Ben is his name. The man at the pizza place told me his first and last name, so I spent hours googling him. He has been arrested for assault before, but was released with not enough DNA evidence. I’m sure there are others. And I want him to know that I won’t rest until I take him down. I probably should have gone straight to my father with his, who is a criminal attorney, but he would have stopped me.
Susan looks at me like she’s worried when I begin to pace. I have been quiet since the boys left. I don’t want to tell her what’s going on. I want her to be innocent of this. I need for her to not be involved. I should have sent her with the boys, but it’s too late now.
A knock sounds on the door and I jerk. I can’t help it. “Susan,” I say quietly. “I need for you to go into the bedroom and call 9-1-1. Keep the door closed. Don’t come out, no matter what. You may hear some things that frighten you, but don’t come out. Do you understand?”
“Why?” she whispers.
“Susan,” I say. “The man who raped me is on the other side of that door.”
She nods and goes into the bedroom, closing the door behind her. I hear the thumb lock click behind her. Good girl.
I go to the door and open it. The man’s nametag says Ben. I know his last name, but all I can think is that he’s now Ben Skrewd. In an even worse way than I was.
I smell him immediately, and I nearly gag. It’s the same cologne he wore the night he attacked me. The night he ripped my clothes off in the main bathroom of a frat house. The night he tried to ruin my life. We started out kissing, but when I asked him to stop, he didn’t. And that was the end of my life as I knew it.
I motion Ben into the apartment. I lock the deadbolt behind him and slide the chain into the lock. He looks at it like he’s confused and sets my pizzas on the counter. “That’ll be $28.50,” he says.
I smile at him. “You don’t remember me, do you?” I say quietly.
“I was just here last week,” he reminds me.
“No,” I say. “From before that.”
His head tilts to the side. He’s bigger than I remember him being. But that’s okay. I’m stronger than he remembers me being, too. Besides, I don’t plan to hurt him. I just need to keep him here until the police arrive. “I’m sorry, but no,” he says.
But now his eyes are jumping from place to place. He knows something is up, but he doesn’t know what.
“Almost three years ago,” I say. I go to the fridge and get another bottle of water. I offer him one and he takes it from me. His hand shakes as he pulls it from my grasp. “We were at a frat house. We were kissing. I thought you were really cute.”
“I’m sorry, but I still don’t remember. You know how frat parties are.” He shrugs.
“Yeah, I know,” I say, forcing a chuckle. “We were in the bathroom, and you turned me toward the mirror. I think you thought that was sexy.” I laugh again. “But then you grabbed my hair.” I run my hand up the back of my head and grab a hunk of it, jerking hard. I bring tears to my own eyes, but I don’t stop. “Then you slammed my head into the counter.”
He starts for the door, but I step between him and it.
“You’re not going anywhere,” I say.
“Like hell, I’m not,” he grunts out. He grabs for my shirt, but I spin out of his reach, staying between him and the door. “Get out of my way,” he says. Spittle flies from his lips.
“Do you know what happened next?” I ask. “Do you remember?”
“No,” he bites out.
“You changed my life.”
“You fucking wanted it,” he says. His words ring like peals of laughter around the room.
My heart thuds.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
But I’m alive, so I welcome it.
“I wanted you to violate my body?” I ask quietly. His face scrunches up. “When I was begging stop, stop, stop, that made you think I wanted it?”
Suddenly, he jumps forward and grabs my shirt. He twists his fist in it and jerks me against him. He’s hard against my hip. He’s turned on? Of course, he is. He reaches for my hair and grabs it. Why is it that men like him go for the hair? Because they can, I guess. I freeze and let him snarl into my face.
“You fucking wanted it because you’re a little whore just like the rest of them,” he snarls, his face so close that his spit hits my cheek like raindrops. He lifts his hand to backhand me. I almost find myself flinching, but then I do what comes naturally. I block his blow. He startles and yelps when I spin him around and pin him with his arm behind his back.
