Trapped

by Annie Jocoby

  But, deep down, I knew that it was fruitless. Nottingham was going to track me down. If he had to send private investigators to every part of the globe, he was going to do it. Even if he didn’t know about the baby.

  I had to try, though. At the very least, I had to give Luke and me some distance from the whole Nottingham situation, so that I could think about my next move. There was a way out of this, I knew it, that didn’t necessarily involve Luke and I running from place to place for the rest of our lives, like fugitives. I just didn’t see it, but it would come to me.

  In the meantime, though, I had to tell my mom and dad about all of this mess. Like it or not, I was going to have to tell them. If nothing else, dad might be able to contact Liam and see if I could stay with him. I didn’t know much about Liam, except that he was some kind of mogul over in London, and was very wealthy. He was young, only 27, and had made a fortune in the music business, representing some of the hottest acts in the world, before establishing his own record label. Last I knew, he was literally a self-made billionaire.

  I personally had never met the guy, which made it strange that I was going to try to see if I could stay with him for the time being. But he was the only relative that I knew who lived in London. All the other Gallaghers were scattered around Cork, Drogheda and Dublin. As much as I had always wanted to live in Ireland, secretly, I knew that London had a much hotter art scene. This would give both of us a fresh start, which Luke was desperately needing after the apparent rejection from all of the people he met at his premiere. I looked forward to getting a fresh start, myself.

  So, a few days after Luke and I had made our tentative plans to run away from the whole Nottingham situation, I found myself waiting for my mom, dad, Nick and Scotty to meet me for dinner at Wolfgang Puck’s. I dreaded talking to them, but I asked Nick to at least give mom and dad a heads-up on the topic of discussion that day. Mom had already called me, hysterical at the thought that I was thinking of terminating my child. I had to talk her down off the ledge, but I managed to get it under control when I reassured her that I wouldn’t be depriving her of a grandchild after all.

  They met me, and we all sat down.

  “Okay,” I said, addressing the four people at the table. The four people who, aside from Luke, meant the absolute most to me in the world. “I guess Nick has filled all of you in on the fact that I’m pregnant, and what that means, considering my situation with Nottingham.”

  “Yes,” my dad said. “I’ve already gotten in touch with some of the best family law attorneys in the city. I’ve gotten a few lined up that will help you fight this one all the way.”

  I shook my head. “You’ll be fighting fire with fire. Whoever you find to represent me, Nottingham will have better. You aren’t the only billionaire involved in this situation, dad. You can’t throw money at this and hope that it resolves itself.”

  “I don’t understand,” mom said. “You assured me that you would keep this child. And you don’t seem to want to fight Nottingham in court. So, what is your plan?”

  I took a deep breath. “My plan is to move to London and start fresh. Luke and I have already talked it through, and we know the possible consequences.”

  My dad was shaking his head. “No, you can’t do that. That is essentially kidnapping, I hope you know that. You’re going to be acting like a criminal by doing that, and you will also be treated like a criminal when Nottingham finds out what happened. You have to face this. I didn’t fight enough when I found out that you were going to marry that man, but I’m putting my foot down now. You can’t do this.”

  I sighed. I was prepared for this. “Dad, once again, it’s not a matter of my asking permission. I’m an adult. You can’t stop me. And believe me, I’ve thought about this situation eight ways to Sunday. I see no other solution. Yes, there could be devastating consequences if Nottingham sees what I’ve done, but I’ll just have to face them if it comes to that. The other solutions to this situation are untenable. Either I terminate or I let Nottingham ruin this baby. Neither of those are options for me. I mean, I admit, the first idea I had was to have an abortion. But Luke made me see that there was possibly another way. And I’m going to take it. The odds are against us living our lives in peace, but I like the odds of Luke and I getting away with this a helluva lot more than the odds that Nottingham won’t get custody of this child.”

  Dad was still shaking his head. “I won’t see my daughter become a criminal.”

  I took a deep breath, and looked at Nick, who, surprisingly enough, wasn’t saying a word.

