by Emma Scott
Brett jumps to his feet. “Jesus Christ—”
The man grips Brett by the collar of his shirt with both hands, swings him—like a shot-putter—and sends him crashing into the dresser. Wood splinters and shatters. He’s not jutting now but flaccid and trying to climb to his feet.
“M-M-Motherfucker,” the man in black cries.
Brett holds his hands in front of him. “Jim, wait…”
Jim doesn’t wait. He grabs Brett around the shoulders and drives him out into the hallway. I hear another crash and then a smack of fist against flesh. I crawl farther on the bed, curl up against the wall. I pull my knees to my chest and hug my legs as there is shouting and an alarm sounds.
“What did you d-d-do to her?” I hear Jim shout. “Tell me!”
“Nothing! Jesus, I didn’t fuck her, and it’s not like she’d remember anyw—”
The voice cuts off with another smack of Jim’s fist.
The alarm goes silent. I hear a woman crying.
“I’m sorry,” she says tearfully. “I had no idea. I must’ve dozed off.”
I hear a buzz of static, followed by another man. “Hey, it’s Hank. We got a situation. I got him contained but call 911.”
More people talking in low voices and then the man in black—Jim—comes back into the room. His silhouette fills the doorway, hands still clenched into fists. Gradually they loosen and his breath slows.
“Are y-y-you okay?” he asks softly. His tone is low and gravelly around the stutter.
I nod, yes. Then shake my head, no. God, the silence in my mind is so vast and deep. Like a desert. I don’t know if I’m okay. I don’t know if I should be afraid of Jim.
He saved you.
He saved me but I don’t know him. Maybe he’s just as bad. Maybe he wants a turn.
But somewhere, beneath thought, I know that isn’t true.
I don’t want him to leave.
Sobs pour out of me, and I bury my face against my knees.
“Thea…” Jim’s voice sounds like it’s breaking.
He knows my name.
He knows me.
I peek up through strands of hair and blurry tears. Jim’s taken a step closer but no more.
I hold my shaking arms out to him. I don’t know why. I need him. I need someone so I don’t feel this alone. Jim sits on the bed. Gathers me to him. I climb into his arms. He smells clean. Warm. Hard and soft. Hard leather and a soft shirt. Hard muscles of his chest under my cheek and his soft hand that strokes my hair, and it’s so easy to feel the difference between him and Brett; his every intention is in his touch. This man would never hurt me.
Jim holds me tight as I tremble in his arms. And then he begins to sing. His low and gravelly voice rumbles beautifully under my ear. I feel safe enough to slip my hand into one of his. Big. Strong. Scarred along the knuckles. Red and swollen now. Because he fought for me. Saved me.
Other figures fill the doorway, other people talking, but Jim keeps singing to me. The silence in my mind is defeated by his voice. My eyes close. I’m so tired. It’s safe to sleep now because Jim is coming with me.
He’ll follow me into the dark.
Chapter 15
Jim
Thea’s sobs quieted. The rise and fall of her chest against mine became deep and even, and at last, she slept. Gently—reluctantly—I laid her down on her pillow and covered her with her thin blanket, then slid to sit on the floor, my back against the bedframe. I couldn’t hold her anymore, but no way in hell was I leaving her room.
The staff saw what had happened. They all watched as I held Thea and sang to her. They knew I wasn’t going anywhere without a fight and there’d already been enough violence for one night.
They let me be and guided the residents back to bed. I sat with my knees drawn up, arms resting on them. Hands dangling but ready to fight again. As the sanitarium went quiet, sleep toyed with me, coming and going. Then a hand on my arm gently shook me awake.
It was Sunday morning. The watery light of dawn filtered in from the window.
“Jim?”
I jerked my head up and winced at the crick in my neck. Rita crouched next to me, her expression a myriad of gratitude and regret. Another nurse stood by the door, a syringe pack and a blue plastic box in her hand.
“Jim, you can go,” Rita whispered, blinking against the tears in her eyes. “The police are still here, waiting for a statement. Sarah and I need to sedate Thea now.”
