Footsteps faded away and the door to the studio closed.
Pixie leaned against the wall and let out a whoosh of air. This must be how Dorothy felt when she was swept up inside that tornado, only instead of landing in Oz, she’d arrived in her own personal hell. She slid down the wall until her butt hit the floor. Her mind scrambled, trying to put everything together.
Taking deep breaths, Pixie tried to clear her head. “You are fine,” she exclaimed out loud to the room, grateful no one else had arrived. “Fine. Fine. So very fine.”
Her first reaction, to run home and hide in bed for a week, was replaced by more practical considerations. What he’d done was intimidating. Threatening, even. But with his back to the camera, and no sound recorded, their interaction would look like nothing other than a reunion between father and daughter, even if it wasn’t a particularly happy one. Her word against his, and she’d lost that battle once before.
Pixie stood and picked up her bike helmet, placing it on the hook Cujo had drilled into the wall for her. She wondered what he would think if he knew the whole of what had happened to her. Sure, Arnie had never raped her, but the revulsion from being used, from being touched by him filled her with a sickening dread.
Over time, her stepdad had started to provide her samples of the drugs he sold to stop her from freaking out. Searching for a way to escape, she took whatever he gave her. Opiates, sedatives, heavy-duty painkillers. Anything to take the edge off the raw fear, and to try to kill the feelings of being worthless and alone.
Tell her, I’ll kill her. Tell anyone, I’ll kill her. Refuse, I’ll kill her. Leave here, I’ll kill her.
She’d done what she needed to do. As a young girl, she’d believed his threats. The mom she’d known before Arnie was drifting away from her. Gone were the Sunday mornings they’d watch old movies together, or the evenings they’d spend listening to show tunes. They’d never been able to afford to go to the theater, but they’d watch snippets on her mom’s phone, and make up the stories to go with the songs they heard.
Pixie, certain that it was only time before his voyeuristic tendencies and inappropriate touches turned to something even darker, had tried to get her mom to leave. She’d even gone as far as getting her mom to sign the paperwork allowing her to leave school at sixteen to earn money to help them get out. No amount of encouragement had worked. She’d suggested moving to another town or state, but her mom had wanted to stay with her stepdad. He paid his way, which helped with the cost of the trailer, and he fed her habit.
Pixie stopped short at telling her mom the truth, because she believed Arnie’s threats.
Until that night.
*
The two innocuous, sterile packages sat on the kitchen counter, but to Dred they might as well have been nuclear bombs. He didn’t want to touch them, didn’t want to open them, and certainly didn’t want to follow the instructions from the woman in the navy-suit standing next to him.
The hour before her visit, he’d abstained from eating, drinking, or chewing gum. Thank heavens for in-house visits. “Discretion” was the ultimate keyword in his life.
“Please, Mr. Zander, if you’d open the packet and complete the swab of your left cheek,” she said, her perky voice full of encouragement.
Dred grabbed the first package and ripped the paper. He stuck the end of the swab inside his mouth. Up and down he swept, rotating the stick as instructed.
“You’re doing great, Mr. Zander. Just a couple more seconds.”
At least it didn’t hurt. He repeated the actions a couple more times and held out the stick. The woman took it from him and pressed it between two foam pads attached to a card. Dred swallowed the need to reach over, grab the swab, and set fire to it. Where was Elliot when you needed him? He’d torch it in a second.
Why was he panicking? There was no way the baby was his.
“Okay, right cheek now.” The woman handed him the other packet.
Dred repeated the process, the monotonous up and down, all the while thinking of a little baby in St. Joseph’s hospital. In one regard, Jordan was right. If he was in fact the father, then he needed to learn more about the mother of his child. What kind of person was she? Was she capable of being a good mom? If she was, and she wanted to keep the child, he’d give her whatever she needed to provide an amazing life for her and their daughter. But if she wasn’t . . . the thought sent a chill down his spine. If she wasn’t, she’d have a fight on her hands because it would be a cold day in hell before he’d let any child of his have the upbringing he had. What confused him was how to stop it. There was no way he was equipped to raise a child. And he couldn’t force an adoption if the mom wanted to keep the baby. And they all knew from Lennon’s experience, that even babies adopted into wealthy families couldn’t expect a happy ever after.