“How does it feel?” I ask quietly beside his ear. “To be overpowered.”
I set him free with a shove. He rubs his shoulder, his face a snarly mass of hatred. He reaches for me again, and I block him and then hit him in the nose with the heel of my hand. Blood spurts from his nostrils and rolls down over his shirt. He raises his hands like he’s going to try to grab me again, but I knee him in the nuts. He goes down holding his gonads. I crouch beside him and look into his face.
“How’s it feel?” I ask again.
He starts to get up, but I’m not going to allow that. I kick him in the side of his face with my tennis shoe and he falls heavily against the floor on his stomach.
I put my knee in the center of his back and reach for the lamp on the end table. I drag it onto the floor and it breaks into shards, but all I want is the cord. He grunts as I dig my knee into his back and bring his hands up behind him. I wrap the cord tightly around his wrists and ankles and bind him up into a crooked bow, his legs taut. He lost his shoe in the scuffle, so I pull his sock off and shove it into his mouth. Then I call out. “Susan!” I say.
She opens the bedroom door, and her eyes grow wide. They’re rimmed in red and I feel really bad for what I just made her listen to.
“Would you unlock the door?” I ask her. I jerk my thumb toward it. “The front door.”
Just as she opens it, the police rush into the room. They take me in, and stop. Pete rushes in right behind them. “What the fuck?” he asks.
But I’m calm. I smile up at him. “This is him, Pete,” I say.
“Who?” he asks. He looks at me like I’ve lost my mind.
“The man who raped me,” I admit. And finally a sob rolls off my chest. “It’s him.” I point toward the lump on the floor.
Rage immediately takes over Pete’s face. He advances toward Ben, and I feel like I have to get between them, even though the police are now in charge. Pete shoves me to the side, and I can’t stop him by pulling on his arm so I throw myself onto his front and wrap my legs around his waist, clinging to him like a koala. He seethes with rage. But I can’t let him ruin his life. I can’t let him hurt that bastard, no matter how much I’d like to see it happen.
“What the fuck, Reagan?” he breathes, taking my face into his hands so he can look into my eyes.
I lay my head on his shoulder and hold him tightly, finally allowing the emotion to hit me. I sob into his Pete’s neck until he drops into a chair and just holds me straddling his lap. The police ask questions and he answers them. Edward and Susan stand arm in arm, and Susan tells them everything she heard.
I hear the words “DNA” and “evidence collection” and “this might be enough.”
I lift my head and look into Pete’s face as they usher Ben out into the hallway in handcuffs. “I did it,” I say. I sniffle, but a chuckle falls over my lips.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asks.
“I didn’t want you to kill him,” I admit.
“You kicked his ass, princess,” he says, and he suddenly grins.
“Yeah, I kind of did, didn’t I?” I say, and I start to laugh. I can’t help it. I’m sure there are others, and I just made sure that the rapist will pay, at least for my crime and possibly for others as well.
Pete gives Edward a wad of cash and tells him to take Susan and Gonzo to the arcade. They leave, still excited about what happened.
I lay o
n Pete’s lap until I think his legs will probably fall asleep. But he doesn’t move me. He just talks quietly into my ear about how amazing we are. How wonderful we are together. How proud he is of me. How scared he was when he saw the police coming through the door.
“He touched me, Pete,” I say.
He stands up, his hands clutching my bottom, and he carries me into our bathroom. He sets me down carefully, unwinding my legs from around his waist. He undresses me slowly and turns the water on.
He comes into the shower with me and soaps me gently and slowly, washing my hair with tender fingers. “He grabbed my hair,” I say.
Pete rinses me and washes my hair again. “I’ll wash it all away,” he says.
He uses a puffy sponge to clean my body, dragging it slowly over my breasts and hips. Then he lifts one leg to the side of the tub and spreads me open, his hands slick and soapy. “I’m not dirty there,” I say.
