When I was finally finished, he asked me a question. His tone changing from one of comfort and gentleness to one much firmer and serious. “Brynne, have you ever told your mother about what happened with Karl Westman?”
“No, you said never to speak about him to anyone.”
“And you’ve told her nothing?”
“No, Ethan, not one word. I never even mentioned him to Dr. Roswell.”
“Good. That’s good.” He continued to rub my head and trail fingers through my hair for a minute before he said, “Baby, I know this is hard to bring up, and to think about, but nobody can ever know about what happened with Westman the night he took you. Never. You have to take that experience and just put it away into a part of your mind as if it never happened.”
“I-I know. Because they killed him, didn’t they? Senator Oakley’s people had Karl killed because he was trying to blackmail them and holding the video as collateral over them, right?”
He kept rubbing my head with his strong fingers massaging my scalp through my hair. It felt divine, and was in such contrast to the unpleasant topic we were discussing. “I think that’s very close to what happened, although there’ll never be any proof or evidence to show it. His body will never be found. Westman has been wiped off the face of the earth.”
I nodded. I couldn’t really express my feelings, but I got it. Ethan’s choice of words hit me right in the heart. Wiped off the face of the earth. Because that’s what had happened to my dad. Gone. No longer here for me. No more hearing the love for me in his voice when we talked.
And the reason he was gone, all went back to something I had allowed to happen years ago. Consequences of my actions. Lance was in there too, yes, but it was my decision that made his evil deeds possible. I went to the party. I got drunk and didn’t respect my body. I was used and abused, and let the experience take me over to the point I was willing to just go out of this life. Pathetic. But in the end, it was my father’s life that was sacrificed.
“What are you thinking?” he asked me in a soft voice, for the second time today.
“About how I miss my dad,” I blurted, my emotions so raw I felt another crying jag coming on strong.
“Baby…” Ethan put his hand on my belly and started rubbing. The gesture was very sweet but it just made me long for my dad even more.
The words started tumbling out of me and I couldn’t stop them. “Today we went to the doctors and saw pictures of our baby. If Daddy was still here I would have shared with him, and he would have wanted to listen…and be excited about being a grandpa. I would have shown him the pictures—he would have wanted to know how I was feeling—I just miss him so much…” I paused for a breath. “I can’t talk to him now, and I can’t talk to my mother, either. I have nobody... I feel like an orphan—” I finally broke, silently this time, but no less emotionally painful, in sharing my grief about something that would hurt for a very long time.
Ethan felt my silent sobbing shudders, but his response was simply to hold me a little tighter, showing me that even with my great loss, I still had him. The rubbing on my belly must have gotten a little stronger too, because that’s when it happened.
A fluttery little tickle from inside my womb. A brush alongside the front of my belly that reminded me of the beat of butterfly wings. I froze, and covered over Ethan’s hand with my own, pressing on the spot where I’d felt it.
“What?” he asked worriedly. “Are you hurting—”
“I felt our baby. Moving around inside me. Like butterfly wings flapping.” Like a message from an angel.
He kept his hand on me, probably hoping he could feel what I was feeling but I doubted it was possible quite yet. As we lay in bed together worrying about bad things that couldn’t be changed, I realized something very important. I would never make it through this without Ethan. His strength pulled me through the hard parts.
Ethan never let me give up.
The words that came out of his mouth next, showed me just how much I had been blessed when he’d found me, regardless of my losses.
“I love you,” he lulled at my ear, “and this little person loves you…so much.” He splayed his fingers wide, swirling them over my stomach in a show of affectionate possession when he told me the last part. “He’s there watching. Your father. He loves you from another place now, but his love is still there, Brynne, and it always will be.”
OAKLEY didn’t waste even a day in reaching out. I’d thought a few days before the request came through. But, no, I suppose not. The Senator didn’t have much in the way of time to work with. The US election was less than a month away, and time stopped for no man. I’d played out the scenario in my mind as soon as I saw the news report in the restaurant at lunch. That cocksucker was going to use his son’s war injury to propel his running mate into the presidential seat. And it was going to work.
The call came through on my mobile while I was smoking my one cig for the night.
“Blackstone.”
“Yeah. What do you want?”
“I want insurance that puts the past to rest once and for all.”
“Of course you want insurance. We all want it. How do you propose for that to happen, Senator?” I dreaded whatever he might suggest. Probably because I had an inkling for what it might be. The earlier call from Brynne’s mum was a good fucking clue.
“A simple showing of support to an old family friend should do it. Hospital visit. Media will be taken care of.”
Bingo. I cringed at the idea. “My wife will never agree,” I told him, picturing how I’d left her in bed after crying herself to sleep. Drained and exhausted, and very emotional from the argument with her mother. That insensitive bitch had stretched my patience to its last reserve today. What sort of fucking cow thinks so little of her daughter’s emotional and physical welfare? And now this arsehole. I stubbed out my ciggie and lit another.
“Make her agree, Blackstone.”
“I know you care for nothing but the success of your campaign, Senator, not even what’s happened to your son, but I don’t give a maiden queen’s first fuck about your politics, or your rapist son.”
