“Sheriff Schilling said if Blake does anything else—anything—you report it. Until then, Jayce will be there, and this Zan. You don’t think they’d mind escorting you to classes, do you?” His chin moved on top of her head.
“Zan already does.”
“Na prawda?”
She picked at the button on his chest pocket. “Really.”
“Look at me again.”
She turned up her face.
“Zrób to dla mnie.”
Her heart stuttered. What would he ask her to do?
“I need you to remember that no matter where you are, no matter what happens, no matter what mistakes you make, I love you. Zawsze.” Always.
“Yes, sir.”
She knew Tatuś honestly thought he meant it.
But if he knew everything, that would change.
31
Time dragged.
The week that had passed since the bonfire felt like a month. Kyle had come by to check on her twice—bearing flowers and sheet music. She’d played guitar awhile, even pulled out her Peru journal. Her notes about Psalm 40 tugged at her heart. She’d written that getting away from Blake felt like getting out of the slimy pit. Peru had been new, firm ground. A solid place to stand.
And oh, for a new song. Even now, she toyed with an idea—that whole transition.
About how, without Christ, she’d been too weak to climb out on her own.
But here she was, out and scrambling for shelter. What good did it do to get out of the muck and mire only to keep hiding?
At least her fingers had developed calluses from playing guitar in her sanctuary.
Kasia plopped into A.J.’s overstuffed chair. “Think Zan’s in Charleston already?” He’d dropped her off after class, made sure she had what she needed, and turned her over to Jayce.
“I’d think so, by now.” A.J. had almost finished her book. They’d agreed to enjoy a quiet evening of reading.
Kasia rubbed the pads of her left fingertips. Should it bother her that even they were beginning to numb? “You know why he had to go home? All he told me was that he had a court date.” He’d seemed way too burdened for a speeding ticket though.
“Jayce said it had something to do with his sister.”
She hoped it wasn’t something tragic. Every time he talked about Bailey, worry creased his face and hunched his shoulders. Maybe one day he’d open up about her. Let Kasia pray for him.
She stared at the wall inches from her face, let her vision blur and focus and blur again. It didn’t help the intensifying headache.
But she needed to feel something.
She’d gone numb.
“A.J.? Why don’t you ever talk about what happened before you moved down here?”
A.J. set her book aside. “You’re blunt tonight.”
“Sorry. Guess the rock Blake threw knocked off my verbal filter.”
“Yeah, maybe.” A.J.’s voice held compassion.
Kasia didn’t know what to do with it. She decided to keep frustrating her eyes.
“You remember I mentioned my dad’s loaded, right? So picture those Manhattan social circles. That show Revenge was my life—prep school, ritzy parties, the high life. Church wasn’t on the radar.”
Kasia glanced over.
“I’d had a thing for my brother’s best friend, Stefan, for years, but he never paid me any attention. The summer I turned sixteen, my parents let me go to Paris. I spent the summer with some family friends, and…I guess I grew up a little. In the ways that Stefan noticed anyway.”
Kasia shifted and faced A.J.
“My parents threw a welcome-home bash before school started, and everyone was there. Finally, Stefan danced with me and ignored the rest of the crowd. He actually apologized for never noticing how beautiful I was before.” She blew her bangs out of her face. “It was a load of crap.”
“Been there,” Kasia muttered.
“Sorry.”
Kasia could tell she meant it.
“Luke, my brother, was nervous that I was in over my head with Stefan. I totally ripped into him and told him to mind his own business.” She mocked her sixteen-year-old self. “‘Honestly, Lucian, do I tell you what to do with the girls you go out with?’” She smiled sadly. “He stopped bugging me about it.”
“Do you wish he’d stayed on you about it? Now?” Sometimes Kasia wished a friend would’ve grabbed her by the shoulders and asked what she was thinking. But no one ever did. She’d never had those kinds of friends.