“You were never dirty there,” he says. He looks up at me. “But I plan to lick it, so I want to clean it. Sue me.”
He spreads me open with his fingertips and I lean back against the shower wall, letting him take me with him into a world of pleasure. He’s my Pete, and he’s always known what I need. He parts my lower lips with his fingers, slides a digit inside me. Pete used to be afraid to love me, but now he plays my body like he owns it, because he does. If I don’t want what he wants, he’ll stop, and I know that. It took him a while to learn that, but he got it. He’s what I need in every way.
His lips find my clit and he latches onto it, suckling gently in time with sudden, fierce strokes inside me. My knees will barely hold me up, but I don’t want him to stop. I don’t want to go to the bed, because this is good. It’s so good. He sucks my clit and adds another finger inside me. His eyes are closed because the water from the shower is pounding over his head. I turn the nozzle to the left, and his eyes open. I can feel his smile against me, but he doesn’t let up.
Suddenly, an orgasm crashes over me and I can’t hold back my scream. I thread my fingers into his wet hair and hold him in place. “Don’t stop,” I say as I ride out the pleasure. My body quivers and shakes and I let him take me all the way, until his ministrations grow painful. I jerk his hair and he lets up, licking slowly until I stop coming on his face. My God. He can undo me.
He stands up and hitches my legs around his waist again, pushing me against the shower wall. He’s usually not this forceful. “I love you so fucking much,” he says, as he pushes into me.
I slide down his hard, long pole, slick and wet, and he doesn’t stop the impalement until I’ve taken all of him. I’m full and so damn happy to have him inside me that I don’t care what position we’re in. “I can’t last long,” he says.
“Don’t,” I urge. I look into his face, cupping his cheeks in my hands as he pushes into me and pulls out, lifting and lowering me on him. He strokes so slowly into me, trying to hold off, to wait for me. “Faster,” I say.
He’s holding all of my weight, but he doesn’t seem to mind. Suddenly, he grunts and spends himself inside me. I squeeze him to me, my arms around his neck. He props me against the wall and leans both of us so that we’re still standing, but just barely. “If you ever fucking do anything like that to me again, I’m going to paddle your ass.” He chuckles. But he shivers at the same time. “Do you have any idea how scared I was?” He lets my legs drop and we both wash off again and then get out. He wraps a towel around me and one around himself. I follow him from the bathroom. “How could you scare me like that?” he asks.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “But if I’d told you, or even told my dad, one you would have tried to kill him. This way was better.”
“You’re right,” he says. “Not about this way being better, but I would have killed him. Or made him wish he was dead.”
He drops his towel and starts to get dressed.
“You should call my dad and tell him what happened,” I suggest.
He scoffs. “Do I look stupid?” He points at me. “You did this. You tell him.” He comes and kisses me quickly. “I’m really proud of you,” he says against my lips.
Then he goes out into the kitchen and picks up his cell phone. I assume he’s calling his brothers. They’ll need to know, too. Just like my dad. I call my dad, and he tries to ream me a new one about putting myself in danger, but I can hear my mom cheering in the background, and she’s teary when I talk to her.
“So proud of you, Reagan,” Dad says.
“Thanks, Dad,” I say. Then we hang up and I go sit on the couch with Pete.
His brows are drawn together. “Just got a weird text from Logan,” he says.
“Oh,” I breathe. “What did he say?”
“He said he and Em are getting married in a few days at the court house.” He looks up. “Why would they do that?”
I grin.
He shoves my shoulder. “What do you know?”
I wince. “I’m not supposed to say anything.”
“Well, I’m not supposed to lick your pussy, but I do it every time you want.” He laughs.
“Emily was worried that she’s preggers,” I admit.
“What?” he gasps. He reaches for his phone.
“Wait!” I cry. I grab his phone. “It’s a secret. Don’t tell him you know.”
“I’m supposed to keep a secret like that?” he asks, astonished.
