to work and I packed up as much of my stuff as I could. I hesitated,
I’ll admit it. I think that’s the only reason it happened. If I had left as soon as he went to work, I probably would’ve been home free. But I was scared. I had no car, no credit cards. I had some money in the bank. At the time, I wasn’t sure it was still there, but I’d received money after my parents’ death. I had never told him about it, scared he would take it.

  “He didn’t allow me to have any of those things. I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere alone, wasn’t allowed to buy anything. The only time I left the house was when he took me somewhere. After I moved in with him, he stopped taking me out unless it was to a business function. I was only there to look pretty, he told me. I’d become his prisoner. He picked out my clothes, told me how to do my hair, what makeup to wear, how long I could sleep. I ate what he wanted me to eat, watched shows he approved of, but only when he was home. He didn’t let me use the Internet, wouldn’t give me a phone. There were security cameras in every room, including the bathrooms and closets, and on all the doors outside. He kept me under his thumb every minute of the day.

  “He had taken over my entire life and I wasn’t sure how to survive without him. I debated on whether or not I was safer with him, despite the damage he inflicted. After all, I wasn’t dead. He told me he loved me and that I would always belong to him. That I would never survive without him.” Amy met Rhys’s eyes. “He wasn’t lying. About the last part, anyway. Only, he’d meant it in an entirely different way than I took it.”

  She looked over at Wolfe. “Before I could get the nerve up to leave that day, he came home. He saw that I had my stuff packed, had watched me pack it, in fact. I tried to tell him that I was done. That I wanted out. I told him I didn’t love him anymore, that I needed to move on with my life. That I would survive without him. That I could make it on my own. I even promised I would never tell anyone that he was a complete monster. Not in so many words, of course. I knew not to talk to him like that.”

  As she told the story, Amy saw the trend, realized how she had grown to hate him more and more with every passing day. Sure, she’d felt the anger at the time, but as she told the story, she had to wonder what had stopped her from killing him. She hated him that much, and prison would’ve been a step up from the hell she’d been living.