I’d give Oakley points for laying it all out on the line. He wasted nothing on words. Just went straight to the issue in that tonal American accent of his that seemed almost devoid of humanity. “Don’t you think it’s better to be a couple of indiscreet teenagers who had a lapse in judgment years ago, and who’ve put it firmly behind them, than to worry about extortion should their shameful secret be brought to light? If they are still friends, then no crime ever occurred. Simple insurance, Blackstone. I think you should care very much.”
As much as I hated to admit it, Oakley’s “insurance” scheme was really very clever. But the cleverness of it wouldn’t help Brynne. It would hurt her. “I care about the welfare of my pregnant wife, who was made ill tonight by this whole shitstorm blowing up in media. And that, Senator, is not going to help you one iota. I can’t make her go and see him. She won’t do it.”
He responded with, “Within the week, please,” and cut the line. Fucking bastard. I stared at my mobile, sure the number he’d called from was already deactivated. The tingle of fear scratched its way down my spine. I lit another Djarum and filled my lungs. I didn’t know how to fix this problem, and it had grown exponentially in a matter of hours. The US presidential election was propelling this one. How in the goddamn shitting hell did one fight that monstrous beast?
So I got up and left my office. I went to sit outside on the balcony, where I started smoking in earnest. One Djarum after the other, until I was high from the pumping nicotine and spice that fueled the addiction I couldn’t deny.
The smoke drifted away on the cool nighttime breeze in lazy, wafting swirls. I had a flash of longing that my problems could magically do the same. Wishful thinking. Real life never worked that way. My hand was being forced in this. Sometimes my experience with poker was a curse…because I knew the odds here. I could see when folding was the only o
ption.
It wouldn’t help Brynne to bring her into Oakley’s circle, but I feared it was already too late for that. My poor girl was going to be hurt.
CHAPTER 8
“I found Ethan outside on the balcony smoking a few nights ago. I’d been upset earlier about…the Lance Oakley situation…and woke in the middle of the night to find the bed empty. I got up to use the bathroom, and then went looking for him. He’s been trying to quit smoking, and was doing well from what I knew, but a few nights ago…I could see that he’d fallen off the wagon.”
“Nicotine addiction is no less difficult to break than drugs or alcohol,” Dr. Roswell said in her non-judgmental way.
“I think it’s more than nicotine addiction in his case, though.”
“How so, Brynne?”
“Umm, he once told me about his time as a prisoner of war in Afghanistan.” I hedged with what to tell her because it felt like a betrayal to share Ethan’s story without his permission. I decided my need for information superseded his privacy. “He was held and tortured for twenty-two days. During his time in captivity, he suffered cravings for cigarettes to the point he nearly went mad. He told me that the cigarettes were a reminder that he survived. That he was alive after all that he endured—able to smoke another day. He has terrible nightmares and suffers through them, and when I try to help him he shuts down. He won’t tell me very much and I think he feels ashamed. It’s horrible…I worry so much about him.”
“I imagine it is very hard for Ethan. So many soldiers suffer with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.” I noted that she wrote it down in her book.
“So, what can I do for him?”
“What you have to understand about victims of trauma, and from what you’ve just told me, Ethan has suffered—and survived—trauma in the extreme, is that they will do almost anything to avoid having to be reminded of what traumatized them in the first place. It’s too painful.”
“So, when I press him to tell me, it’s just making it harder for him? Asking him to speak of what happened, hurts him even more?”
“Well, think of it in your terms, Brynne. You have suffered a trauma. It’s affected your life in every way. You just told me about how the coverage of Lance’s injury in the media this week has upset you terribly.” Dr. Roswell never was one to sugarcoat anything. “How hard do you work to avoid being reminded of what happened to you?”
Really fucking hard, Doctor.
LEN held the door for me as I left Dr. Roswell’s office. “Shall I take you home, Mrs. Blackstone?”
I sighed at my gentle giant of a driver. “Len, please. We’ve been through this over and over again. I want you to call me Brynne.”
“Yes, Mrs. Blackstone. Home then?”
I shot him a slow nod, and muttered, “I give up.” The man was as stoic as they come, and yet I always felt he was teasing me when we played this little game of ours. I settled into the seat and pondered what Dr. Roswell and I had discussed about PTSD. I had a lot to think about. For Ethan and for myself, but mostly, I just wanted to be a good wife and supportive of him. Letting him know I was there, and loved him no matter what he’d shouted out during a bad dream, or needed from me in order to feel better. If it took some pounding sex to help him relax after a bad dream, then I could do that. The sex was always superb, and right now my body was on hyper-drive with the hormones, so…
My phone chirped and I fished it out of my purse. From Benny. You okay, luv? It made me smile when I read it. Ben hadn’t stopped looking out for me just because I was married to Ethan now. We kept in touch religiously. He was a friend I loved with all my heart, and knew I could just be myself when we were together. Ben and I were different in a way that I couldn’t be with Gaby. Ben and Gaby were also very close, but she wasn’t without her own demons, either. We both teased Ben that he attracted women friends with mountains of emotional problems. He said it gave him “pussy points” knowing what made us females tick. That he may not be into pussy himself, but it did make the world go round, so it was worth understanding. Sadly, his jest was very true. Ben would have seen Lance’s story splashed all over the news. Hell, a person would have to live under a rock not to have heard it. So he was just letting me know that he was in my corner.