  I raised an eyebrow. “Sometimes, dad, you have to break the law if a situation is bad enough. I would think that you, of all people, would know this.” I looked at Nick again, pointedly, and he shook his head.

  Dad looked over at Nick, and then back at me. “How did you know?”

  “I just do,” I said. “I was a bratty kid, and wanting to learn how to do subversive things. I taught myself to hack, and I found out about Paul Lucas, and what really happened to him. And all that I can say is that Uncle Nick is in no position to…”

  Scotty’s face got white, and I immediately felt bad. Nick looked like he was going to come over to my side of the table and strangle me with his bare hands. He turned to Scotty. “Scotty, honey, I need to speak with Dalilah alone.”

  Scotty just put her hand on his, and said “no need. I know. I’ve always known what happened to that bastard. I’ve just never told you that I knew.”

  I immediately felt terrible for bringing up this can of worms, especially since that was apparently some kind of secret between Nick and Scotty all of these years.

  “Crap,” Nick said. “Then I guess I need to talk to you alone. Later, though.” He shook his head and addressed me. “When are you going to stop bringing this up, Dalilah? It happened, it was years ago, and he got what was coming to him. Let it go.”

  It was my dad’s turn to look mystified. “Wait,” he said to Nick. “You knew that Dalilah found out about that, and you never told me?”

  He shrugged. “I didn’t find it to have any relevance. Dalilah promised, on her word, that she wouldn’t let that whole sorry incident out of the bag, but, apparently, she’s not good with her word.”

  “Listen,” I said. “I only brought that up to let you guys know that sometimes you have to make solutions that are not exactly legal, when you’re up against the wall. That’s what I’m going to do, here.”

  Dad looked like he wanted to slap me, which is a look that I had never seen on his face. “Two wrongs don’t make a right,” he said. “Listen, I’ve made mistakes in my life. Nick has, too. Your mother has made mistake, Scotty too. We’ve all made mistakes. Some of them were pretty huge ones. But that doesn’t give you carte blanche to repeat the pattern.”

  “That wasn’t a mistake, Ryan,” Nick said. “Paul Lucas wasn’t a mistake. He got what was coming to him, and you know it.”

  “That’s not the topic of conversation, here,” dad said to Nick. “The topic is whether or not my daughter will commit a felony by doing what she’s planning on doing. Dalilah is the topic, here, not what you and I did 17 years ago to a pervert who didn’t really deserve to live.”

  “Huh, dad,” I said. “Nick made himself judge, jury and executioner of that man. And you’re going to lecture me on what I’m about to do?”

  At that, my dad slapped my face, hard. I put my hand up to my cheek, and looked at him. He had an expression that I had never seen in my entire life. His face was red, his eyes menacing, his mouth turned down. “You will never talk to me like that again,” he said. “How did you turn out like this? So devious, so underhanded. I didn’t raise you to be a criminal. And you will never bring up Nick’s past to try to justify your shitty actions. You will face up to what you wrought by doing what you did with Nottingham – using him, getting trapped by him, and marrying him for the wrong reasons – and you will do it within the bounds of the law. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Crystal,”
I said, thinking to myself that I was just going to have to run away with Luke without his blessing. I looked over at my mother, who wasn’t saying much. She at least seemed to have a little bit of humility, considering all the devious things that she did in her own youth. Namely, running away from my dad when she was pregnant with me. She, essentially, did what I was proposing to do in this situation, only my motivation for doing so was much, much different than her motivations for running away all those years ago.

  Ironic. For once, my mom really seemed to understand me. At least, if I read her expression correctly, she understood me. It seemed that she was furtively trying to give her non-verbal approval for what it was that I was going to do.

  My mom put her hand on my dad’s. “Calm down, Ryan,” she said. “Listen, you and I have to talk about this later.”

  “There’s nothing to talk about,” dad said. “I know what you’re thinking, beautiful, and it’s not the same thing at all. You running from me when you were pregnant with Dalilah wasn’t the same thing as what Dalilah is proposing to do.”