“What for?” I said, my voice a croak.
“We have to know what happened. Brett said he never…”
I shut my eyes, shook my head. “Don’t.”
“We need to examine her,” Rita said softly. “Thea can’t tell us if he’s lying or not. Not with words.”
My glance went to the plastic box in the other nurse’s hands. A rape kit. My stomach churned and bile rose to my throat.
Inhale. Exhale.
I hauled myself off the floor and glanced around Thea’s room for the first time. A twin-sized bed, a small desk with pens and paper. A ruined dresser, its wooden shelves cracked and splintered. My shoulders ached at the sight, remembering how I’d ripped Brett off of Thea in a black haze of rage.
Aside from the wrecked dresser, the room was the same as most other resident’s quarters but for the papers taped all over the walls. Reminders and notes.
Bathroom is here.
This is the closet.
Two years living at Blue Ridge, and Thea still didn’t know her own room.
I gave her a final glance. She slept peacefully, but they’d stick a needle in her to send her down deeper so that she wouldn’t wake up to an examination she needed.
She can’t consent to that either.
“Thank you for taking care of her,” Rita said. “You were right. I’m so sorry. I wish I’d listened.”
“I wish I hadn’t been right.”
I forced myself to leave Thea and stepped into the hallway. Alonzo and Anna were conferring in low voices. They stopped when they saw me.
“My damn phone was off,” Alonzo said. “I didn’t get your message until late. Too late.”
“Too late is right,” Anna said. “Get your résumés ready, my dears. When Delia Hughes hears about this…”
“Where’s Brett?” I spat the name through gritted teeth.
“Jail,” Alonzo said. “He was in her room, his privates hanging in the wind. Even without your statement, it was obvious what was happening.”
“Come on, Jim,” Anna said. “The police are waiting downstairs.”
In the foyer, two uniformed officers were interviewing Jules at the front desk.
“He made a lot of crude jokes,” she said. “But he was so fun. And nice. I never…”
“Crude jokes in general,” an officer asked. “Or jokes with specific innuendo toward residents?”
“Both. He made a lot of jokes…” Jules swallowed and tried again. “I never thought it was real. I never did.”
My hands balled into fists. He joked about Thea. About touching her…
“Jim Whelan?” one of the officers said. “We need a statement.”
I told them everything I’d seen and heard before I’d bashed the door in. Which wasn’t much. The only reason I’d heard anything at all was because I’d been momentarily petrified with rage at the sight of that bastard’s dick in his hand and Thea’s teary, fearful expression.
“He said she wouldn’t r-r-remember anyway,” I said. The rage returned on a red haze, awakening the stutter, but the cops didn’t notice.
Rita came down with the results of the examination. “Negative,” she said, and my eyes fell shut in relief. “Seems Brett was telling the truth about the nature of his assaults. Good news, if you can call it that.”
Anna nodded, her lips pursed. “I’m glad, but the damage is done.”
As the police conferred with Rita and Anna, Alonzo pulled me aside.
“The damage is done,” he said. “Not just to Miss Hughes but to us too. I
t’s going to be bad at that meeting tomorrow. But no less than what we deserve, I reckon. And by ‘we,’ I mean myself. Not you. You did right, Jim. Since the beginning, you been doing right by that girl.”
“So have you,” I said. “You’ve been doing right by all of them, with no help from the director. They have to see that.”
Alonzo put his hand on my arm. “Go home, Jim. Get some sleep and I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I walked out the front door to my Harley. I’d already been dreading the meeting with Delia, the doctor, and the director. But now, with that bastard assaulting Thea… When I walked out of Blue Ridge tomorrow, it might be for the last time. Delia Hughes might have the entire sanitarium shut down. Good people would be out of jobs.
And Thea would remain trapped in her five-minute prison for the rest of her life.
Chapter 16
Jim
Monday morning, I showered and put on my only dress shirt, jeans, and my leather jacket. I rode to Blue Ridge with my guts in a knot.