I shot back: I will be :) I miss u tho. Take me shopping 4 pregger clothes sometime soon?
I grinned wide at his quickreply. Yes, sexy mum. xo He had the very best taste, in regards to all things fashion and design. Ben would do me right in the clothing department, I had no doubt.
London traffic dictated that the time spent getting me home would be taking much longer than it ought to, so I checked emails and responded to texts until my inbox was cleaned out. Len was not a chatterer, so I didn’t have to keep up conversation as he drove the Rover expertly through clogged streets and autumn drizzle.
It hadn’t escaped my notice that my mother never tried to call me back either. Not a surprise really. I’d said some pretty harsh things and hung up on her. It would be a while before we talked again. Our relationship was just so messed up. I hated believing that, but the truth was often ugly, and for my mother and me, the truth was a succubus with raging PMS.
My phone alerted me to an incoming text. I dug it out of my purse once again and read it.
It was a media message that included a screenshot of my Facebook profile. I looked closer, feeling my heart sink like a stone when I deciphered exactly what had been sent to me. A post I’d made on my profile, when I’d used the GPS on Facebook to lead Ethan to where Karl had me. I’d also tagged Karl Westman in Who are you with? soEthan would know who had taken me. Below the screenshot was a single sentence: Karl Westman has been missing since August 3rd and his last known contact was you.
HYSTERICAL, was the only way to describe her when she arrived at my office. Len ushered Brynne up to the forty-fourth floor and I met her out in reception. From there I took her straight into the en suite adjacent from where I worked.
She looked around the studio flat in confusion, probably wondering why she’d never been in it, or heard me speak of it. Telling her this was the place where I would fuck all the women before she came along, didn’t seem appropriate at any time, but right now? Out of the motherfucking question.
So I held her in my arms instead. “Tell me you’re all right, baby.”
“Ethan, why are they doing this to me? Are they ever going to stop? Her questions broke my heart. As if a meat cleaver was put to my chest and given a hearty whack, shattering bone and obliterating flesh.
“Brynne, I need you to calm down and listen to me.” I took her face in my hands and lifted it up, forcing her to focus on me. “Senator Oakley rang me that night after the news hit the wires. He wants you to visit his…son in the hospital, and show the world what good friends you are.” It made me ill to have to even say the words to her, but I’d realized a few nights ago, there was no other way out of this mess.
“He called you? You spoke to him and didn’t tell me?” she shouted accusingly.
I shook my head. “I’m sorry, but I made a judgment call—”
“—But why? I don’t ever want to see Lance Oakley again as long as I live. Don’t you dare ask me to go to him,” she spat. “You’re no better than my mother!”
With her eyes flaring wildly at me, I could tell she was ready to bolt, so I shut that idea right the fuck down. “Nope, not true,” I said, gripping both of her arms, forcing her to focus on me. “I told him no. I said I wouldn’t ask you to do something that would upset you, but they sent that Facebook screenshot today.” I lowered my voice and told her the brutal truth. “This shit won’t go away until you go on the record as a close family friend.”
“No…” she said pitifully.
“Brynne, baby…there are others who know about the video—you told me so yourself. This visit to see Oakley in the hospital will make it worthless. I can’t risk you any more than you already have been. Please just listen to why.”
The look she gave me? The tragi
c expression on her beautiful face, streaked with tears and devastation…really fucking hurt me.
After a moment she closed her eyes and nodded almost imperceptibly.
I kissed her long and slow. Just to bring us close, and show her first and foremost how much I loved her. Then I sat her down and told her about my conversation with the Senator. About how important it was to keep any others who knew of the video’s existence, from trying to do what Karl Westman had attempted. Blackmailing degenerate motherfucker. And, also to neutralize any negative effect of the video by declaring friendship with Lance Oakley. Rapist dog with two dicks. How, if they were seen to still be friends, then a crime never could have occurred—just a youthful indiscretion between two kids, in the event the video ever surfaces to embarrass the future Vice President of the United States. Cocksucking immoral maggot.
Brynne took it all in, listening to me speak without interrupting or dragging everything down with more questioning. Her clear brown eyes held mine, quietly processing the situation. God, I admired her strength. Never a doubt about my girl’s bravery, or her intelligence.
But I was also hurting her right now. I knew about facing the things that scared you. For Brynne, being forced to visit Oakley’s bedside scared her.
It’s fucking killing me too.
She seemed to think about everything I’d told her, and got up and walked into the bathroom, stopping before the mirror. She stood there and stared into it, with seemingly little emotion, looking, in some ways, nothing like the passionate girl I’d met back in May.
Finally she turned to look at me. Lips trembling, eyes filling with tears that would taste salty if I licked them, she opened her mouth to speak. Her throat swallowing reflexively, her voice cracked, “I—I have to go and see Lance…don’t I?”