  “It’s not?” mom asked. “What’s the difference?”

  “For one, you knew that I wouldn’t press charges for kidnapping. At least, I hope that you knew that.”

  “Regardless, it’s the same thing,” mom counteracted. “If you’re going to call Dalilah a felon, then you’re essentially saying that I’m a felon, too. Really, if you get to the heart of the matter, that’s true.”

  Oh, god. Now, I was turning everybody against each other. I never wanted to drive a wedge between my parents, let alone Nick and Scotty, yet it seemed that everybody was angry with one another all of a sudden.

  I dug up their pasts in a way that I probably shouldn’t have. I essentially opened the long-festering sores that lay deep underneath two seemingly rock-solid marriages. I immediately tried to put a lid on it, while telling them that I was still going to run, and they couldn’t stop me anymore than they could have stopped me from marrying that bastard in the first place.

  I put my hands in the “time-out” position. “Listen, let’s focus, here. I’m really sorry that I’m bringing up sore subjects. I never meant for this meeting to result in there being hard feelings between all of you. But I also want to let you guys know that you should empathize with my situation. You guys have been in impossible situations before, and you took care of it how you saw fit.”

  I looked at my mother, and took her hand. “Mom, you ran from dad when you were pregnant with me. I understand why, too, considering that whole Natalie mess. Dad forgave you, and you two moved on.”

  Then I looked at Nick. “You plotted the death of the man who was doing horrible things to Aunt Scotty. I’m quite sure that you didn’t want to do that, but you did. You did, because you understood that doing that was the only real solution to an impossible knot of a problem.”

  My father shook his head. “What kind of an example have I set for my own daughter?” He no longer looked angry, but, instead, looked extremely sad. “Dalilah, please understand. Everybody at this table has done terrible things. With the possible exception of Scotty. But, please don’t repeat the pattern. I know it sounds hypocritical and like I’m telling you to do as I say, not as I do.”

  I felt sorry for him, because he looked so defeated. I saw in his face that he was beginning to understand that nothing that he could say or do would stop me from doing what it was that I felt was necessary. I also saw in his expression the shame and guilt over his own actions in the past, and the apparent effect that these actions had on me. He knew that he had little moral ground to stand on in lecturing me, and this devastated him beyond measure. I knew that, just by reading his facial expression and body language.

  Of course, I had no idea exactly what role my dad played in the Paul Lucas affair. I did know that he at least knew about it, and probably approved of it. This made him as guilty as Nick in my book. This would be why he was coming across as so guilty.

  “Dad, don’t blame yourself,” I said. “Truth be told, I’ve always at least tried to be a good girl. I haven’t succeeded by any stretch of the imagination. I keep getting myself into these impossible knots, and, when it comes to this one, I see no way out of it except for to try to run from it. If you can tell me a truly viable solution to my problem, I’m all ears. And, no, telling me that we’re going to fight Nottingham in court isn’t a viable solution to me. Because you and I both know that the chances of prevailing on this will be slim at best.”

  Dad just looked at me with those sad green eyes. I felt depressed just seeing that expression on his face. So much regret, guilt and shame in those eyes…my mom had a similar expression, but hers was more sadness for knowing that I, once again, had screwed up my life. And that I, once again, was about to do something to possibly screw it up even further.

  Finally, dad just sighed. “What’s your plan?”

  “Well, I was wondering if you could contact Liam Gallagher for me. I know that you’re not close with him, and you barely know him, but he’s the only person I can think of who lives in London. I know that he has a palatial mansion, too, and I hope that he might take in two vagabonds who have no place to go.”

  “And then what?” dad asked. “What are you going to do once you’re over there?”

  “Try to make it in the London art scene. Luke and I both are eager to re-start our art careers. London would be the perfect place to do it. And, while we’re there, we’ll be thinking of ways to get around the whole Nottingham thing. I know that there’s an underlying solution to this whole thing, that will involve both of us eventually returning to New York with our heads held high, but I just don’t know what that solution would be just yet.”

