“I’m thinking of breaking up with him,” I said.
She looked a little shocked by my answer, and set down her pen and paper. “Did he do something wrong?” she asked, sitting back in her chair.
“No.”
“Is he being pushy or forceful in any way?”
“No, not at all.” He’s been an angel.
“Has he said anyth—”
“He deserves someone who isn’t damaged,” I said. “He deserves to be touched, and kissed, and . . . he just deserves more.”
I loved Richard with all my heart. He had always been there for me. He let me cry when I needed to cry, gave me space, and loved me when I allowed it, but he needed more. More than I could give.
It hurt me to see his face look so deflated when I’d pull away from him, or turn my head away from a kiss. I wanted to kiss him, to hold him and never let go, but I couldn’t. He had kissed my lips. He had touched my skin. No matter how hard I’d scrubbed my body, he still lingered there. He had burned himself onto me. And it was a scar that only I could see.
“Do you not deserve love?” Joanna asked. “If Richard is not expecting these forms of affection, then why break away and end a good thing?”
Because I’m damaged goods. “I don’t know,” I whispered, wiping a small tear away. “I just don’t feel I’m ready for what he needs, but I don’t want to lose him.”
Joanna looked up at the clock and clicked her tongue. “I want you to do something for me, Lee. I want you to talk to Richard about these feelings.” I looked at her like she was crazy. “I’m serious,” she said, with a little force in her tone. “I bet you haven’t even started preparing yourself for the trial next week, because you’re too focused on why you’re not good enough for Richard.”
I glanced over at the calendar that sat on Joanna’s desk. Was it April already? The trial was scheduled to start the first week of May, and with that asshole damned near back to perfect health, the state was eager to get the ball rolling.
“You’ve been losing days again, haven’t you?”
“I’ll talk to him,” I replied, ignoring the question. I didn’t want to talk about my constant sleeping or spacing out. Weeks would go by and I wouldn’t know. If it wasn’t for Richard, I wouldn’t even know it was Tuesday. Therapy day.
“If you love Richard as much as you feel you do then, in my opinion, talk it out. If you two need me, or even if you need to talk to me about it, you know you can call me at any time.”
Her words stuck with me as I left the building, and I found myself not only thinking of Richard, but the other girls as well.
They all seemed to be getting better in some small way. Sara and Kandace dove right back into school, needing the distraction and normalcy again. Anna and I chose to take some time off. Anna had the better reason, being pregnant and then having the baby, but . . . I just didn’t want to think about school. I wasn’t ready yet. I appreciated that nobody pushed me about my decision. As if it would have mattered.
As always, Richard was outside waiting for me. Always with a smile on his face and a cup of coffee in his hand. Before, when I had come home from a session with Joanna, I’d go right to bed and sleep until the next day. Richard thought if he got some coffee in my system it would keep me awake for a little while, hoping to get me to talk. Of course, we never talked about what he wanted to talk about, but I liked hearing about his classes, or about what Luke had done that day. I even caught myself laughing a few times when Richard talked about Luke going off on Adam for being too loud with Emma in the other room.
“No brother should ever hear that shit,” Luke would complain.
We sat in silence this time. It made me feel a little nervous. Richard was never silent after my sessions. I guess it was a good thing. It allowed me to think about what Joanna and I had talked about. Did I really want to let Richard go? Could I imagine a life without him? I knew the answers to these questions already. It was a no-brainer. I just didn’t know if I needed him more than he needed me.
Once we got home, I was relieved that no one was there. My mother had left shortly before Emma did, having stayed in Boulder until all her family leave ran out. She still came up at least twice a month, but I was happy that today it was only going to be the two of us.
Instead of walking to my room, like I always did, I went over to the couch and sat down.
“We need to talk.”
I looked up at Richard and saw a mix of fear and excitement in his eyes.
“Okay,” he said, coming over and sitting next to me.
“I’m sorry that I’ve been so distant,” I whispered, restraining myself from saying undeserving.
“You don’t need to apologize for that, Lee.”
I took a deep breath and stared straight ahead. “I think we need to—”
“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t say it.”
I sighed and rested my head in my hands. “You don’t understand.”
“You’re right, I don’t,” Richard said, obviously upset. “I can’t for the life of me understand why you feel you don’t deserve to be loved.” He shifted in front of me and sat on the table facing me. “Why do you have this idea that we can’t get through this together?”
“I don’t know,” I whispered. “I’m not the same girl you once knew. Not anymore.”
“Bullshit!”
“I’m broken. I’ll never feel right . . . think right.”
“Bullshit.”
“You deserve better, all right?” I cried. “Fine, you want to know how I feel? You think you’re ready? I live in a constant state of fear.” I kept my eyes on him the whole time, willing my tears to maintain their distance. “I fall asleep every night, knowing I’m going to be dreaming of that man’s breath on my face, hearing the screams of the girls as he raped them, and I don’t know when it’s going to stop . . . if it will ever stop. You deserve a girl who . . . you just deserve more, Richard. I love you, but I’m not enough for you.”