“Luke kept an eye out for me. And yeah, I’m glad. Stefan was charming around our classmates—but alone? Different story. Sure, we messed around. Did all kinds of stuff that I really liked at the time, but I always drew the line before sex. I guess he thought he could convince me. I was so enamored, I made excuses for him every time he pushed me about it. Sometimes…I even liked how he pushed.”
Kasia chewed her lip. Sometimes the wrong thing feels good.
“So this one afternoon, I went over to his house to study, and he’d gotten this porn flick. He literally made me sit and watch it. Told me to take good notes.” She wore an expression of disgust, but her eyes were sad.
“I went home and—of course—didn’t talk to anyone about it.”
Kasia swallowed.
“I just showered for an hour or two and told myself I wouldn’t mind doing some of that stuff someday…as long as Stefan loved me.”
Kasia’s stomach turned. Before Blake, she’d believed sex was supposed to be beautiful. But the real thing always felt like she was in some sick movie.
“I had planned to go to a football game with Luke that night, but I didn’t feel up to it. He went without me and came home an hour later with a broken nose. Apparently, Stefan had been rolling around under the bleachers with some skank from the other school. Luke beat the snot out of him—tried to protect my honor.
“I was grateful…till he demanded I break up with Stefan. I should’ve, totally. I know. But I was jealous that Stefan had wanted somebody else. I thought I could change his mind. Be whatever he wanted, you know?”
Kasia smoothed a long curl between her fingers. She knew.
“I was so blind. Psychotic, the things we do when we’re messed up in the head, isn’t it?”
A.J. looked right into her. Kasia massaged her temples.
“Does your head hurt again?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“I can tell. Give me two minutes to finish, and I’ll get you some medicine. Yeah?”
Kasia nodded. She half regretted asking about it all. A little too close to home.
“That weekend, there was this big party. My parents forbade it, so I lied. Said I was going over to my friend Charlotte’s. I don’t remember much, except I found Stefan at the party and acted like an idiot. He went to get us drinks, and…I woke up in the hospital several hours later.”
How awful. Kasia thrummed her finger across the nubby upholstery.
“Apparently, Luke—the meddler—had called Charlotte’s and found out I wasn’t there. He raced to the party and searched every room until he found me.” A.J. drew in a shaky breath and dropped her gaze. “I was out cold on somebody’s bed…with my shirt torn and my pants cut off. And there were bruises on my neck and shoulder too.”
Kasia gasped. “I can’t even imagine.”
“People probably still talk about my brother going ballistic that night, much to my parents’ dismay. Seriously, more than half the people ditched the joint before he even got up the stairs. So I heard. Stefan had put some Rohypnol in my drink and done whatever he wanted with me. By the time Luke got there, Stefan was gone, but…he left no doubt about his identity.”
A.J. uncurled herself from the couch and brought Kasia two pain relievers and some water. “Needless to say, we pressed charges, and he spent a night in jail before his daddy bailed him out. His high-society parents kept it as quiet as possible. At least they made him plead guilty though. He was charged with first- and second-degree rap
e, three counts of aggravated assault, assault on a minor, and first- and second-degree sex offense, and sentenced to ten years in a state penitentiary with possible parole after three years. Which I heard he got.”
She rattled off that list of charges as if they’d been old friends for years.
“For a long time I was a shell. In denial about all of it. My parents put me in therapy, and I got to deal with it a little. Basically, I decided not to let him hurt me anymore. I had a life to live, and I was going to live it. I didn’t make it a secret though. I talked about it—sort of became the school spokesperson for date-rape awareness.”
“I bet your parents were proud after all that.”
A.J. closed her mouth and eyed her watch. “Sheesh! I didn’t realize we’d talked so late. We’d better hit the hay, yeah?” She stretched and grabbed her book.
Kasia reeled at the abrupt ending.
A minute later, A.J. stood beside her door, switched off the lamp. “Night, Kosh.”
