by Moriah Jovan
Leah stared at him, watching his emotionless face and hard eyes. She swallowed. “With difficulty,” she finally whispered.
He left then, closing the door behind him, but not before Leah caught the flash of a victorious smile.
* * * * *
His name was Knox. Knox Hilliard. And he expected her to sacrifice her virtue for Rachel’s freedom. It sickened her to her core.
The case was clearly hopeless and as the days passed until it came up on the docket, Leah wracked her brain to think of ways to help Rachel. She called McLean’s law colleagues back in Houston, but they were all too busy. Three years after McLean’s death was too long for their promises of “Anything we can do for you, Leah” to stay fresh.
She called a few attorneys in Kansas City, but they weren’t interested, especially considering the amount of money she could pay. Or couldn’t, as it were. Legal aid didn’t exist in Chouteau County.
Rachel, after having been painted as a “two-bit whore” by not only the defender but Hilliard as well, was despondent.
“Mama, I didn’t kill him! I didn’t even want to rob the store! Joe did that. It wasn’t me!”
“I know, baby, I know.”
Two weeks passed and bruises began to appear on Rachel’s face and arms.
“What’s happening to you, Rachel?”
“Mama,” she cried, “I can’t hold my own in here. These women—they’re mean. I get beat up every single day for something stupid. They want to—” she gulped and lowered her voice. “They want to have sex with me, Mama.”
Leah’s breath caught in her throat and she said with as much confidence as she could muster, “Don’t worry, honey. I’ll think of something.”
But the day came when Rachel didn’t appear at the Plexiglas and Leah asked the guard where she was. The old black woman who always gave them extra time to talk looked back at her with something akin to sorrow. “She’s in the infirmary, Miz Wincott. They done beat her up too bad.”
Leah’s stomach soured and she thought she was going to be sick on the floor. “Is she—is she going to be all right?”
The guard shook her head. “I don’t know, ma’am. I surely don’t know.”
The trial was delayed because of Rachel’s condition and Knox Hilliard looked at Leah across the courtroom, eyebrow cocked and mouth pursed.
Leah looked away, numb.
He didn’t seem surprised when he opened the door and silently allowed Leah into his home that night. There was an air of triumph about him that humiliated her and she bowed her head.
“Let me have your coat, Leah.”
She took it off and gave it to him; what he did with it she didn’t see.
He held out his hand and she took it, allowing herself to be led into the innards of an early ’60s ranch.
He pointed to the bed. “Sit.”
She sat.
He flipped open his cell and dialed some numbers. Looking at Leah, he said, “Nocek. Hilliard... I don’t give a shit what time it is, listen up. I’m dropping all the charges against Rachel Wincott. Yeah. See you in the morning.” Then he put the receiver down, picked up Leah’s hand, and kissed it. Expecting to feel revulsion, she bit her lip as a thimble full of long-forgotten sensation snaked through her.
“How can I help you?” he asked, not really caring.
“Let me go,” she breathed raggedly.
“No.”
“Why me?” she whispered as she looked up at him, tears rolling down her cheeks. “Why couldn’t you have just let her off if it was that easy? You can see how hard this is for me.”
He wiped away the wetness on her cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. “I want you.”
That was it? He wanted her, so he made sure he did what he had to do to get her, including manipulating everything around her?
“What about money?”
He snorted and rolled his eyes. “Don’t waste your breath. I only take money from men and ugly women and you don’t have enough to make it worth my while.”
Leah stared at him, then whispered, “You’re corrupt.”
A slow smile spread on his face and he caressed her cheek. “Thoroughly.”
Guilt. It wasn’t Leah’s place to atone for Rachel’s crimes, but she could no more allow her daughter to suffer than she could quell her shameful desire for this man’s touch.
He kissed her when her tears began to abate and brought her to her feet. He didn’t rely on Leah to do anything but stand there and be seduced, and Leah was glad, because she knew she wouldn’t have been able to help the process along.
But Knox kissed and caressed her finally bare body until Leah was quivering with desire, her shame only a remnant. When his bare skin touched hers, Leah forgot all about Rachel.
Saying nothing, he laid her carefully on the bed, sliding in beside her, and continued his onslaught. The night was quiet, except for the lone call of cicadas, and dark, except for the light of the full moon that shone through the window and splashed across Leah’s smooth white belly.
He touched her there, his big tanned hand covering her flesh from her ribs to the apex of her thighs.
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered as he nuzzled her ear, though she didn’t believe he meant it. Still, the words, the atmosphere, the memory of the loneliness she had acutely suffered since her husband died worked on her until when at last he entered her, she was a willing and eager participant.
* * * * *
Rachel, bruised and battered, in her own clothes, hobbled down the hallway outside the courtroom to throw herself in Leah’s arms.
Leah squeezed her hard, her eyes trying to dam tears that would not be dammed. “Oh, baby,” she said, her lips against Rachel’s cheek and her hand stroking her thinning hair. “We did it, Rachel. I love you so much.”
“Oh, Mama, thank you,” she cried in Leah’s ear. “How did you do it? What happened?”
Leah sniffed and laughed with no humor whatsoever. “Just a bit of luck, I guess.”
