“What’s up, man?” Dallas said to Jim.
Dean watched as Dallas’ lips tightened, a sure sign of anger. Dean cocked his head quizzically and Dallas averted his eyes. He said a few more words to Jim, then hung up.
“Poker’s canceled,” Dallas said.
“Huh? How come?”
“Because we’re all going over to Kat’s.” Dallas ran his huge hand over the back of his neck. “She’s going to talk to us, and we’ll see if we can help her.”
“With what?”
“With whoever she’s running from.”
Dean set down his coffee cup with a crash. “She finally admitted that she’s hiding?”
Dallas nodded. “Yeah. But she won’t tell Jim more than that yet.”
“And she’ll tell us?”
“She will.” Dallas hesitated. “She wants to know if we can keep her safe.”
“Fuck, yeah, we can.” Dean was furious just at the thought of someone wanting to hurt her. “Why is she even doubting it?”
“I don’t know.” Dallas sipped his coffee. “But she seems to feel that it’s a question. Makes me wonder just who the hell this fucker is, and what he’s capable of.”
That gave Dean pause. “You think it’s bad?”
“Dean,” Dallas said. “The woman has set up her whole life to make sure that she doesn’t officially exist anywhere. She has a packed suitcase next to her door, ready to run at any second. Nobody does that. So yeah, I think it’s bad.” He sighed. “It’s probably about as bad as it can get.”
**
Kat opened her apartment door and gazed up at Dean, Dallas and Chris. They stared right back down at her, their hard eyes taking her in, looking for damage. She stepped back, suddenly not at all sure that this was a good idea. She glanced at the suitcase.
“Hey,” Chris said softly. “How are you, hon?”
“Oh, fine.” She swallowed her nerves. “I mean, you know. Fine.”
The men stepped in to the open living room space, exchanged glances with Jim. He brought over some bottles of beer that he and Kat had bought when they had gone shopping that morning, and they all sat. Kat perched on the very edge of her chair, looking for all the world like a bird about to take flight. She turned her bottle of beer around and around in her shaking hands.
The guys sat quietly, just looking at her. Waited for her to start talking.
“I – I don’t know where to begin,” she said helplessly.
“That’s OK,” Jim said. “Maybe with this: you told me you’re from Oregon. That’s true?”
“Yes. Born and raised.”
“When did you leave?”
“Four years ago.” She cleared her throat. “I ran four years ago.”
“Where’d you go first?” Dean asked.
“First? Wisconsin.”
They blinked at her.
“That’s quite a ways away from Oregon,” Dallas commented.
“Yeah. That was the point.” She took a sip of beer. “If I’d had the cash, I’d have gone farther. All the way to Florida, if I could have.”
“OK. And after Wisconsin?” Chris said.
“Uh, let’s see. Michigan. Alabama. Oklahoma. Kansas. Texas. Arizona. Then Colorado.”
“All that moving in four years?” Dean said. “And you’ve been in Denver for what – a year, right?”
“More.” Kat bit her lip. “I never stayed in one place longer than five months, but Denver’s been different. I – I really love it here. And Emma got sick so I stayed to help her, but I planned to leave before Christmas last year. Then what happened to Olivia happened, and I couldn’t imagine leaving her like that, so I stayed. Then Jenny decided to… to face what happened to her, and I knew she needed my help. So I stayed a bit longer. Time’s just… passed.” She looked down. “Now I feel like this is my home. I don’t want to go.”
“Well, we don’t want you to,” Dallas said lightly. “Why do you feel like you have to leave again? I mean, it’s been four years since you ran. Isn’t that enough time? He’s probably lost you, or given up finding you by now, don’t you think?”
“No.” She shook her head. “He hasn’t.”
“How do you know?” Dean said.
“Because he’s a monster.”
The men looked at each other, stunned at the pain and fear in her voice. Each one of them felt their natural protective instincts rise now; they were the kind of men who made a point of taking care of people less-strong than themselves. Seeing Kat like this made them want to keep her safe, at any cost.
“What did he do?” Jim asked her. “To make you run?”
Kat shook her head. “I – I can’t. I’ve never talked about it, not with anyone.”
“Nobody?” Jim said. “Your parents?”
“No.”
“Do they know where you are?”
“No.”
“You have no contact with them?”
“I do, but I never say where I am. It’s safer for them that way.” She looked up at the men. “We have burner phones, and I change mine every time I move. We communicate by short calls only, and delete the call histories right away.”
“No texts?” Dallas said.
“None.”
“Uh-huh. E-mails?”
“No. No written evidence at all.”
Dallas sighed. “Who is this dickhead, Kat?”
She froze, and then suddenly started to shake.
“Hey.” Jim crouched down in front of her. “Come on, baby. You’re safe here with us. You know that, right?”
Kat nodded. “I just – I’m scared to talk to you.”
“Why?” Chris said gently.
“I don’t know.” She half-laughed. “Maybe because if I do, it’s all real.”
