Roar (15 page)

FOR THE FIRST TIME
in years I didn’t wake to her sneaking into my room like a scared kitten. I didn’t go to sleep worrying about her, and I didn’t go to sleep praying he wouldn’t touch her. I can’t remember a time before where I had that. Now it seems like my life has committed that to normal. Not anymore. All night she’s been wrapped tightly around me just the way I like it. Her long hair is caught around my forearm and her breath is tickling my nipple. My white tee shines brightly against her silky skin in the morning sun; this is exactly how I like it to be. This would have to be the most perfect morning of my entire life. My scared kitten has taken a huge risk, and I’m so proud of her. I know now that we will grow. She will prosper and be the wild tiger I know and want her to be.

To some she looks tiny, cute, and maybe helpless―to me, she may be cute and tiny, but she isn’t helpless; she has a wild, strong heart and a bright soul. That’s why I love her; that’s why I know one day I won’t be able to call her a kitten, and I wonder if that will be soon.

“You snore,” she murmurs. “I think you
should
take the bed on the floor, or better yet, the couch.”

I can see her fighting the smirk, and I can’t hold back the laughter before I roll on top of her and place my hand over her mouth to muffle her squeals. I want to touch her, tickle her, but I’ve run out of limbs; one is holding me up and the other stopping her squeals from bringing Nona to my room for the first time in years. So I muffle her mouth with mine and my hand takes her soft thigh.

No longer is she squealing, no longer is she fighting me, instead she kisses me back and arching to meet my body. No, I don’t think she will be my kitten much longer.

Nona never comes to my room, but Davey, on the other hand, had no reservations to my boundaries, and this morning is a prime example as to why I need to convince Nona I need a lock in here. Davey burst through the door in his favorite blue striped pajamas, clapping happily. He looks at us, bites his lips and laughs, clapping harder as we have been caught in a compromising position. A minute later and I would have been deep inside her and in deep trouble.

“Shut up, Davey, and shut the damn door,” I rasp at him trying not to call any attention to Nona down the hall while trying to keep Charlie covered as I get up from the bed. Although, if he sees I don’t have anything on, he will drop the bomb. He may have Down syndrome, but he isn’t stupid; he isn’t unaware of what sex is, and he isn’t wearing his hearing aid.
Fucking hell.

I have no choice; I slip from the covers where Charlie hides in embarrassment. I run across my room to my door, closing it quickly and quietly before grabbing the first thing I see, which is my calculus book, to cover the meat and veg. All the excitement has Davey laughing into his hands; his eyes are wide. Man, I’m fucked.

“Davey, it’s important for both Charlie and I that you keep this a secret, okay?”

He nods slowly, and most would think that means he is in deep thought, but I know better. His motor skills are slower than most with certain things. It’s a fifty-fifty chance he will keep our secret, but even if he means to now, it doesn’t mean he can carry it through. I sigh.

What will be, will be, I guess. I reach for my pants and pull them on. “Charlie, I’ll get your clothes from the airer, then I’ll be back.” I wink at Charlie, who is watching intently and smiling tightly, I take Davey’s arm. “Come on, bro, time to go back to bed or watch some cartoons on the box.”

I know she will get up and make my bed in my tee. I will never get rid of that shirt. It makes me smile thinking of her in it. Yeah, despite being disturbed before the deed, it’s still the best morning ever.

So far over breakfast Davey has kept quiet about what he saw this morning, but I think it’s because we have kept him busy in the hopes he will forget. When he asks us for a movie day, we are quick to agree. Davey and I head to the caddy while Nona and Charlie wash the dishes, tend to a load of washing, and get the popcorn ready. It feels natural and wonderful. Everyone I love is safe and under one roof. I couldn’t ask for anything else. I couldn’t care less where my mom is and why she took the coward’s way by dumping her sons on her mother’s doorstep, which has been a silent battle of mine, but not anymore. I have it all now, and I will never let anyone ruin it or take it away. None of us will ever feel used, rejected, unloved, or abandoned again. Not if I have anything to do with it.

It’s cliché, but I swear there is a bounce in my step as Davey drags me around the DVD store where he will hire the same rental he always does. We bought it years ago, but he still rents it, and it’s pointless to argue. I’ve seen him tantrum over it, and I swore it was never worth the fight. He grabs
The
Rugrats Movie
,
and I smile every time at his glee, even though I know he doesn’t understand half of the movie. I think it’s the dog he likes best.

I grab a couple of new releases, and we are set and on our way back home, Davey singing along to an ancient song I have never heard of coming from Nona’s old radio. I wouldn’t put it past either of them that it’s actually a cassette.

I pull into the drive and I grin, imagining Charlie hearing us pull in and getting all excited, grabbing the big bowl of popcorn and sodas. When I shut the engine down, every hair on my body pricks and my heart stampedes against my chest. Is that a scream?

Davey is out of the car and talking, but I strain to hear what I hope I only imagined. Then there’s another, this one louder than the one before. Then multiple screams, and I break out into a run to the one place I pray not to find the ones I love in. It’s not the garage, but her house―his house.