The parking lot was fuller than usual, with a few sedans and one medical van with Roanoke Memorial emblazoned on the side. Inside, the normally hushed sanitarium echoed with footsteps and voices.
I found Alonzo, Joaquin, and Anna in the hallway outside the rec room huddled up and talking in low voices.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“The new doctor is in there with Delia and Thea,” Alonzo said, inclining his head at the rec room door. “They’ve been in a serious pow-wow with board members and other doctors for an hour.”
I frowned. “Is the meeting with Poole and Stevens still on?”
“Poole and Stevens are no longer affiliated with Blue Ridge,” Anna said. She tilted her chin. “Neither is Mary Flint.”
“Dude, it’s nuts,” Joaquin said. “Delia Hughes blew a gasket—”
“As well she should,” Alonzo said.
“—and heads rolled.”
“Somehow, none were ours,” Anna said dryly.
“Okay,” I said slowly. “Delia isn’t taking Thea out of Blue Ridge?”
“Don’t think so,” Alonzo said. “The new doctor—Christina Chen? She’s in charge now and somehow, she’s convinced Delia to stay. Said she’s going to be more involved in Miss Hughes’ care.” He nodded at the rec room again. “Starting now.”
“And that’s it? Delia was satisfied with that?”
“Strangely enough.” Alonzo scratched his chin. “Something’s going on with her. I can’t put my finger on it…”
“Agreed,” Anna said. “She seemed almost eager not to have to pull Thea out of Blue Ridge. As if she were grasping at any reason to stay.”
“Snakes and all,” Joaquin said.
Alonzo gave him a dirty look.
“I meant Brett too,” Joaquin said, holding up his hands.
“Miss Hughes was grossly abused while under our care,” Alonzo said. “Delia Hughes would be well within her rights to sue us into oblivion. The fact we’re still here is a blessing.”
“It’s a miracle,” Anna said. “As much as I loathe what happened to Thea, it was the wake-up call the board needed to fix so much of what was broken.”
“We’re not out of the woods yet,” Alonzo said. “Delia’s got us by the balls.” He clapped me on the shoulder. “Needless to say, your suspension is over.”
Joaquin chucked my other arm. “You did good for Miss Hughes, man.”
“Indeed,” Anna Sutton said. She patted my hand. “Thank you, Jim.”
I looked around at them—Anna and Alonzo like proud parents and Joaquin the brother I never had. A family. My family.
Dream on, you big dummy. Doris scoffed. They just feel sorry for you.
But her words didn’t stick this time. No one lost their jobs and Thea was still here with a new doctor. I went to the break room and changed into my uniform, feeling lighter than I had in days. A new era was beginning. I just wished Thea hadn’t had to suffer to make it happen.
I pushed the mop bucket out into the hallway and began the stretch of the linoleum that led to the front foyer.
Maybe Thea will start a new painting. Maybe this Dr. Chen will have some ideas about her word chains. Maybe I could help—
“You,” a familiar voice said behind me.
“Ms. Hughes,” I said, turning.
“I suppose I should thank you for coming to Thea’s rescue the other night,” Delia said.
“Just doing my job,” I said warily.
“And you did it well. Got to her right at the nick of time, didn’t you?”
I cocked my head. “Sorry?”
“You busted through the door like a superhero. Perfectly timed to catch that man in the act.”
“Not perfectly,” I said, feeling the stutter right there, rising with the anger at her insinuations. “I was t-two nights too late.”
Delia tilted her chin. “And holding my sister? Singing to her? Is that in your job description as well?”
I gripped the handle of the mop. “She was upset. Music helps her calm down.”
She pursed her lips, watching me. “I’m torn, Mr. Whelan,” she said. “I’m grateful to you, and I don’t trust you. You’re not—”
“Yeah, I know,” I said, cutting her off. “I’m not a doctor. I’m just an orderly.”
“You are. Thea is so defenseless, I’ve always mistrusted male staff around her. Turns out I was right to be wary.”
Tears shone in her eyes but she blinked them away.
