My Vows Are Sealed (Sealed With a Kiss)

by Carmen Richter

  Kate gave me another hug. “You’ve got this, hon. We’ll all be right outside if you need us, okay?”

  I nodded. “Thanks.”

  Kate, Ashton, and Alex walked out of the room, standing right next to the entrance, and Detective Michele went and pulled the door shut before coming back to the bedside.

  “Okay, Darla, can you tell me what happened today?”

  Even though I’d told my story to Brendan and my friends before, this was so much different. This time, there was a chance that my father could finally be held accountable for his actions. My injuries were testament that something had happened to me today, but today was just the culmination of almost eighteen years’ worth of terror and abuse. And she needed to know about all of it.

  “This might take a while,” I sighed. “It’s not just what happened today. It’s what’s been happening for my whole life.”

  “That’s okay. I’ve got all the time in the world,” she told me.

  So I took a deep breath for strength, and then I started at the beginning.

  Chapter 33

  Brendan

  The Last Night

  It felt like I’d been waiting for days when Saul finally came back into the room and handed me the manila envelope with my phone, wallet, and keys in it.

  “Okay, Brendan, you’re free to go. The detectives handling this case might have some more questions for you, but I get the feeling you’re not leaving Darla’s side anyway,” he said, giving me half a smile.

  I sighed in relief, and a few more tears leaked out of my eyes. Finally. I could finally get to where I belonged: right by Darla’s side. And that was where I’d stay for the rest of my life. I refused to ever spend a single night without her again.

  “Thanks,” I muttered.

  “I’m sorry this happened,” he said for what felt like the hundredth time.

  “It’s not your fault,” I said, a little more harshly than I intended to, then sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  “I know you didn’t. I’d be upset too. Just do me a favor and let me know how Darla’s doing, okay?”

  I breathed a sigh of relief that this ordeal was over as I nodded, then headed out of the interrogation room without another word. I was in the middle of dialing Kate’s number on my cell phone to ask for a ride to the hospital when I saw Naomi sitting in a chair right outside the squad room with mascara and foundation streaked down her face and looking like she was out of tears to cry.

  “Brendan,” she gasped, shooting up and rushing over to give me a hug. “Oh, my God.”

  “Alex called you?” I guessed.

  She nodded. “And I called Kate and Ash. They’re already at the hospital. I got put on chauffeur duty.”

  “Have you heard anything?” I asked her, desperate for any news at all.

  “Kate texted me a few minutes ago. Darla’s with a detective right now. She’s still waiting to get x-rays, but they did an ultrasound already. The doctor hasn’t been back in, but the ultrasound tech said it looks like the baby’s okay.”

  My knees buckled and I put a hand on the wall to steady myself so I didn’t collapse. I started crying all over again as a wave of sheer relief washed over me.

  Thank You, Jesus, I prayed. Thank You for keeping them safe while I couldn’t.

  Naomi looked me right in the eye. “Did you hear me, Brendan? Darla’s alive. And it seems like the baby is too.”

  “I need to see her,” I managed to choke out.

  “Okay. Then let’s go,” she murmured, wrapping an arm around me and leading me out of the building.

  “Brendan!” I heard my future mother-in-law’s voice call as Naomi and I speed-walked toward the emergency room entrance.

  I turned and found Peter and Marie walking toward me, accompanied by Gloria. Gloria broke into a run, and as soon as she was close enough, she pulled me into a hug.

  “Please say she’s okay,” she sniffled. “Please.”

  “I don’t know,” I choked out. “Abraham accused me of kidnapping and raping her and had me arrested. Mr. Gleason was on duty at the police station, and he’s the one who got me released.”

  “Oh, sweetheart,” she murmured, pulling back to look at me with tears streaming down her face. “I’m so sorry.”

  I tried my best to smile at her, but I wasn’t entirely successful. None of this was in any way, shape, or form her fault, and I knew that, but I was still too worried about her daughter and about the possibility of what would happen if Abraham was released to calm down. I wouldn’t be calm until I had Darla in my arms again and her psycho father was safely behind bars.