“Can we go home now?”
Leah looked up and over Rachel’s shoulder, and met Knox’s gaze across the hall. “Not for another week or so, honey. We’ve got paperwork to finish up.”
“But—” Rachel protested, pushing her away. “I’m done. I can go home. They said so.”
“Rachel—”
“Mama!” Rachel cried, tears flowing down her cheeks. “I want to leave here! Now! I can’t stand to stay another second.”
“Rachel! The prosecutor and Mr. Nocek still have things to finish up and I have to be here. A week’s not going to make much difference to you one way or another.”
But it made a lot of difference to Leah. She wanted to stay.
“Mama,” Rachel choked and Leah’s brow wrinkled at her daughter’s hysteria. “They raped me, Mama. Last night. I couldn’t stop them. Please, please, please take me home!”
Leah closed her eyes and breathed deeply. The significance was too vivid to contemplate. She opened her eyes, raised her hand, smoothed Rachel’s hair. “We have to stay,” Leah whispered. “It’s important. I’m sorry I didn’t do what I needed to do earlier to get you out.” Her voice quavered. “So sorry.” For both of them.
“Where are you going, Mama?” Rachel cried that evening. “Please don’t leave me here alone!”
“I won’t be gone very long, Rachel,” she said as she opened the motel room door. “Lock the door real good and don’t let anybody in. You’ll be all right.”
“But where are you going?”
“Just to get something to eat and to read.”
“Oh, okay.”
Knox wouldn’t let her go. “A week, Leah,” he growled in her ear as he held onto her when she would have gotten out of bed, propelled by guilt she knew she should feel. “That meant all night, every night. Don’t forget—I can put her back in prison as fast as I got her out.”
“No, you can’t,” Leah sighed. “You dismissed the charges without prejudice.”
He released her t
hen, his mouth hard. “Not true. I can reopen it within a year.”
“You bastard,” Leah whispered.
“Count on it,” he snarled. “What’s it gonna be, Leah? You and me, or Rachel and the prison butches? ’Cause I don’t give a shit one way or another.”
She stayed.
As the week progressed, it grew more difficult to think of lies to keep Rachel satisfied. But she had to, not because Knox would reopen the case against Rachel, but because she didn’t want Rachel to know what she was doing.
Or that she liked it.
Her last night with Knox was bittersweet and she felt tears form in her eyes when he began to nuzzle her jaw, to start all over, to give her what she’d come to crave from him. She started at the sound of the doorbell just after midnight. Knox rolled out of Leah’s arms to answer it, leaving her alone and missing his warmth. He came back and stood naked over Leah. Her eyes raked him and stopped at his arousal. She licked her lips in memory of what he had taught her to do, what she wanted to do again. He chuckled.
“Rachel’s here.”
Leah’s shocked gaze met his coldly amused one and she bounded out of bed searching for her clothes. Knox handed her his robe and she snatched it out of his hand without a word, covering her naked body with it as she scurried out of the bedroom. She halted at the threshold of the living room and stared at her daughter, who stood in the tiled entryway, a soft night light reflecting off her beautiful face.
Rachel stared between Leah and Knox, still nude, who leaned dispassionately against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest.
“You’re fucking him?” Rachel squeaked in disbelief.
“Rachel—”
“I was worried about you. I thought you were mad at me and I wanted to talk to you so I followed you. I thought, you know, you had a friend or something you were talking to and I’d wait for you. When you didn’t come out...”
“Rachel, I—”
She stomped her foot and pressed her fists against her cheeks. “I can’t believe you’re fucking him!” she screamed. “What about all that stuff about virtue and chastity you were always spouting at me? If you weren’t married, you didn’t do it. That’s what you said! And what about Daddy? Don’t you love him anymore?” She choked on a sob and pointed at Knox. “He wanted to put me in prison and you fucked him! You are such a hypocrite! I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”
Leah stood numbed, her whole world crashing down around her ears, unable even to react to the vile word her daughter used so liberally that Leah herself had never uttered.
...gave His only begotten Son...
So vain. So arrogant.
Knox brushed past Leah and captured Rachel’s chin in his hand, jerking her head up to look at him. “The only reason you’re here and not behind bars is because of your mother,” he snarled at her, uncaring that her eyes were wide with fear. “She put herself in your place to save your sorry ass.”
Knox released her and Rachel spit in his face, but fell against the wall with the force of Knox’s back-handed slap. Leah felt she should step forward and did, but Knox pointed at her. She halted. “If you’d done that fifteen years ago, Leah, you wouldn’t be here right now.”
Rachel held her face and glared at Leah. “Did you like it?” she hissed. “Did you like fucking this asshole?”
Leah didn’t have to look at Knox to see that he was staring at her, daring her to deny what she had felt. She kept her eyes on Rachel, drew herself up. “Yes, Rachel,” she finally murmured with a confidence she hadn’t felt in years. “I did.”
“I hope I never see you again.”
* * * * *
“In national news today, a twenty-two-year-old woman was arrested for armed robbery. Rachel Wincott, suspected leader of a gang of female burglars, was caught as she came out of a liquor store...”