  Dad shook his head. “Oh, god, is there any way that I can talk you out of this?”

  “No,” I said. “I’m doing it, with your help or without. Luke and I are both pretty broke, although he does have some money saved up from the proceeds from his show. That money will go fast, though, in an expensive city such as London. I would love to have a place to stay while we both try to get established. So, please, dad, please could you talk to grandma Maggie about talking to Liam? I know that she’s in touch with her cousins, so it probably would be best to be coming from her.”

  Dad shook his head, defeated. His shoulders were slumped, and his head was down.

  “Okay,” he finally said. “I’ll do what I can.”

  Chapter 3

  Ryan

  On the way home from dinner, I drove to my house with my wife by my side. She wasn’t saying a word. But her eyes conveyed to me that she was in as much pain as I was about this whole mess. If that was even possible, because I felt that I couldn’t feel much lower than I did right at that moment.

  I reached over for her hand, and she took it and gave me a weak smile. “I know what you’re thinking, and none of this is your fault. Or mine, for that matter. We’ve always known that she was going to be handful. Right from the very start. I still remember the first time that I knew that she was special. She said a word when she was just four months old, and knew what it meant. I knew, right then and there, that she was going to give us trouble.”

  I sighed. “I know, beautiful. I know it’s not our fault. But it doesn’t make any of this any easier. What’s going to happen when Nottingham inevitably finds out what’s going on? Then what? Our daughter will be lucky if she doesn’t wind up serving time in prison, that’s what. But how do we stop her? Aside from chaining her up in our basement, that is.” I shook my head. “The sad thing is, she’s almost right. There’s very little that she can do in this situation that will have a good outcome. Of course, when Nottingham finds her and slaps her with felony kidnapping charges, he’s going to be the sole custodian of that child.”

  Iris shook her head, tears in her eyes. “What can be done, here? I mean, within the bounds of the law, that is. We shoot the dice and hope that we get an understanding judge who will terminate Nottingham’s rights? I just don’t see that happening.
”

  She took a deep breath. I knew what was next. “Tell me about Paul Lucas.”

  I shook my head. “I never wanted you to find out about that. But I know that you know the story of what he was doing to Scotty.”

  “I do. I remember.”

  “Well, Nick was at the end of his rope with that one. He was a complete waste of breath, that Paul Lucas, and he was threatening to completely make Scotty’s life a living hell, even more than he already was. He threatened her, saying that she wouldn’t be able to get a job in her field, and he unfortunately had the power to do just that. Make sure that she was a total pariah in the architecture world. And Nick had just had enough.”

  Iris nodded. “So, Nick forced him to commit suicide? He as good as murdered that man?”

  “Yes. And I helped him plan it.”

  Iris got silent at that point. I took her hand, and rubbed it. “Talk to me, beautiful. What’s on your mind?”

  “I have mixed emotions about that, to be honest with you. I mean, I know that, sometimes, people literally don’t deserve to live. If they’re serial killers or serial rapists like that Paul Lucas, or something like that, the world is better off without them. But, at the same time, Dalilah was right. You and Nick were the judge, jury and executioner of that man. Is it any wonder that she won’t listen to a word you say?”

  “I never wanted that incident to be known. I never intended-“

  “Yes, of course. You didn’t intend for Dalilah to find out about it. Yet, she did. She did, and now she thinks that breaking the law is the right thing to do, as long as the outcome is beneficial to her. She can’t get beyond that way of thinking, because her parents have not exactly shown her that there is a better way.”

  I knew that Iris was right about that, of course. As much as I wanted to bury, completely bury, what Nick and I had done all those years ago, I wasn’t able to. And Dalilah now thought that my way was best, I guess. The ends justify the means. I felt just like The Prince in Niccolo Machiavelli’s novel about achieving ends with incredibly corrupt means. And the fact that I had passed this thinking down to my daughter devastated me beyond measure.