  “It’s not your fault,” I managed to say.

  Peter put a hand on my shoulder, jolting me out of the thoughts that were running through my mind at a million miles an hour. “Come on. Let’s go find out how she’s doing.”

  I nodded, and Marie put an arm around a crying Naomi’s shoulders as we started to walk inside. Kate had already told Naomi what room Darla was in, so we walked right past the front desk and back toward the rooms. I saw Kate, Ashton, and Alex congregated outside a room and headed in that direction, keeping my eyes straight ahead.

  “That’s the boy! That’s the one who raped my daughter!” I heard Abraham yelling from behind a closed sliding glass door. “Why the fuck was he released? I want him fucking arrested!”

  I looked into the room next to me and found Abraham handcuffed to a bed while a male police officer looked at him with an expression that told me he didn’t believe a word that was coming out of the lunatic’s mouth.

  Gloria gasped and froze in place, her entire body trembling and her eyes going wide as she looked around the room like she was trying to find somewhere to hide. I moved to block his view of her and wrapped an arm around her.

  “I won’t let him hurt you,” I whispered. “You’re safe. Come on.”

  I gently guided her away from her husband’s room, and we walked the twenty yards to where our friends were standing. Naomi immediately rushed into Alex’s arms, and he caught her up in an embrace. Kate and Ashton both looked at me, and Kate pulled out of Ashton’s arms and barreled toward me at full speed, throwing her arms around my neck.

  “She’s still in with the detective,” she told me. “We only got to see her for a minute before the police got here, but she seemed okay. Hurt, but okay.”

  I choked back more tears as I pulled back to look at her. “Thanks for being here.”

  “You’re family. You both are,” she said, giving me a sad smile. Then she looked at Gloria. “You’re Darla’s mom, right? Gloria?”

  Gloria nodded, wiping a few tears off of her cheeks with her fingers.

  “It’s really nice to finally meet you. I’m Kate.”

  “I’m Ash,” Ashton supplied.

  “Dar’s been staying with Kate. Ash is her…” I trailed off, not really sure how exactly to identify their relationship. Ashton wasn’t male or female, so what title did I give them to describe what they were to Kate?

  “I’m her Ash. Why do we need to have labels?” Ashton said, pulling Kate back into their arms.

  Kate turned bright pink and turned her face into their chest. They pressed their lips to her hair, chuckling, and I couldn’t help but join in. As sad as I was going to be to see them leave in a few weeks, I was glad they’d been able to get into the same school so they could go to college together. Maybe a lot of high school romances didn’t last, but I had a feeling that they’d end up beating the odds just like Darla and I would. They loved each other too much not to stay together.

  Gloria smiled as a few more tears built up in her eyes. “It’s so nice to meet you both. I wish I could say I’ve heard a lot about you, but…I think she didn’t tell me much because of my husband.”

  “It’s okay. We know that,” Kate assured her, peeking her face out again. “But we’ve heard so much about you, it kind of feels like we know you already.”

  “Kate, Ash, this is our youth pastor, Peter, and his
wife, Marie,” I said.

  Ashton gave Peter and Marie a hesitant smile, like they weren’t sure how two people from our church would react. And, of course, Peter just grinned and extended a hand toward them. Ashton shook his hand first, and then Kate.

  “It’s nice to meet you both,” Peter said.

  “I think I’ve heard a little more about you two than Gloria has. At least what I’ve overheard Brendan, Darla, and Naomi saying about you at church over the past few years,” Marie chuckled as she shook their hands. “It’s nice to finally put faces with names.”

  “Same,” Ashton said, looking like the weight of the world had been lifted off of their shoulders.

  I hated that so many people who called themselves Christians had been so horrible to Ashton that they didn’t feel like they could trust anyone who went to church anymore. Jesus taught love and acceptance, and for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how that had been twisted into hatred and judgment.

  Before anyone could say anything else, the door to Darla’s room opened, and a young woman with a police badge around her neck came out.

