Xander gave another command that Sam didn’t hear, but the dog stopped barking immediately. At least he hadn’t set Thor to attack.
Sam rushed into the living room to see a young woman cowering in the corner of the couch. Xander had turned on the small lamp on the secretary against the western wall and it cast a gentle glow over the girl’s features. She was wearing a red T-shirt and cargo pants, and had both her hands up as if she’d been caught robbing a bank. Thor had her covered, Xander’s gun was pointed at her chest and she was white as a sheet.
“Who the hell are you?” Sam said.
The girl turned a hopeful face in her direction. “Please, ma’am, don’t let them hurt me. My name is Kaylie Rousch.”
Chapter
38
HOW DO I explain myself to this woman? She is so much more beautiful in person than the photos I’ve seen. They didn’t capture the light in her clear brown eyes, the color of the whiskey Doug would drink occasionally, if he was in a very good mood, or a very bad one. They didn’t show the kindness of her face. Even furious with me, she seems gentle, breakable.
Her man isn’t. He looks like he wants to tell the dog to rip out my throat, and if the dog disobeys he’ll reach over and do it himself without a second thought. He looks dangerous. I don’t like him. He is one of them, another Y chromosome, only able to hurt and break, yell and scream. His fists are like rocks, his eyes nearly black, full of rage. What is she doing with him? Doesn’t she realize he is a monster?
The woman says, “Xander, put the gun away,” and he listens. The dog is still unhappy with me, but after a guttural command, he backs away, too.
The man she called Xander says, “I’m going to search you. Stand up.”
I can’t let that happen.
I shrink into the corner of the sofa, and the words blurt out in a panic. “No. No way. You can’t touch me. Please, ma’am, don’t let him hurt me. Don’t let him touch me.” He takes a step closer and I swear my heart is going to burst from my chest. I can’t help myself; a small moan comes from my mouth, from somewhere deep and primal.
I am amazed to see his face soften. He no longer looks like a devil beast, only a man. When he speaks to me this time his voice is gentle, cajoling, eminently reasonable, as if he’s talking to a spooked horse.
“Listen to me. People thought you were dead for sixteen years, and your DNA was suddenly found at a murder scene. Several people related to this case are actually dead. And now you’ve broken into our house. With your permission, Dr. Owens would like to make sure you mean her no harm. Will that be okay?”
A woman’s touch doesn’t frighten me. Not anymore. I spread my hands wide so they can see I don’t carry any weapons and nod.
“Yes. I can live with that. But I am not here to hurt you. Either of you. I need your protection.”
At a nod from her man, Samantha crosses the room, asks me to stand. She runs her hands gently down my back to the small space where my too-small T-shirt is tucked into my cargo pants, then down my legs and across my torso. She stops there because it’s clear I can’t hide a weapon inside these too-tight clothes and she wishes to spare me the humiliation of touching the inside of my thighs.
Of course, that’s where I have taped the knife. I honestly don’t intend to use it on her. So long as she doesn’t give me a reason to.
“She’s clean,” she says.
No, I’m not. I will never be clean again. But maybe, with her help, I can find a way to become whole.
When she’s finished, I bow my head slightly and say thank-you. My voice sounds very small and childish. I haven’t heard that tone from myself for a very long time. I thought I was a grown-up. I thought things were going to be okay.
And then Doug was dead and gone, and the cocoon of safety I’d wrapped myself in split wide apart and dumped me wriggling into the mud, caught between chrysalis and butterfly. The world we’d created over the years disappeared, and the gaping maw of reality rushed in, grabbed me by the throat and ripped my heart out.
I can’t help myself. I start to cry. It begins gently, just a tear brimming in the corner of my eye, and the woman reaches over and touches me gently on the cheek, and the floodgates open. Before I can stop myself I am sobbing in her arms like a child.
She doesn’t shy away, but wraps me in her love and drags me to a seated position on the sofa and holds me while I cry my heart out.
This is perfect. This is what I’ve always wanted. This simple contact, this loving embrace. I’ve never felt it before, not like this. It’s almost as if an angel lit on this woman’s shoulder and brought my real mother with her. I can feel her arms around me. She smells of vanilla and tea and the sweetness of roses, not the vapid emptiness of vodka and cigarettes and hate.