None of them had anything to say to that. They all knew about trying to ignore the nightmares, in the hope that pretending they weren’t there would make them less powerful. Make them not have happened. The four of them had spent years not talking about Afghanistan, years denying that any of it had been real. Kat’s train of thought made perfect sense to them, and none of them were going to judge her for having it.
“OK, let’s take this slow,” Dean said. “Tell us about him.”
She shuddered.
“He can’t get to you.” Jim touched her arm. “He’d have to get through us first.”
“But he’s dangerous,” she said.
“So are we. We’re totally lethal.” Dean grinned at her, trying to set her at ease a bit. “Don’t let the nice-guy personas fool you.”
She didn’t smile back. “No. He’s not just some guy who works in an office or something. He’s like you. He’s – he’s trained.”
That stopped them.
“He’s ex-military?” Chris said.
“Yeah. A former Marine.” She bit her lip. “He’s just like you. He’s one of you.”
“The fuck he is,” Jim ground out. “If he hurts women, he’s nothing at all like us. We have nothing to do with assholes like that, Kat, and you damn well better know it. Don’t put us in the same group as him.”
Stunned, she raised her eyes to his. “I’m sorry… I didn’t mean…”
“Forget it.” Jim stood up, moved back to the sofa. “So, he’s an ex-Marine. Anything else?”
“He’s a cop now.” Kat set down her beer on the coffee table with shaking hands. “He’s a sheriff, actually, last I heard.”
“Who did you hear it from?” Dallas said. “Who gave you that information?”
She hesitated. “A – a woman. She works with him.”
“She’s a cop too?”
“No. No, she’s more of a clerk. She works at the police station, but she’s more administrative. Sends the cars out, takes care of reports, handles some HR and court stuff.”
> “And she’s the one who told you that he’s still looking for you?” Dallas asked.
She jumped. “How did you know that?”
“Lucky guess, hon. I’ve been in the security business for a while now, and I know how to put the pieces together.”
“You have to promise me that you won’t do anything to put her at risk!” Kat’s voice rose, and they could practically see the panic working its way up her body. “If he ever found out that she helped me, he’d kill her!”
“OK, whoa.” Chris held up his hands. “Slow down. Nobody’s doing anything to put anyone at risk. Just talk to us. Who’s this woman who helped you? How did she help you?”
“She knew that he… that he raped me one night when he drove me home from the bar after I’d had too much to drink.” She looked away. “I went with him because he’s a cop and besides, everyone in town knows him. I mean, I went to school with him, for God’s sake. He’s a former high school football star, an ex-Marine, a well-liked and respected policeman. He – he offered to help me. He got me away from some guy who wouldn’t leave me alone, and I thought I was safer with him than the guy in the bar.”
The men sat still.
“After he finished, he told me that nobody would believe me. Football star, Marine, cop… those things mean something in my hometown. It’s a pretty small place, and he’s a local hero. I was just a high school drop-out who worked at the hair salon on Main Street. I was – nobody. And I have no idea why, but he decided that he liked me. Or maybe he just liked tormenting me, I don’t know. Maybe for him, it’s the same thing.” Kat twisted her fingers in her lap. “He started coming by the salon most days, just to ‘check in’, you know. But he would get me alone somehow and he’d… he’d whisper things to me, right in front of everybody.”
“What things?” Jim said, trying to stay in control of his rage.
“He’d say how much he’d loved it when we were together. How much I’d loved it.” The tears were flowing now, but she didn’t wipe them away. “And he said it was going to happen between us again… that we were meant to be together. That I was – his.”
“And did it happen again?” Chris said quietly.
Kat nodded. “He waited for me to leave work and forced me in to the car at gunpoint and raped me. He followed me around town and turned up anyplace I was, just sat and stared at me. He – he broke in to my house when I was sleeping and beat me up.” Her eyes were wide with fear. “He never left me alone. He told me he’d hurt my friends if I said anything to anybody. He threatened my parents. I didn’t know what to do.”
“Did you tell your parents?”
“Eventually, some of it. Not the worst of it… I told them he was following me and scaring me, and that got them worried enough. But they’re not in Oregon anymore, and they have health problems. They have no money, no influence.” She sighed. “And I was terrified to run to them, because I knew he’d follow me. I didn’t have a car, and the bus was the only way out of town. If I left, he’d just have to flash his badge and he’d be able to come after me, no problem.”
“What happened that made you run in the end?” Dallas asked.
Kat shook her head. “No… I don’t want to talk about that.”
“Kat, please.” Dean’s rough voice was quiet. “Tell us. The last straw – what was it? The thing that made you sure it was run or die?”
She was silent, and they waited. Then she got to her feet and walked to the door. Alarmed, they stood up too, thinking she was going to just pick up her suitcase and leave. They were relieved when she turned around again and leaned against the door, her arms crossed.
Dallas gazed at her, saw her eyes go to the bag at her feet.
She’s feeling trapped and she’s close to bolting. Fuck. We have to make her feel safe somehow.
“Kat?” His Texan drawl was warm and comforting. “Any one of us would step in and protect you from him. You know that, right? You can trust us. I swear it.”
Kat bit her bottom lip, hard enough to almost draw blood. The silence stretched out. Finally, she sighed.