But Kasia felt as if she needed to know, and the darkness made it easier to ask. “A.J.? What happened with your parents?”
The silence was loud for a heartbeat. “My socialite parents didn’t want to be known as the family of Date-Rape Girl. They told me to quit talking about it or they’d ship me off to school.”
Silence. A.J. drummed her fingers on the doorframe.
“After everything I’d already been through, all the progress I’d made, they were ashamed of me anyway. Someone drugged me and raped me, and I was a blemish on their reputation.”
How awful. “And they wouldn’t listen when you talked to them about it?”
“Didn’t try. I left. Tracked down the black sheep of the family and took off to join him.”
A.J. walked into her room and shut the door.
Kasia sat still in the blackness, with only the streetlights slicing through the blinds.
She couldn’t believe what A.J. had been through. The world was so sick and broken.
As she let her gaze trace the stripes of light, she felt it again. Something was out there, at the edges of her memory. Why couldn’t she just remember it and have it done?
32
Kasia was a guitar string wound ten steps too sharp.
She got up and shuffled through the dark hall to the bathroom, slid her palm the length of the cool wall. She filled a glass with water and took more pain reliever before climbing back into bed. But her head throbbed, shoulders aching all the way down her spine.
This couldn’t still be from the rock. Blake hadn’t even given her a concussion.
She readjusted her pillow and tried to distract her mind—homework club would begin next week; a short story was due on Friday for her creative-writing class. She could write about Peru.
Snippets of A.J.’s story crept into her mind like vines. Twisted, stretched, tugged. They hunted something. Other recent conversations joined them.
This isn’t the first time he’s hurt you.
I always made excuses for him.
An infuriating disquiet lurked at the edge of her consciousness—constant. Always worse in the darkness. She’d love to face the foreboding once and for all. Name it, stare it down. Maybe it would slink back to wherever it came from.
God, I need to be done with this. I need rest.
She tossed and turned for almost an hour, unable to figure out why she couldn’t shake the sense of dread.
Finally, mercifully, she dozed off.
She gasped suddenly and sat up. Her breaths echoed in the stillness around her.
Her memory was even louder, and she could not—for anything—quiet it.
She remembered a landscaped garden, remembered the rolling hills behind Blake’s house in Georgia, the weekend of that three-day concert. His parents had been so welcoming and friendly. Until they’d hosted a loud, crowded dinner party and Kasia had declined the wine.
“Kasia, don’t be ridiculous,” his mother said. “It is a glass. One glass. Hardly a crime.”
She’d never even tasted alcohol before, and she knew her parents would disapprove. But she’d be drinking it with Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton, after all.
Before dessert was even over, her senses hummed.
Blake led her up to his suite after dinner, away from the crowd, and she was relieved. And impressed. A fire crackled in the corner. He opened a set of French doors and led her out onto the balcony. He stood behind her, snaked his arms around her waist, and rested his chin on her shoulder. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?” he whispered.
She felt the heat of his breath on her neck and shivered with pleasure. “No, your parents are nice. I like them. But I like it better up here with just you.”
“I’m glad. I locked the world out, so no one will bother us.” He pressed his lips to the hollow beneath her ear.
“That feels nice.” She laced her fingers with his arms across her stomach.
His hands squeezed hers, and he pulled one hand away, piled her hair on top of her head. His lips ran all over her neck, and he pulled her back against his body. When he spun her around to face him, she was surprised by the darkness in his eyes. They were so filled with…lust. He ran his fingers along her collarbone, pulled the thick strap of her dress aside, covered her shoulder with strong, firm kisses. “Do you have any idea how much I need you, Kasia? I physically ache.”
No one had ever spoken like that to her before, and her stomach curled at the words. She wanted him to say something more, something that made her feel right about this. That he loved her. Wanted to marry her. She wondered if the wine might be affecting her too much. “I need to sit, Blake. Would you mind if we sat inside, on the couch?”