“Dr. Chen assures me Thea is in safe hands now. A new director will be appointed, more funds allotted for hiring staff and Dr. Chen herself is committed to Thea’s case. The only thing that would reassure me more, is if the man who seems so taken with my sister no longer worked here.”
The words to defend myself rose to my lips but I bit them back. They’d come out stuttering and weak anyway, making my poor excuses sound desperate. Or obsessive. I knew what my fierce protection of Thea looked like to everyone else: a male orderly paying too much attention to a beautiful, vulnerable patient. Stopping Brett only compounded Delia’s worry. In her eyes, I was just another man who had access to Thea. Another predator who could put his hands on her when no one was looking because who would suspect me now?
“One of the stipulations of my keeping Thea at Blue Ridge,” Delia continued, “is that under no circumstances are you, or any other male staff, to have direct contact with my sister. If what you say is true—you’re just doing your job—this shouldn’t be a problem for you.”
I tilted my chin up. “Not a problem.”
“Good. Because if I hear that you so much as looked her way, I’ll call in another demand.” She gave me a humorless smile. “You’d be amazed at how amenable a facility can be to client’s wishes when it’s within that client’s ability to sue said facility into the ground.”
She started past me, then stopped. For a second, her dark eyes softened beneath the hard mask of her face.
“I am grateful you stopped that man. I know it sounds like I’m not—”
“I don’t need your gratitude, Ms. Hughes.”
She stiffened. “I disagree. My gratitude is the only reason you still have a job, Mr. Whelan.”
I didn’t take Thea on her FAE that day, and I never would again. I had to be content the new doctor was interested in Thea’s case. Still, the idea of working under the same roof with Thea every day and not talking to her was a kind of torture.
Jesus, I really am a creepy stalker.
Maybe it would be better if Delia had me fired after all.
I should do what she wants and quit. Start over somewhere else. Keep my head down. Do my job.
Rita and Alonzo fumed about Delia’s edict in the dining room after lunch.
“That’s some bullshit,” Alonzo said. “I can talk to her.”
“Have you met Delia Hughes?” I asked with a wry smile. “Forget it. My job’s hanging as it is.”
“But after how you saved Thea?” Rita said, shaki
ng her head in disbelief. “When I think of Brett in her room…” She shivered.
“Delia’s protective,” I said. “Can’t blame her for that.”
She and Alonzo exchanged glances, and I felt the pity roll off of them in waves.
“No big deal,” I said shortly. “There are plenty of residents who need help. You can assign me to one of them.”
Alonzo watched me through narrowed eyes. “Mr. Perello,” he said after a long moment. “He needs someone with him for his daily smoke.”
“Great,” I said. “I’ll do it.”
Alonzo went back to work, and Rita reached her hand across the table and gave mine a squeeze. “I’m sorry, Jim. I wish things were different with Thea. For her sake, but for yours too.”
“For m-m-my sake?”
Her smile tilted toward pitying. “You seem so taken with her. And in her own way, she cares about you.”
I stared, my skin heating.
The stuttering orderly and the broken-down girl. I could practically see Doris shake her head. What a pitiful pair you make.
Now my skin burned with humiliation and I pulled my hand away. “I gotta get back to work.”
I rose from the chair and headed out without looking back. I cleaned up a few resident rooms and took Mr. Perello for a walk outside. He sat on a bench and savored his one cigarette.
“This is a life, isn’t it?” he asked, watching the smoke curl up and hang thickly in the humid, summer air. “Not the life. A life. I guess that counts for something.”
A life.
That’s what I had before Thea. It wasn’t much, but at least there hadn’t been so much damn confusion. Or this ache in my chest that didn’t quit. A longing. Strange emotions I’d never experienced before, like bright swaths of color over a drab gray sky. They swept through me when I thought of Thea. I remembered the softness of her hair and how good it felt to hold her, even if it was to keep her from falling apart.
It wasn’t right to feel like this. It wasn’t right to feel anything for a girl who had no control over who was in her life. Who couldn’t make a single informed decision. Who smiled her brilliant smile at those around her because what choice did she have but to trust us?
