“I think we can make that happen,” Rylan answered before I did.
Even though I normally hated when people tried to talk for me, I was glad he'd done it this time. I didn't want to make any assumptions, but I also didn't want to be alone tonight.
“Good.” The doctor scribbled something down and handed the paper to me. “That's a prescription for a mild painkiller if you need it.”
“Does that mean we're done?” I asked. I was grateful for the prescription since I knew I'd probably need it tomorrow, but I cared more about getting discharged.
Her smile was understanding. “Yes, it does. I just have a couple things I need to have you sign.”
I held out my hand.
“I'll be back with the papers in a moment,” she said. “You can change back into your street clothes.”
Shit.
I'd agreed to change into a gown for the exam because I wanted out of the dress. Then it hit me. I gave Rylan a puzzled look. “I thought the dress was evidence.”
“It is,” he said. He reached down and picked up a bag I hadn't noticed. “I paid one of the orderlies to get some clothes. I'm not guaranteeing they'll even match...”
“Thank you.” I squeezed his hand, then raised it to brush my lips across his knuckles. “For everything.”
“I meant it, you know,” he said. “That we'd work something out so you wouldn't be alone tonight.”
“She meant that for you too,” I said as I released his hand and started digging into the bag. There were no undergarments, but I was fine with that. The idea of a stranger picking out a bra and panties weirded me out. I quickly pulled on the sweatpants under the hospital gown, and the sweatshirt came next. They were both baggy, but at least the guy had picked gray rather than some outlandish color.
“Your apartment's going to be off limits for at least a day or two,” he said. “And it'll be another day before a cleaning crew can get everything fixed up.”
“A cleaning crew?”
“No arguing, please.” He gently touched my uninjured cheek. “I don't want a single thing left in your apartment to remind you of what happened.”
I didn't tell him that the memories would still be there, no matter how much cleaning was done. I knew that from experience. Still, I appreciated the fact that he wanted to do that for me.
“Whatever you want to do is what we'll do,” he continued. “Whatever you need to make you feel safe.”
My heart did a little skip. “You make me feel safe.”
He shook his head, his eyes sad. “I shouldn't...”
I put my finger on his lips. “We're going to talk about that, but not here.”
His gaze locked with mine for a moment and then he nodded. “Do you want to stay at a hotel? Call in a friend to stay with you?” He lifted my hand and rolled up my sleeve so my hand was free, his head staying down as he spoke again, “Or you can stay with me.”
“At your house?” I tried to make my voice nonchalant.
“No strings. No expectations,” he said. “You can stay in the guest room for as long as you like.”
“Thank you.” I looked away and told myself not to feel disappointed that he'd specified guest room. I didn't want this to confuse things between us, and I definitely didn't want him thinking I was trying to take advantage of what had happened.
“Jenna.” His voice was soft.
I turned back toward him. My emotions were close to the surface, but I managed to keep them back.
He cupped the side of my face and I leaned into the touch. Better than any painkiller.
“I'll understand if you want to stay in one of the guest rooms, if you need your space, but I would also love for you to stay with me.”
I inhaled sharply.
As if he knew I needed him to say the words, he clarified, “In my room. In my bed.” His thumb brushed the corner of my mouth. “In my arms.”
Chapter 22
Rylan called a car to take us to his house. He'd driven to mine but said he'd call someone to pick it up later. All he cared about right now was getting us home. Warmth coiled in my stomach at the word. Home. I knew he didn't mean it like that. It was his home, not mine, but for now, I wouldn't overthink it. I'd let myself feel safe, feel love, feel home.
It was already heading toward evening so we'd have all weekend, just the two of us, and I was looking forward to not doing much of anything that didn't involve a bed, couch or good food.
I stayed in the sweat suit as we went through the kitchen, picking at food here and there. Neither one of us said much of anything, but in a way, I found that comforting. I had a lot I was planning to say, but I appreciated the break.
After eating, Rylan held out his hand. I took it and the two of us went upstairs. We got into the shower together, and while there were definitely some lingering touches and looks, things didn't become sexual. I knew Rylan wanted me. He made no effort to hide the way his body reacted to mine, but I knew he wouldn't make the first move. Not after what had happened.
I wanted him too, wanted to feel the safety and comfort of his arms around me. Wanted him to make me forget. But first, it was time for me to tell him everything.
There were soft, fluffy robes for us both after we were done drying off and then he looked at me, waiting for me to make my decision about where I wanted to go.
“We need to talk.”
His eyes widened slightly, but the rest of his face went blank.
“Nothing bad,” I said quickly. Then I amended my statement. “It's not a break-up or a where are we going speech. It's about what really happened this morning, and how it connects to all of those things about my past that I haven't told you.”
“Jenna, I meant what I said. You don't have to tell me anything.”
“I'm ready.” I stopped him before he could say anything else. “And I need to tell you. I need you to know.”
He studied my face for a moment, probably searching it to see if I was serious or just saying it because it was what I thought he wanted to hear. Finally, he nodded.
“Okay. Where do you want to talk?”
