“Abby, you are being charged with a class A felony of arson, as well as driving without a license, destruction of property over twenty-thousand dollars, and possession of marijuana. You have priors for breaking and entering, petty theft, possession of marijuana paraphernalia, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, and battery. You should really take your situation more seriously, sweetheart, because you’re looking at ten years without sunlight in a nice, cozy cell all to yourself.” Bethany was taunting me. The way the word sweetheart melted from her lips, it could have been mistaken for an endearment. Southern women used it when they couldn’t come right out and call you a cunt.
“So what, then? Rape and attempted murder are just misdemeanors? ‘Cause I got a feeling that kind of thing goes unpunished around here.” I looked her right in her eyes.
She parted her shiny red lips and chuckled.
Bethany circled around the desk, unbuttoning the jacket of her suit, and knelt down next to me. “I’m glad you decided to have your little episode today, because now you need my help, and I am the only one who can make all these unfortunate charges go away. I felt bad for you, Abby. I really did. That’s why I sent you the money. Too bad you fucked up a good thing. Now, we play it my way.” Bethany flashed me a fake smile.
“Now, you’re blackmailing me?” I asked. Bethany stood and took a seat opposite me, propping her briefcase up on the table.
“Not blackmail sugar. An agreement.” She pulled papers from her briefcase and set them in front of me. “This is your account of what happened that night: you were mugged. You don’t know who did it. You didn’t get a good look at your attacker. The police report will make it seem as if they searched heaven and hell for the assailant but have ultimately come up empty-handed, and the case will be shelved.”
“You’re out of your goddamned mind.”
“Now, sugar, don’t go using the good Lord’s name in vain. It’s not the Christian thing to do. This is a business transaction—your account of what happened in exchange for me dropping the charges for torching my house. You’re the one who ruined this, Abby. You could have taken your money and gotten out of town, but instead you chose to go all avenging angel on me.”
“Fuck you.” I’ll go to jail, I thought. After what I’ve been through, jail would be like summer camp.
Bring it bitch.
“Doesn’t matter to me, darlin’. It’s not like you can prove anything, not like Owen will ever be charged, what with his father being county judge and all. It’s a simple decision really.” She leaned over the table and propped her chin up on her elbows. “Jail, or your signature. You make the call.”
She was right, but I didn’t care. This wasn’t about making sure Owen was prosecuted for what he’d done to me. This was about not letting these people own me.
I wasn’t a piece of land or livestock.
They could take their power and shove it up their asses.
Bethany had a victory smile already plastered on her overly botoxed face. It was time to rip it the fuck off.
“I don’t think you quite understand something, Mrs. Fletcher.” I mimicked her posture, leaning and pressing myself as close to her as my cuffed hands would let me. “The last thing you want to do is fuck with someone who has nothing to lose. I want your entire family to leave me alone, and I want Owen to stay at least one hundred yards away from me at all times. I mean it. If he sees me on one side of the street, he needs to cross to the other.”
“This isn’t a negotiation. I’ve laid out your options so you pick. Jail or signature. End of story.” She placed the papers back into her briefcase and clicked the locks shut. She stood. “What will it be, Miss Ford?”
“Fuck you.”
She shrugged and turned to leave, but before she could twist the knob on the door, she turned and looked at me. “Enjoy jail, Abby. It’s always nice when a daughter follows in her parents’ footsteps.”
Bitch.
I had to pull out the only card I had left to play.
“Hey, Bethany.” She glanced at me over her shoulder. “Did you know that photography was a hobby of mine?”
She froze and turned all the way back around. Her face had gone pale.
I felt a tickle on my nose and bent over to scratch it on the table. “I’m more of a documentary kind-of photographer, really. I like to tell a story with my pictures, you know? It’s amazing what the camera picks up when you’re naked in the mirror. Even in black and white photos, you can see where the purple of each bruise looks gray, where the dried blood looks almost black. You can almost see the yellow tone in the swelling of a black eye… or two.”
She crossed the small room in two strides leaned over the table, bracing both arms on it for support. “All that proves is that someone hurt you. It doesn’t prove who did it.”
“I have copies of the pictures and my statement of what happened that night in three different locations. If something were to happen to me, if Owen does this to someone else, or if you don’t follow through with my demands, there is a plan in place to send them to every newspaper and media outlet within a hundred miles. I won’t be the one rotting away in a jail cell. Owen will be. I’m guessing shortly after that, I won’t be the only rape victim in this whole situation, either.”
I was bluffing about everything but the photos.
She tried to stifle her gasp. She shifted her grip on the table before making her decision.
“Owen leaves you alone, and the charges against you are dropped. Is that what you want?”