“I don’t give a shit about being cleared. I’m staying here until she talks to me. If that were your woman in there, you’d do the same.”
He nods. “I would.”
“Any news?” Silas asks Mark, finishing his coffee and tossing it in the trash bin like a three-pointer. He misses, makes a face, and bends down to throw it away properly.
“Yeah,” Mark says, anger evident in the way his nostrils flare, the posture he assumes. “This thing goes all the way to the top, and has tentacles everywhere. When Galt and I tried to get you released, Drew, turns out NSA, CIA and FBI operatives were all part of the effort to help set you up.”
“I got the full alphabet thrown at me,” I say, impressed.
“Galt figures someone finds you to be very, very dangerous,” he adds, eyebrows up. “That’s high praise from him.”
“And you outsmarted them all,” Silas intones, voice low.
“We still don’t understand how the hell Corning has that kind of reach, and -- ”
Just then, Monica and Harry emerge from the room, eyes hollow.
Oh, no.
Mark stops talking and gives Harry a worried look.
Monica grabs my hand, and says softly, “You can go in now. Maybe you’ll have better luck than we did.”
What the hell does that mean?
Lindsay
I am turned slightly away from the door. I smell Drew’s aftershave before he even sets one foot inside the room. My stomach flip-flops.
Not yet.
Not now.
I’m not really here. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want him to see me like this.
I don’t want anyone to see me like this.
No. Scratch that.
I don’t want anyone to see me ever.
Too much of me has been seen. Too much of me has been stripped naked before the world, bloodied and bruised, my fury worn as my only weapon and exposed for consideration and judgment. John didn’t just kidnap me. He stole me. He stole me and delivered me to Stellan and Blaine and they took my humanity – again – and turned me into an animal.
Only this time, I was awake for all of it. Aware. Sentient and breathing and afraid and terrified to the point where I just can’t be who I was before.
He stole who I am and scraped it clean off me, like a car stripped of all its value, the important parts gleaned, the rest an empty shell no one wants.
A nuisance.
A pile of non-functioning junk.
The sound of Drew’s even breath makes me close my eyes and slow my own respiration. If I pretend to be asleep, maybe he’ll go away.
His scent gets stronger. I feel heat to my right, like he’s radiating it outward.
Even though my eyes are closed, I can tell when he’s next to me. He doesn’t touch the bed. A shadow changes the light behind my eyelids, and his heat intensifies. There’s more than simple warmth there. It’s a kind of compassion that takes on temperature, as if goodness can be calibrated to produce light.
I don’t deserve that.
I know he’s in pain. I know I should reach out, should heal, should work together with him.
If nothing else, he should be thanked.
But the thoughts tumble together with hard, sharp edges of memory. The shards of terror embed themselves in my bloodstream, floating like inner tubes on a lazy river, waiting to be caught on rocks and long, thick logs made of dead trees that just haven’t rotted to pulp yet.
If memory is a mother, protecting us from the worst the world throws our way, then the present – the achingly slow now that rolls out second by second, never rushed by intent or desire – is a bully.
The present hurts me right now. It hurts to be here, to be aware, to be so close to Drew and yet so far away.
He has no idea how distant I really am.
And frankly, neither do I.
“Lindsay.” My name coming from his mouth brings me back to his bedroom, a place of sanctuary and passion that was destroyed by Stellan, John and Blaine. When I hear his voice, all I can see is Blaine on top of me, groping, his hand a final insult as I gave up on Drew.
I say nothing. I’m dying a thousand deaths inside. I slow my breath. Maybe if I slow down enough, I’ll just stop on my own, winding down like a toy that finally rests, tilted toward Mother Earth, inertia drawing it to a close.
“I know you’re here.”
No, Drew. You’re wrong.
I’m not.
The pain medication button is in my hand. I press it so hard the first joint of my thumb turns cold.
“I am so sorry,” he whispers. I can’t look at him. If I did, I know I would see tears.
I can’t look at him because that is what a whole person would do.
And I am just a shell.
“I am so proud of you,” he adds. The scrape of a chair against the tile floor tells me he’s here to stay. The sound is like nails on a chalkboard. I don’t react.
How can I?
I’m not here.
“Please open your eyes.”
I don’t.
“Lindsay. I know it hurts. I know you feel like you are dying inside, like you’re trapped in a big black hole with nowhere to grab. I know it. Grab onto me. I’m here. Grab onto me. Take whatever part of me you need and hold on to it, baby. Borrow a piece of me until you can find that part of yourself. Please. Don’t do it for me. Don’t do it for your parents. Do it for you.” He doesn’t touch me, but his hand goes on the bed, next to me. It’s shaking.
His voice is trembling.
My soul is an earthquake.
My heart is a tsunami.
And like any force of nature, there’s nothing anyone can do to stop this. It just is.
I fade out, the medicine doing its job, thank God. My eyelids crack open slightly. Out of the corner of my eye, I see his head bent down, broad shoulders in a suit jacket, the fabric stretched tight.
His hands are clasped on the bed next to me.
Like he’s praying.
Chapter 12
Drew
“I brought you maple creams,” I say, holding out a five-pound box of chocolate-covered candy for Lindsay to ignore. For the last three days, I’ve visited her every day.
And for the last three days, she’s refused to communicate. Eyes closed, breathing slow, body tense. She has no idea that I understand. I do. I get it more viscerally than she could possibly know.
And that’s why I’m not giving up.
She can ignore me.