  “Wow. There’s more of you now,” she chuckled.

  “How is she?” Gloria asked.

  “She’s hurt, and she’s still waiting on radiology and the doctor, but she’s a strong young lady. I think she’ll be just fine,” the detective informed us.

  “Can we go in and see her now?” I asked.

  She nodded, and before she could say another word, I was walking past her and into the room.

  “Brendan,” Darla gasped. “Oh, my God.”

  I cleared the distance to her bedside in two strides and kissed her until I had no oxygen left in my lungs, not even bothering to try stopping the tears that pooled in my eyes. I didn’t give a shit that her mother, our youth pastor, and eighty percent of our friends were right here watching. I needed this. To feel that she was alive. To know that she was here and her father hadn’t won.

  “Please say you’re okay, Dar,” I rasped, resting my forehead against hers. “Please.”

  “Everything hurts,” she sniffled. “I know my arm and at least one rib are broken, but they haven’t come to get me for x-rays yet. But they said it seems like the baby’s okay. My dad kept trying to tell them to…to…”

  Darla broke down in tears, and I held her as tightly as I dared to. I didn’t need her to finish that sentence to know where she was going with it. I’d walked in on her father trying to kick her in the stomach. I knew he would have tried any way he could to kill our child. Thank God the doctors hadn’t listened.

  “It’s okay, baby,” I whispered, kissing her head. “It’s okay. You’re safe now. I’m never going to let him hurt either one of you again.”

  “The…the baby?” Gloria asked hesitantly.

  Damn it. Of all the ways Darla’s mother – and our youth pastor – could have found out about this pregnancy, this was probably the worst one. I’d hoped we would have been able to sit down with them and tell them privately, not have it blurted out in the middle of a hospital room while Darla was battered and bruised and broken.

  Darla’s eyes went wide, full of a mixture of shock and fear.

  “Mom?” she asked timidly, her voice breaking.

  As much as it physically pained me, I let go of my fiancée and backed away so her mother could have a moment with her. Gloria scurried over and caught her daughter up in a gentle hug.

  “Oh, honey,” she sniffled. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I’m okay, Mom,” Darla choked out. “I’m hurt, but I’ll be okay. How are you here? It’s not safe. He’s still here too.”

  “Peter and Marie called me. And I know coming here was a risk, but you’re more important. You and that little angel. How far along are you?” she asked.

  Really? That was all she had to say? Nothing about how she was disappointed in her daughter for getting pregnant out of wedlock? Nothing about how we were just kids ourselves and had no business raising one? It wasn’t that I wasn’t glad for that, because I was. I was just surprised.

  But at the same time, we needed someone on our side in this. We didn’t need the lectures. We needed someone older than us who believed that we could do this. Our friends all believed in us and were supporting our decision to keep this baby, but that wasn’t the same as having an adult we trusted and looked up to in our corner.

  “I just found out yesterday,” Darla sniffled. “I’m sorry, Mom.”

  “You don’t have anything to apologize for, sweetheart. I love you so much.” Gloria let go of her, then turned to me and gave me a hug too. “Both of you. It won’t be easy, but you’re going to be amazing parents. I just…I wish I could do more to help you.”

  Damn it. That did it. I’d thought I was out of tears to cry, but apparently I wasn’t, because more of them stung my eyes.

  “We love you too,” I managed to say.

  “Thanks for telling me about that, by the way, Brendan,” Alex snarked. “I thought we were friends.”

  I snorted as I let go of Gloria and went to sit on the edge of the bed next to Darla. “Sorry. I was a little preoccupied this morning.”

  Darla groaned in pain as she scooted over so I could sit on the actual bed instead of the railing, and then burrowed herself into my side and wrapped her arms around me, resting her still-splinted arm on my lap. I draped an arm around her and put my other hand under her chin, tilting her face up for a quick kiss.

  “Darla?” an unfamiliar voice asked.

