Quinten stared at the blank pieces of paper that sat in front of him, at a loss as to what to write.
Saige hadn’t once visited him since he’d been arrested, charged, then incarcerated, so why would she come now?
The warden had asked him if he had any last requests, and the only one he’d been able to think of was to see his Saige. The form to have her vetted to visit had been completed, and he’d been assured she’d be granted access, but the rest would be up to her. As much as he tried not to get his hopes up, his heart raced at the thought that he’d get to see her one last time…even if there were bars between them.
Would she really come to see him though? Time was ticking and his hands shook with the reality of what was about to happen to him. He tried not to think about it, but how could he not when he was living this hell.
And what about his brother? Alex was due in a couple of days. It was a visit that he usually looked forward to, but now that he’d been moved and his death imminent, he didn’t know how to feel. His stomach was in turmoil, and he feared he’d puke.
He’d escaped a lot of the violence that happened in prison because, as a death row prisoner, he’d had a cell to himself and the security was different, or so he’d been told. It didn’t change his longing for the life that he had started to dream of before it was taken away from him.
The dreams had kept him going while Saige had been away at college, and the guilt he felt at being the one to bring her home the weekend she’d been taken still ate at him. He’d been sick and tired of his life, and had needed her badly. She’d heard his need through their connection over the phone and before he could say anything, she’d had a bag packed and was in her car.
That had been the last time they’d talked.
He missed her voice, her smile and, most of all, the feel of her arms around him. Even now, his heart swelled with the love they once shared, and no one could tell him it had all been a dream on his part. He knew that his brother believed the worst about Saige. She’d been the only thing to cause arguments between them over the years.
“You done?” the guard questioned.
They got edgy when he had a pencil in his hands. What they expected him to do with it, he didn’t know.
He wasn’t a killer.
“I haven’t thought of anything to write,” he admitted. “I thought the words would come, but now that I have the chance to write to her, I don’t know what to say. There’s so much.” He shook his head before he dropped his gaze to the sheet of paper. “What do you write to the girl you love, who you know you’ll never see again?”
Quinten had no idea how long he sat crying with the paper blurred in his vision. He just knew he had to write something because he couldn’t leave this life without her knowing how much he still loved her.
* * *
8:30am
* * *
Saige didn’t know whether or not she could trust Alex. One minute, he seemed like Quinten’s caring older brother, and the next he glared at her as hate emanated from him. The only way she’d understand Alex more was to read the statement.
The statement that she’d given so many years before sat on her lap while she gazed out of the window. Saige knew she had to pick it up and read the words she supposedly said, but the thought of reading what happened to her made her belly quiver with nerves.
Alex told her that the statement didn’t go into detail, but if she wanted more details they would be in the hospital report that her doctor had written for the court. She opted to ignore the latter for now.
Draining the bottle of water that she’d been nursing, she placed it on the table and started to read.
He held me down...
There was so much hate inside him...
He kept talking about money...
His voice was distorted...like a machine...
He was so strong...
I don’t remember him raping me...
Did he?
I just wanted to leave...
I promised him I wouldn’t tell...
A short time later, Saige had reached the end of the report, and realized that tears ran down her face. So much so that she couldn’t even see the signature at the bottom of the page.
“Do you remember?” Alex offered another tissue while he stood to the side.
She shook her head. “My head is full of the report, but I didn’t see any mention of your brother.”
“Then you obviously didn’t read the last paragraph.” Alex pointed to the bit that she missed because her tears had prevented her from reading it.
Wiping her eyes, and blowing her nose, she took a drink from another bottle of water that Alex passed her, and started to read the last paragraph.
I, Saige Lockwood, state that the photograph selected, whilst in the hospital, from a lineup of ten photographs given to me by the District Attorney’s office, and Detective Coulter Robinson, is of my abductor, Quinten James Peterson.
She gasped, and managed to look at the signature before her tears started again, not that they’d ever stopped.