“I – I got pregnant.”
The men inhaled sharply.
“That was when I knew I had to talk, at last … I went to the police station to report what had been happening, and there was a big parade one town over, so I knew he’d be gone. Almost everyone was. But… but she was there. The woman who helped me.”
“What’s her name?” Dallas asked.
Kat’s eyes snapped over to his face. He looked back calmly, his eyes gentle. She took a deep breath.
Just make one up, girl.
“Leanne.”
“Is that her real name?” Dallas said, totally on to her.
“…No.”
“It’ll do,” Dallas said. “So what did Leanne say?”
“She was horrified, but not at all surprised. Turns out her boyfriend had known… him… really well back in high school. They’d been on the football team together, and Leanne’s boyfriend had told her more than once that he didn’t want her going anywhere alone with… him.”
“Why not?” Chris asked.
“Her boyfriend said that he had a nasty temper and twisted personality behind that good-guy persona. Said that he wasn’t to be trusted, especially if you were a woman.” She shrugged. “Seems that his mask had slipped a few too many times in practice or at some parties, and Leanne’s boyfriend had this guy’s number.”
“So she believed you.”
“Totally. No question. She hustled me the hell out of there, though, took me home with her. Told me that I couldn’t be seen at the station, and no way I could file an official report.”
“Why?” Dean said.
“She said he’d make sure it disappeared. And then I would, too.”
“So what did you and Leanne do?”
“We started to plan my escape. Her boyfriend, let’s call him Bobby, helped. We stockpiled my money a bit at a time, and we picked a day when she’d drive me out of the state. Bobby would be her alibi. And he started picking me up from work, and staying at my place overnight.”
“He what?”
“Yeah.” Kat smiled. “The three of us decided to make it look like Bobby and I were having an affair, and that Leanne was upset about it. We staged a few public cat-fights in the local bar, and Leanne would sometimes go to the bathroom at work and pretend to bawl.”
The guys laughed.
“I know, right? That way, it wasn’t weird that Bobby was always hanging around me, and when Leanne looked stressed or freaked out around the cop, there was a good reason for it.”
“Smart,” Dallas said approvingly.
“Yeah. It worked for a while. Then…” She stopped.
“Then?” Dean prompted.
“Then he got me alone. Behind the hair salon.” She looked away from their eyes, not able to handle the anger she saw there. “I was throwing out the garbage before meeting Bobby out front after my shift. He – he beat me bad enough to almost kill me, shouting the whole time that I was his, and no other man had any right to what was his. I think – I think he really meant for me to die out there.” She took a deep breath. “I lived, but the baby didn’t.”
The men were totally still now.
“At the hospital, they found out that I’d miscarried, and that went in to my medical record… the record that was shown to the cops when they came to question me about the assault. He – he found out that I’d been pregnant, and that was when I knew I had to get away once and for all.” She swallowed. “He assumed that the baby was his, not Bobby’s, and he told me I’d killed his baby by being such a fucking slut. He said I’d pay for that. That he’d kill me for that. I – I believed him.”
“So Leanne and Bobby got you away?” Chris said.
“Yeah. The second I was strong enough, I checked myself out of the hospital. Le
anne and Bobby both took that day off work, and the story was that they were staying home to ‘patch up’ their relationship after his affair with me. Bobby was actually at home, but Leanne picked me up on a corner far from the hospital. And we drove to the state line.” Kat shrugged. “She dropped me about two miles from the bus station in Ontario and I took the first bus east to Idaho. And I just – I disappeared.”
A long silence followed her story. Now it was Kat who waited.
Finally Jim spoke. “And you’re sure he’s still looking for you? Leanne’s positive?”
“Yes. She has a prepaid phone too, and we talk once a month or so, really fast. She told me that he takes time off a lot, and Leanne and Bobby followed him once. He goes to bus stations and asks questions, checks security footage from street corners. And whenever she can, Leanne checks his computer search history, and she reads all his e-mails.”
Dallas looked impressed. “She spies on him?”
“Yeah. She set up something on his computer so she has full access. Anyway, he still sends off e-mails requesting tax declaration information about me, and he checks to see if my social insurance number has popped up anywhere, and he checks social media constantly. I know the second I get back on the grid in any way, he’s going to find me. I can’t afford to poke my head up even once… with his badge, he can get any information he wants.” She stared at them, hard. “I have to keep going, don’t you see? I can’t get lazy or too secure. If I do, it’s just a matter of time before he catches up to me.”
“Kat,” Dallas said gently. “You have good and disappeared. I promise you.”
Kat glared at him. “You don’t know that, Dallas.”
“It’s part of my job to find people, remember,” Dallas said. “To find people who don’t want to be found. And hon, you’ve hidden damn well. I’d struggle to find you.”
“Not good enough.” She shuffled her feet. “What if he has cop friends in every state looking for me? What if he hires a professional? I need a guarantee that he’ll never, ever show up at my door. Until I get that, I keep moving.”
Enemy From The Past (Unseen Enemy Book 4) Page 5