I thought about it. Did I want to go back down to the living room and sit while I shared all of the shit from my past? No, what I wanted was to feel safe while I talked, and while I felt safe in the entire house, there were three rooms where that was the most true. One, I wanted to use later. The other was through that door.
“Can we sit on your bed?” I asked. I stuck my hands in my pockets. They were already starting to get cold. “This isn't going to be pleasant.”
He reached out and put his arms around me, pulling me toward him. He didn't try to cop a feel or even kiss me. This was an embrace of pure comfort and I let myself enjoy it. I took the strength he offered me and stepped back only when I was sure I could do this. Once I started, I didn't want to stop. I only wanted to do this once.
After a few minutes, we moved into the room and settled on the bed, not touching, but close enough that we could if either of us wanted to.
“None of this will be easy for you to hear,” I began. “And it's not easy for me to say, but it needs to be said. If there's any hope of this.” I gestured between the two of us. “Any chance for us to work, you need to know.”
My eyes met his and in those blue-violet depths was an array of emotions. Anxiety over what was to come. Concern for me. A hint of anger that I knew would grow. And hope. A hope I understood because I had been fighting it for a while. Hope that we would become something more.
“When I said before that I kept my scars, I meant it.” This seemed like as good a place as any to start. I pushed up my sleeve so that my scar was visible. “They're reminders, like my tattoos.” I gave him a half-smile. “The hair and the piercings are different. The tattoos mean something, like the scars. They tell the story of who I was.” I hesitated, and then added, “Who I was before I became Jenna Lang.”
I looked at him, expecting shock, but he didn't even look surprised.
“My backg
round checks on employees are a bit more thorough than the average boss.” He groaned. “Or, at least, I'd thought they were.”
“Trust me,” I said. “Unless you dug into his home computer, you couldn't have known. You'll understand why in a minute, I promise.”
He nodded and then went back to what he'd been saying. “For you, I found a record of a name change when you were eighteen, but nothing else, including what the name had been changed from. I knew that you weren't born with that name even though you used it on your college application, before the change. And that's where I stopped looking.”
“You knew there was something strange, but you stopped looking?” I wasn't sure if I wanted to kiss him for not hacking systems to find the truth or slap him for digging so much in the first place. Okay, I was sure which I wanted, but it had very little to do with his actions.
“It wasn't my story to find,” he said. “It's yours to tell.”
“Thank you,” I said sincerely. Knowing how easy it would've been for someone like him to hack the court records, I respected him all the more for not doing it. That was the only place the old me still existed.
He held out his hand, giving me the choice to take it. I laced my fingers between his, grateful for the contact. I would need his strength.
“My tattoos,” I started again. “Angel wings on my back to cover scars from beatings and cigarette burns. Symbolism you'll either get or not when you've heard it all. The barbed wire to remind me of the prison I came from. And Lily.” I blinked back the sudden tears. “She saved me.”
I took a slow breath and Rylan waited.
“The scars remind me of the things I survived.” My voice was still steady but my fingers were holding more tightly to Rylan's hand. “The reason I wanted us to have our statements taken separately was because I had to tell the detective why Christophe came after me. How he knew me. And it wasn't through work.” I put my other hand on top of our joined ones. “I couldn't let you find out that way.”
I took another deep breath and hoped it would calm my nerves. Not surprisingly, it didn't. Nevertheless, I pushed on.
“My mom was twenty-three when she had me, but as near as anyone could figure, she'd had at least six other kids before me, maybe more. That's also not counting the abortions. The first one, a boy, was born when she was fourteen and she gave him up right away. One died. SIDS from what I heard. When the police did their routine follow-up, they found the drugs she'd been using. I think there were three kids taken away that first time. By the time I was born, she'd lost custody of everyone. A total of two boys, counting that first, and three girls. I don't know if the one who died was a boy or a girl. Don't know names either. Sometimes she'd say my brothers were Dillon and Mikey. Other times, it was Ollie and Samson.”
“You never did any... digging?”
I smiled softly. I knew what he meant. I was a good enough hacker that I could've gotten the information if I'd really wanted it.
“I'd be lying if I said I'd never thought of it,” I admitted. “But I don't think I could face any of them. There'd be too many questions.”
“Like why she kept you and not them?”
“The answer to that one is simple. I got her stuff. Mom kept my birth quiet because she knew I'd get taken if the state found out. She'd been turning tricks since she was fourteen to pay for drugs, so a father interfering wasn't going to happen.” I traced my finger along Rylan's thumb. “She always liked the idea of being a mom more than the reality of it, so I think she might've eventually let me go too if she hadn't met Tony. He was her new pimp slash drug supplier when I was born. From what the cops found out, I was only a year old when Tony told my mom that there was another way she could pay for her drugs that didn't involve her giving blowjobs for ten bucks a pop.” I looked down. There was no going back after this.
“I'm right here, Jenna,” Rylan said. “I'm not going anywhere.”
I raised my head and met his eyes. Safety. Strength. I could do this. “I was her way to get what she wanted. It was just Tony for a year or two, or so I was told. I don't remember. Then he got killed by some other dealer and my mom decided to go into business for herself.”