  I looked up and saw a man who couldn’t have been much older than me and was dressed in scrubs standing in the doorway.

  “That’s me,” she mumbled.

  “Hi. I’m Blake from radiology. Okay if I take you for some x-rays?” he asked.

  She nodded, and I pressed my lips to her hair before letting go of her and standing up.

  “We’ll all be here when you get back,” I promised. “I love you.”

  The rest of the gang stepped to different sides of the room to clear a path for Blake, and he wheeled Darla’s bed out of the room. I turned to Peter and Marie, expecting to see…I didn’t even know. Judgment. Disappointment. Pretty much anything other than the sad smiles they were both wearing.

  “What, no lecture?” I asked, only half-joking.

  I’d figured someone was going to say something about the fact that Darla and I weren’t married yet, but it was like everyone was avoiding the subject or something.

  Marie chuckled and walked over to hug me. “It’d be kind of hypocritical if we lectured you.”

  “Huh?”

  “I told you we had Danny and Dawson less than a year after we got married. What I didn’t tell you was that they were born six months later,” she explained. “And they weren’t premature.”

  I would have loved to see my face as I processed what she was saying. It wasn’t that I felt lied to or tricked. Looking back, they’d literally never touched on the subject of abstinence or sex in any Sunday school lessons. But they were devout Christians and their faith was important to them, so it was a little shocking to hear that they’d ended up in the same situation that Darla and I now found ourselves in.

  “We’re the last people who would judge either of you,” Peter added. “We love you both, and anyone in that church who says anything different will have us to answer to.”

  “Damn straight,” Alex agreed. “I can’t stand judgey people. They can all mind their own fudging business.”

  Naomi giggled. “Fudging?”

  “There are elders in the room,” he snickered.

  Peter snorted. “Thanks for making me feel old.”

  “If you’re old, I’m ancient,” Gloria chuckled weakly. “And I’ve heard way worse than the word ‘fuck’ being married to that bastard, trust me.”

  I felt like one of those cartoon characters with a rubber-like neck as my head snapped over to look at her. Even though I’d never heard any colorful language from Darla’s father before today, knowing what I knew about him, it
hadn’t really surprised me when I’d heard him ranting and raving. But Darla barely ever said anything stronger than “damn,” so hearing her mother use that kind of language shocked the hell out of me.

  “Oh, my God.” Naomi let out a shocked chuckle, covering her mouth. “Guys, the pastor’s wife just dropped an F-bomb.”

  “Life’s too short to worry about language,” Gloria sighed, then looked at me. “Brendan, sweetheart, can I talk to you alone for a minute?”

  I nodded. “Of course. Let’s go grab a cup of coffee. I get the feeling neither of us is going to be sleeping tonight anyway.” Then I looked at our friends. “If they bring Darla back while we’re gone, tell her we’ll be back soon.”

  “We will,” Marie promised as she leaned against her husband. “Go ahead.”

  Gloria and I walked out of the room, and I led her toward the coffee machine in the waiting room, pulling out my wallet and grabbing a couple of dollars. I slid one into the machine and pressed the buttons for a coffee with cream and sugar, then handed the second bill to Gloria.

  “Crappy coffee’s on me,” I chuckled weakly as I grabbed the paper cup from the machine, gripping it by the lip because it was too hot to hold anywhere else.

  “Thanks,” she sniffled. “This is…I’m just…I’m praying they arrest him. Is that wrong?”

  I shook my head. “No. If I didn’t love Darla more than I hate him, I’d kill him. For hurting her, and for hurting you. But killing him would mean going to jail, and the idea of life without Darla…I can’t even think about it. I was terrified when they cuffed me and took me away. Scared of never seeing her again. Scared that he’d hurt her. Scared that our baby wouldn’t make it through this. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

  Tears pooled in her eyes as she took her coffee out of the machine and looked at me, and it broke my heart. I could see the hopelessness, the helplessness, written all over her face. The echoes of a lifetime of abuse and pain and having no one to turn to. This was what Darla’s life was like before she let me in.