His eyes smoldered. “Perfect.” He led her in toward the sofa. “I’ll be right back.”
She sat, her mind fuzzy—her body very, very awake. When he came back, he had their wine glasses refilled. She’d already had too much.
But he scowled when she edged away. “I want to propose a toast.”
She hadn’t realized it was important to him. She took the glass.
“To Kasia, my oak. You’re so strong, and I admire that. But I love the effect I have on you. The way I make you smile, the way you shiver when I touch you, and the way you let me know what you want without words. Here’s to much, much more of that. More of us.”
He clinked his glass to hers, and they sipped a mouthful of the warm liquid. “Now,” he said. “You toast me.”
She had no idea what to say and felt ridiculous even trying. “To Blake. I hope I make you as happy as you make me.” Another swallow. Her throat burned. She set her glass down.
Blake finished off his wine and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
And then it was overwhelming. It was a mess of desperate hands, hungry lips, shallow breaths. It was fear and confusion. Her stomach was in knots.
She didn’t want this. The room was hot, dark, spinning. She tried to pull his hands back to her face, to kiss them and turn it back into a romantic moment, but he was overpowering. She let him do more than she wanted, hoped at some point he’d be satisfied and just hold her.
But it wasn’t enough.
“Blake, I can’t—I don’t want to have sex. Not before we’re married. We haven’t even—”
“Shut up. You’re doing this tonight.”
She tried to shove him away, but he was too heavy against her.
Eyes full of tears, she whispered, “Please, Blake. Don’t. Don’t do this to me.”
But he shoved her head to the side, held it there so he didn’t have to see her face. She stared into the flickering orange of the fire as a tear ran down her cheek and into her mouth.
Kasia reached out and placed her palm against the cool of her new bedroom wall, grounding herself in the present.
That had been the last time she’d cried.
She lay there in a cold sweat. Her stomach clenched. She jumped out of bed and ran to the bathroom to vomit. When she was empty, she curled up in a ball beside the
toilet. How had she not remembered that?
Oh, God, I think I liked it better when I was oblivious. Feeling guilty was better than feeling victimized.
The whole time A.J. talked about her rape, Kasia had pushed away the memory. If she could keep it beneath the surface, she could pretend it wasn’t there. But tonight she’d asked for help. For strength to face her demon.
So there it was.
The bathroom door opened, and a sliver of light hit her. And then light flooded the room. She shielded her eyes with her arm.
A.J. padded across the floor and touched her calf. “Kasia? Are you all right?”
She couldn’t answer.
“Are you sick?” A.J. pressed her hand to Kasia’s forehead.
“No. I—I had no idea.”
“No idea? About what?”
Kasia pressed her hand against the tile. “Blake. He…” She couldn’t gather her thoughts, couldn’t form a sentence.
“Did he call? What did he do now?”
“No. I remembered.”
A.J. knelt beside her.
“The first time…we…he…I was—” Oh, God, please no. She pushed herself up off the floor and dry-heaved.
A.J. pulled Kasia’s hair out of her face and held it back. Nothing left but bile. When Kasia sat back on the cold tiles, she unloaded every gut-wrenching, sickening detail.
And she wished she’d never remembered.
33
Zan appreciated one thing about the legal system: Victims of violent crime—in imminent danger—were given priority on the docket.
Seemed like they understood the need for immediate justice for Bailey. If not a preemptive strike, at least a quick reaction.
God, however, had taken His sweet time.
Wednesday morning, back in Charleston, Zan woke around five to fix Bailey breakfast before they were due at the courthouse. If he could’ve been in town last week too, for Bailey’s entire trial, he would’ve. But the three days Coach Markman allowed him to testify would have to be enough.
Tomorrow the jury would announce their verdict, and Michael would receive his sentence. No way he’d get off.
The only downside, as far as Zan was concerned, was that capital punishment wasn’t on the table.
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