Leah sighed as she flipped the television off and went to bed.
The call came at one o’clock and was not unexpected.
“Rachel? Hi, baby. Where are you? All right, honey. Yes, I love you too. I know you’re sorry. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
THE STONE WAS ROLLED AWAY
May 1999
Leah winced when the door slammed and turned away so Knox wouldn’t see her tears, her heartbreak. She bowed her head and put her face in her palm to sob quietly.
“You’re free to go.”
His voice came somewhere out of the darkness. Low. Lifeless.
She whirled. “Is this what you wanted?” she screamed at him. “To humiliate me?”
“No.”
“What did you want then?”
“You.”
She stared at his silhouette, dark against the vague light of the sconce behind him. His hands were propped on his naked hips and his head was bowed.
“I told you that already,” he muttered after a moment, reluctant, as if it were an admission of guilt. “I couldn’t have you any other way.”
That thoroughly shocked her, but for which reason of several, she couldn’t say.
“You’re welcome to stay the rest of the night if you want, but . . . you don’t have to. Our . . . bargain— I— It’s done.”
Leah felt herself drawn into this conversation the way she’d get drawn in by a gory traffic accident as she drove by the scene. “What do you want me to do?”
His head snapped up. Though she couldn’t see him staring at her in the darkness, she could feel it. “Do you really want to know?”
For no reason Leah could fathom, she blurted, “Yes.”
He hesitated. “I . . . would like you to stay.” That wasn’t all he’d meant to say. She didn’t know how she knew that, but she did.
A normal woman would go find her clothes and flee. She would flee straight to the FBI or . . . whoever . . . could put this man away for what he’d done.
A normal woman would have let her daughter pay for her own sins.
“For how long?”
“As long as you want.”
Leah turned without a word and walked into the bedroom. She dropped the robe she wore—his—and climbed back into the beautiful bed where she’d found sexual enlightenment. She couldn’t say why that was important to her at this moment: Perhaps it was the darkness. Perhaps it was her confusion. Perhaps it was a lifetime of stasis thrown into dramatic and orgasmic chaos by a beautiful young man.
“Leah?” he said warily from the doorway.
She turned over in bed, presenting her back to him.
Yes, she was furious with him.
No, she didn’t want to leave right now.
She didn’t understand it, but it was late and Rachel had cut the last piece of her heart out of her body.
I hate you. I never want to see you again.
It wasn’t the first time she’d ever said it, and it wouldn’t be the last.
Funny, of all the things that angered her about this entire week, Knox’s striking Rachel was not among them.
She felt the tickle of a tear running down her cheek even as the bedclothes whooshed back and the mattress depressed.
He didn’t touch her in an effort to seduce her yet again, which was okay, but . . .
“Go to sleep, Leah,” he murmured, gently running his fingers through her hair, stroking her, petting her.
Yes . . . sleep, something she hadn’t had much of for the last two weeks, and now she didn’t have to worry about getting back to her motel room as a show for Rachel.
* * * * *
The sun awoke her.
Her eyes opened slowly, not sure what she’d see, as she had always departed before dawn. Knox was an early riser and his definition of a full night didn’t extend to sunrise.
What she actually saw shocked her so badly she began to cry again, silently, the way she had always cried, her tears wasted into cloth as she lay beside McLean in the darkness. Lying upon Knox’s pillow . . .
A white rose.
A long blue velvet box.
A key.
A note.
Leah wiped her face with the tail of the pillowcase, then haltingly reached out for the note, dreading what it might say that would humiliate her further:
She choked and the tears blurred her vision and stung her eyes.
I’m sorry, he said. Didn’t he think about that before he’d blackmailed her into bed?
I want you . . . I couldn’t have you any other way.
Remorse?
Not true remorse, no. Leah didn’t believe it for a moment. It was the remorse of having gotten caught out. He’d had no punishment, but true remorse would have prompted him to let her go far earlier than this, after their bargain was done.
Perhaps she should be grateful he’d honored the bargain at all.
She reached out and lightly ran her fingertips over the soft jewelry box. She sat up, leaving her torso bare. It vaguely occurred to her as she picked it up that only a week before, she would have covered her breasts, even though she lived alone.
Now . . . she had no reason to.
Her breath caught in her throat at the diamonds and pearls that winked back at her once she’d opened the lid. A bracelet, with matching earrings.
Did he consider this payment for services rendered or was this a gift of appreciation, of want, of remorse?
She looked at the rose and the key. She didn’t know what “white” meant in rose language, nor did she think a man would know, so perhaps it had no symbolism beyond what a rose given usually meant. The key, on the other hand . . .
It was a house key. She could tell by the three triangular holes in the head.
As long as you want.
It was Saturday and he was gone. He had to be; the house was too still.
Why?
No, she didn’t have to ask that. He’d gone to his office, immersed as he was in the prosecution of Rachel’s boyfriend, Joe, who could die and rot in hell for all Leah was concerned.
Leah trembled in anger as she looked down at the exquisite jewelry and the beautiful rose Knox had given her. Her hips were bare under the covers and her torso nude to the morning breeze that whispered through the pretty mullioned window. Before this week . . .