I nod. “Yep. You can’t even tell Sam.” I think he tells Sam everything. “I told her I wouldn’t tell.”
“Logan’s going to be a dad,” he says quietly. Reverently.
“Yeah,” I say and I lean my head on his shoulder.
“So, when do I get to knock you up?” he suddenly blurts out.
I stare at him. “You want to knock me up?”
“Well, yeah,” he says, like I just asked the dumbest question in the world. Pete has a good job now working with the boys at the prison, and he goes to school part time for criminal justice. I haven’t graduated yet, but soon, I will.
I smile, but we have to stop talking because the kids come back. They knock on the door and then let themselves in. Susan comes and hugs me. “You okay?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says. “Better than ever. But can you show me how to do that stuff you did?”
I’ve been working with her for a while, but nothing like the defense moves I used today.
“Of course.” I’ll teach her anything she wants to know.
Logan
We planned to be married at the county courthouse, but Emily’s mother wouldn’t hear of it. She lost her shit when Em told her, and Paul had to get busy and find someone who could marry us in an actual ceremony. I’m happy, though, because we’re doing it at Paul’s apartment. We pushed the furniture to the side and set up a couple of rows of chairs.
We thought it would just be family, but then we made the mistake of inviting Henry. Henry is the doorman at our apartment building, and he’s a sap when it comes to romance. His wife recently died and he loves a good love story, so we couldn’t exclude him. Since he was invited, his granddaughter, Faith, and her new husband, Daniel, came too. We met Daniel a few months ago. He lost his leg in Afghanistan but, when he found Faith, he found something to live for. He’s been in treatment for his PTSD, and he’s no longer jumping at every noise. He gets quiet sometimes, but doesn’t everyone?
Friday came and brought her dorm roommate, Lacey, and Lacey brought her boyfriend, Sean. I had to eat a whole jar of pickles just to get those two together, so I’m kind of glad to see them here.
Hayley is wearing a pretty dress, and Paul keeps picking her up and putting her on his knee. Someone motions for everyone to take a seat, and Paul stands up behind where Em is going to stand. I don’t want to miss a word, so he’s going to translate from behind her. He’s my best man, though, and he always will be. Emily’s mom walks out of my old bedroom, and she wipes tears from her eyes. She goes and sits down, and Em’s dad walks out of the bedroom with her on his arm and makes a big production
of presenting her to me. Like he could get her back at this point. It’ll never happen.
She’s wearing a plain white dress that her mom picked out, and she has on her cowboy boots with it. She’s so damn cute that I want to jerk her to me and mess her all up. Last week, she put the blue streak back in her hair. I like it. I like it a lot.
Her parents don’t know yet about her being pregnant, and Paul is the only one of my brothers who knows. I suspect that Reagan told Pete, though, because he keeps grinning at me and rubbing his belly. He’s an idiot, but he’s one of my idiots, so I’ll have to keep him.
Emily wants to wait until the three-month mark to start telling people about the baby, just in case something goes wrong. I’m fine with that.
The preacher starts to talk, and I look into Emily’s eyes. I don’t catch anything the preacher said, until she laughs and points behind me to Paul, who is waving like a lunatic. Pay attention, dumbass, he signs to me. I chuckle and start watching him. I’d much rather look into Emily’s eyes than watch his fingers. But I also don’t want to miss anything.
We go through the ceremony and get to the vows. We decided to write our own, and I know writing is hard for Em, so I’m worried about how this is going to go for her. I shouldn’t be. She’s so fucking capable. I wish everyone knew it.
I take out my notes and start to read to her. “I fell in love with you the first time I saw you. It happened at the same time as you decked me and broke my nose.” There’s a rumble of laughter. “That’s what I get for being grabby, but if I had it to do all over again, I wouldn’t change a thing. I promise to love and cherish you. I promise to take care of you always, and I promise to treat you with care and respect in all things. But most of all, I promise never to choose anyone over you, or let anything come between us. I promise to care for our children the same way I care for you.”