Rylan looked sick, the revulsion in his eyes clearly not directed at me. His hand convulsed around mine, as if itching to make a fist. “Jenna, love...”
“I have to keep going,” I said. “I need to say it all.”
He nodded, the expression on his face saying he wished I wouldn't, but also that he knew how important this was.
“I was somewhere between two and three the first time Mom got an idea. I don't know if someone suggested it, or she thought of it herself, only that she was there for every film.” I reached up and touched my hair. “I was Snow White.”
“Which is why you dye your hair,” he said softly, understanding in his expression.
“And that's how Christophe knew me.”
Now came the shock. Rylan stared at me.
“When he was twelve, he found some clips of the movies online and became obsessed.”
“The dress.” Rylan's eyes widened.
“He wanted me to be Snow White again,” I said. “So, you see, that was why he suggested that you hired me. Why he never messed with any of the other women at work. But you never could've known.”
“I should've known I had a pedophile working for me.”
I shook my head. “These men, these people, they're masters of disguise. They know how to cover their tracks.” I steered the conversation back to my story. I could argue against his guilt later. “Until I was thirteen, I spent at least three to four days a week being raped. Sometimes one man, sometimes more. Sometimes they'd bring their wives or girlfriends with them.”
With every word, the horrified and sickened expression on Rylan's face grew.
“Aside from the movies, there were web shows and pictures too.” I put my hand on my side. “When I was six, I told my mom I didn't want to do movies anymore. She beat me after she saw that the grease left a scar. Said I'd have to work twice as hard since I'd made her leave a mark.”
I kept waiting for Rylan to pull away, but he didn't. Then I told him about that night. The worst night. I didn't leave anything out. He needed to know. With each disgusting, degrading detail, the anger in his eyes grew until they were almost black.
“Mom had to let me heal for a couple days after that one,” I said. “The first night I could walk again, I tried to kill myself.” I held up my arm. “I didn't realize that the blood would make the glass too slippery for me to cut my other arm. I didn't bleed out fast enough.”
“No one asked questions?” Rylan's voice was hoarse. “You were a kid, coming into the hospital with a suicide attempt. An exam would've shown...”
I didn't make him say it. “The doctor my mom took me to, the one she always took me to, was a regular customer.” I sighed. “I didn't know that until after he was arrested though. He always wore a mask.”
“How did... how did it end?”
“I was in the middle of making a movie.” I shuddered. If I'd been forced to finish that one, I knew I would've found a way to kill myself. “In the middle of it, the cops burst in. One of the people who subscribed to the website had been arrested a couple of days before. My picture was one of thousands on his hard drive, but the tech people were able to identify some things and figure out where I was. Lily was the only person who came to me and held me. She didn't act disgusted by what she saw… she just saw me.”
“Jenna.” His voice broke on my name.
I didn't stop. It was almost over and I needed it all out. “I spent a couple of months in the hospital before I was put into the system. The one thing my mom had done, at least most of the time, was insist on condoms. No one wanted to risk getting caught because of an STD outbreak. I didn't end up with anything permanent there, but what they'd done to me...” I could feel my throat closing up and had to make myself finish. “Six surgeries total to fix the damage. Most of it at least. They couldn't fix a
ll of the internal stuff. I can't have kids.” I put my hand on my lower stomach. “Most of those scars aren't noticeable unless you're looking for them.”
I fell silent. That was it. Everything he needed to know. The things I'd done and had done to me. The reasons for my panic attacks. Why Christophe had come after me. The damage that couldn't be undone.
“Oh, love.” Rylan pulled his hand from mine and gently took my face between his hands, careful not to touch my cut. “Why didn't you tell me before? Not the details, but enough... I never would've done any of those things to you... never asked you to do anything...” His eyes were shining with tears. “I'm so sorry.”
I wrapped my hands around his and put them in my lap. “ I am so grateful that I met you, Rylan Archer. You have no idea what you've done for me, how safe you make me feel. You've made me face my fears instead of ignoring them.”
I climbed off of the bed, pulling him with me. He stood, confusion on his face. I walked out of the room and he followed. I could feel the tension radiating off of him as I stopped in front of the playroom door. I opened it and stepped inside, flipping on the light before I turned to look at him.
“Jenna?”
I stretched on my tiptoes and pressed my lips against his. I felt his surprise for a moment and then he was leaning into the kiss. He didn't touch me and I could feel his hesitation as he let me take the lead. I took his bottom lip between my teeth and he moaned. I bit down, then sucked his lip into my mouth, soothing it with my tongue before letting go.
“You made it safe for me to face my fears,” I said. “I trust you, Rylan.”
I reached out and took his hands. He let me turn them over, holding them in front of him, palms up.
“There are two things I don't do. I never do.” Butterflies fluttered in my stomach at the thought of what I was about to do. “One, I told you. I don't do bondage. But I also don't close my eyes during sex. No matter how amazing something feels, I can't ever bring myself to trust my partner enough to close my eyes. I can't give myself over that completely. There's always a part of me that's holding back.”