I kept my eyes on him as I watched him take in my words. His face was a kaleidoscope of emotions. I was about to get up when he stood and lifted me off the couch. He pushed me into my room and stood me in front of my mirror.
“Look at yourself,” he whispered. I tried to pull away from his grasp, but he wouldn’t let me go. He moved himself behind me and rested his forehead on the back of my head. “Please, Lee, just look.”
I looked up slowly and stared at my reflection. One word came to mind whenever I looked at myself. Broken.
Richard stood up straight and looked over my head to gaze at my reflection. “I’m going to say this one time, and then I never want to hear the words ‘you deserve more’ come out of your mouth again.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Do you have any idea how much I love you?” he whispered.
I could already feel the tears start to prickle behind my eyes.
“Do you have any idea how much I want this?” he asked, wrapping his arms around me and pulling me to his chest. “I wouldn’t care if you were bald with scars running down your face, and had the most disgusting form of athlete’s foot I’d ever seen. I’d still want you.”
I rolled my eyes, trying to hide the tear that fell down my cheek.
“No,” he said, turning me around so I was facing him. He fell to his knees and hugged me around my waist, resting his cheek against my stomach. “Please, believe me. Believe me when I say I love you more than anything.”
I bit my lip to hold back the sob that threatened to explode out of my body. I lowered myself onto my knees and cupped his face in my hands. He looked so scared, so worried. I ran my thumb over his cheek trying to comfort him in some small way.
“I know,” I whispered. “Please, Richard, don’t think for one second that I don’t love you, too.”
“Then what do I have to do?” He trembled, resting his hands over mine. “What do I have to do to show you how much I need you? How much I have to have you in my life?”
I couldn’t hold back m
y sobs any longer. I crumbled as his words kept pouring out.
“I want to marry you, Lillian. I want to fall asleep next to you while resting my hand over your growing belly. I want to come home after a long day of work, and see you smile as our children come running toward me. I want to argue with you, cry with you, grow old with you, and I know you might not want these things right now, if ever, but I need you to know that I do. I will be here until you tell me to go.”
I couldn’t believe these feelings, these words that seemed to wrap around me like a warm breeze. A feeling I didn’t think would ever exist for me again.
I wrapped my arms around him, and held him as tight as I could. “Y-yes,” I whispered.
I felt him exhale against my hair. “Yes?”
I nodded in haste. “Yes.”
He pulled back and cupped my face, gazing into my eyes. “Yes?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. He looked as if I was speaking in a foreign language. I took his hand off my cheek and lifted it to my lips, pressing a firm kiss to it.
“I want all that, too, Richard,” I said, rubbing my cheek against his hand. “I want to feel your children grow inside me, wake up every morning and see you next to me, and be with you as we grow old and ugly.” We both laughed through our tears and I moved his hair away from his eyes. “I know it won’t be easy, and that we’ll butt heads the whole way, but there is no one I want to be with. So yes, Richard, my answer is yes.”
Richard’s chest started to shake as a smile spread across his face. A loud laugh erupted from his lips.
“Yes!” he yelled, standing to his feet. “She said yes!” He bent down and wrapped his arms around me and lifted me up, twirling me around. “Oh my God, Lee . . .”
He placed me back on the floor, but still held onto me. He looked into my eyes and lowered his forehead to mine. We stood there for what felt like hours, just holding each other. We were looking into each other’s eyes as if we were having some bizarre staring contest. For the first time in months, I had the need to show my love for him. To prove to him how much I needed him, just as much as he needed me.
His eyes widened a little as I moved my lips toward him. His demeanor completely changed in a second. He went from happy to ecstatic with a simple swipe of his tongue over his bottom lip. Taking a shallow breath, I closed my eyes and pressed my lips to his. I had missed that warmth, that tingle I would get whenever our lips touched. His hand came up into my hair and massaged my scalp. I sighed against his lips and smiled.
“I love you,” I whispered.
“Always,” he whispered back, capturing my lips again.
Chapter 18
—Richard
I jerked in my seat as Judge Cooper slammed her gavel against the wood. It was day three of the trial, and each day had been more unbearable than the last.
“Mister Williams, please try to control your client.” Judge Cooper sighed, tossing her gavel across her desk. “I do not appreciate these outbursts in my courtroom.”
“Yes, Your Honor.” The defense attorney appointed by the state—an asshole named Williams—leaned over and whispered in David Reed’s ear. He was a monster, a soulless beast walking the earth, and I wished I could choke the life out of him with my bare hands. Both him and his shady-ass lawyer.
Anna Lin was on the stand, being questioned by the prosecution. She was having a hard time keeping it together, which was understandable considering that the man who had raped, tortured and humiliated her for over five months was sitting just across the room from her with a smug grin on his face. I wished she didn’t have to go through this, nor any of the girls for that matter, but I had faith in them that they would pull through.
“Anna, please continue. Tell the court how you obtained some of your scars,” Ms. Howard, the prosecutor, asked.
“He enjoyed burning me with a lighter when he came into my room,” Anna answered.
“Objection,” Williams called out. “How could she possibly know what my client enjoyed or did not enjoy?”
I wanted to jump over the rail and castrate the fucker.
“Sustained,” the judge said.
Ms. Howard just smiled, nodded, and faced Anna again. “Anna, what gave you the impression that the defendant enjoyed torturing you with a lighter?”
“Objection!” Williams said again.
“I’m only asking for my witness’ opinion, Your Honor,” Ms. Howard countered quickly.
The judge nodded. “Overruled.”
Ms. Howard motioned for Anna to continue.
“He would laugh when I begged him to stop. He even did it sometimes when he was . . .” Anna couldn’t finish. She started crying right there on the stand.
I had to force my eyes to not wonder toward Reed. I was afraid that if I even looked at him I wouldn’t be able to stop myself. The feelings running through my body didn’t seem natural. I couldn’t have described them even if someone were to ask. Hearing what Anna had gone through, and knowing it was what all of them—even my Lee—had gone through, filled me with a hatred that bordered on insanity.
“Your Honor, can we please give the witness a few minutes to collect herself?” Ms. Howard asked.
Judge Cooper looked at her watch and nodded. “We’ll take a short break. Be back in fifteen.” And with a smack of the gavel, we all stood up as the judge left the room and Anna rushed out of the witness stand.
Luke, Adam, and I, along with my parents, Sadie, Noah, and the rest of the girls’ families, slowly began making our way out of the courtroom behind Anna when a soft whistling stopped us in our tracks.
It was the jackass, Reed.
Anna stopped and spun around, shaking and looking like she was about to collapse, but I quickly reached out and caught her. Tears fell from her eyes when she gazed up at me.
“That son of a bitch.” I glared over Anna’s shoulder to where Reed sat.
He continued whistling, and I recognized it as the tune of the song Lee had told me Reed always played when they were underground.
“What it is?” Luke asked.
“It’s the song,” I answered. “That fucking song he always played when he left the girls alone in that place.”
Behind us, a woman’s voice hitched and a man cursed, but all I could see was red. It was as if I was a bull and Reed was the red flag.
“Get me out of here,” Anna whimpered, clinging on to my shirt.
I continued to glare at Reed and he smiled like he didn’t have a care in the world.
Suddenly, Adam was standing in front of me, blocking my view. “Go. Get her out of here, Richard.”
As soon as we made it out of the courtroom, I handed Anna to someone—her parents, I assumed—and rushed to the bathroom. I paced a few times in front of the mirror before making my way to the last stall and slamming the door shut behind me. I wanted to hit something, hit it so hard it would release all the anger I felt in my body. But instead of pounding my fist against the wall, I pressed my back against it and slid down until my ass hit the ground with a thud.
I sat on the cold tile floor, tapping the back of my head against the wall as I tried to control my breathing and prayed for my body to calm down. Lee needed me strong. I hadn’t seen her since we arrived, which was hours ago. She’d been taken to a secluded room somewhere until it was her turn on the witness stand. When it came, the last thing I wanted was for her, or that asshole, to see that he’d gotten to me.
After a while, I heard the bathroom door open, and the clicking of shoes on linoleum.
“Richard?” Luke called.
“Yeah.”
“It’s Lee’s turn on the stand.”
What? I looked down at my watch, and sure enough almost two hours had passed. I stood and opened the stall door. My brother waited in silence as I went over to the sink and splashed some cold water on my face. I looked up and glared at my reflection.
I glanced over at Luke through the mirror before reaching over and pulling out a few paper towels to wipe the wat
er off my face.
“How did Anna do? Did she make it though the rest of her testimony all right?”
“She did good, real good, but we better hurry.”
Nodding, I took one last look at myself before walking past Luke and out the door.
“Miss Locke, could you please tell the jury what a typical encounter with the defendant was like during your time in captivity?” Ms. Howard asked.
Lee had appeared calm when she was sworn in, but I knew it was a mask she was wearing to fool everyone. As she’d sat down, I’d caught a glimpse of her right hand, which looked like she had scratched it raw. It was a nervous habit she developed since she got home from the hospital.
I wasn’t surprised that the prosecution wasted no time getting right into the meat and potatoes of Lee’s story. They had already spent a whole day going over questions to prepare her for this, but all that preparation didn’t seem to make it easier on her.
“He would come into my room and beat me, sometimes touch me,” she answered with a steady voice.
“Touch you?” Ms. Howard asked as I tried to push down the acid that was creeping up my throat. “Over the clothes? Under the clothes?”
“Both. Over and under.”
“What were some of the things he would say?”
Lee looked at her brother and mother, who were sitting next to me. “He would call me names, threaten my life, and even threaten my family’s lives.”
Ms. Howard nodded and walked over to her table, picked up a notepad, and then faced Lee again. “I want you to try to remember October eleventh, ten days after your kidnapping. The day Ruth-Ann Summers was murdered.”
Lee started tapping her heel against the floor.
“How did that day begin?” Ms. Howard asked.
Lee closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Anna woke me up,” she said slowly. She opened her eyes and looked straight at me. “She tapped on my wall and kept calling out my name until I woke up.”
“What happened next?” Ms. Howard asked.
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