I run up the front porch and through the open door to the mixed screams of Charlie and Nona and the distinct growling and shouting of the man I hate most in this world. He was supposed to be at work; he was supposed to be out of our lives. But what I find is Nona murmuring on the floor in the hall where he must have thrown her. Just ahead is the large man in his uniform on top of Charlie as she screams and tries to wrestle free and breathe. I lunge at him, knocking him from her, but I don’t have a grasp on him as I skate across the shattered glass on the tiles. He is up on his feet in no time and upon me, slamming his fist into my face at least twice before I see the stars that I fight against, to no avail. I can’t go; I can’t leave them with him. It didn’t matter shit how much I was needed; need and fear have nothing on his fist.

It could have been seconds, maybe minutes, I don’t know, but when I hear the whimpering, I force the rest of my body to respond. Charlie and her dad are gone. I crawl to my feet and see that Nona, too, has disappeared, but I still hear whimpering. Where is she?

Slowly my mind is reacting, firing with fear as I hear more whimpering from Charlie’s room. Bile rises to my throat at my fear. I’m so fucking scared; I don’t think I have been this scared before. My body is not my own, staggering to her door when I want to run to it. It’s open, and I don’t waste time, I don’t make plans, I just silently walk in. I see Charlie, bruised, crying, and practically naked on her bed. He’s standing before her with his back to me, taunting her as he drops his pants to his ankles. I don’t look at what’s in my hand; I don’t care as it bites into my flesh. I took it from the bathroom floor knowing what I must do with it. I know it will never end unless I stick it in him. I do.

I’m actually quite shocked at how easily the shard of glass slides into his kidney area, how fast the blood flows over my hand. Although I could watch him die right now, I pull that piece of glass from his body and let him turn toward me so he can see who it is that sent him straight to hell.

He turns so slowly, his eyes wide, I actually can’t believe he isn’t wailing in pain, and I hate myself because I want him to. I want him to feel the pain, which would be just a fraction of the pain he has caused Charlie over the years. Every time he called her name across the yard from his garage; he broke a piece of her soul. I want him to feel the kind of pain I felt watching that, unable to do anything. I want all this as I slide the shard into his stomach where I let it stay, hoping that I hit something important.

He takes the shard in his hand, he looks at me and he actually smiles—the fucker smiles! I want to check on Charlie, but I can’t look away from this crazy motherfucker until he is dead. Instead, I watch the crimson juices dribble from his body to the floor. I watch as he wraps his fingers over the shard and pull it from his body, causing more of his blood expel. Before I know it, he has it pointed at me.

Then, like a flicked switch for his own survival, he shoves me to the side. Charlie screams and then he’s pulling his pants up as he stumbles out of the room and down the hall. I can hear him grunting and hitting the wall with his bleeding body on his way. I hope it fucking hurts. I run to her, wrapping my arms around her small, quivering body as she bawls against my chest. I pull her sheet up around her, trying to soothe her shuddering. I actually thank God, right there and then, he didn’t get to her from me, when I hear it―gunfire.

“Stay here!” I demand, and she nods her blotchy face. Her eyes are screaming for me to stay, but I can’t, and she knows it. I hope she does what she’s told. I run from her room and toward the front porch where I can almost smell the scent of gunpowder in the air. I leap off the porch, over the steps to the grass, and that’s when I see the end. I see him face down and lifeless, a hole seeping blood from his back. Nona is standing to my right with a rifle in her grasp, staring at the sack of meat that used to be her neighbor, the town sheriff, Charlie’s father, and our tormentor. It is all over. Finally… over.

“YOU THINK ANYONE BELIEVES
you or that murderer back there, Charlotte Barns?” Sheriff Noel snickers before sipping his steaming coffee from his ridiculous cartoon mug.

“My lawyer believes me, and I hope he will make the judge believe us also,” I retort like a stupid teenager. I shouldn’t show all our cards. The less Sheriff Noel knows, the less preparation he has to put a stop on any success we may attain.

“You can’t be serious?! No judge here will allow your boyfriend bail. You had a chance at a new life with that doctor, but you couldn’t help the disgusting lust for Shaw. You have no one to blame but yourself.”

“Maybe so, but it is my life!”

Sheriff Noel bangs his cup on the cheap table that stands between us, its contents sloshing over the edge. “Your daddy would roll over in his grave if he could see what you’re doing with your life.”

I thought I hated Noel before, but he just stepped into a new low. He knows my story, he just chooses not to believe it. To then bring it up, like I could give a fuck what my father thinks of my life, is like poking an angry bear. Where the fuck is my lawyer? “Sheriff Noel, I suggest you stop talking to me because I have nothing further to say to you,” I growl, which brings a smirk to his even more ridiculous baby face. I just want to punch it.

“You can go whenever you like, Charlotte. But I will remind you that lying to the police and leaving a false statement is an offence. I would suggest you reconsider your statement.”

“I would suggest you file it and go fuck yourself.”
Shit.

“I could arrest you for that.”

I don’t say anything because I have learned a great skill in my life from people like Daddy and Paul. I have learned to read people, and Sheriff Noel is screaming something big my way. The pregnant silence swathes between us like a rolling fog, before he takes his cup again, and I try to hide my smirk, because I just won this battle.

“Charlotte, why does you statement and Shaw’s statement differ from the one of your neighbor across the road, Mrs. Caine?”

What–the–hell
?! “How would I know what she witnessed and stated to you? I can only report my version; anything else is hearsay, no?”

His jaw is bunching as he sips his coffee, using the cup as a defence to hide his tells, but he’s only fooling himself. “Do you know Mrs. Caine well?”

“No. I don’t know her at all. I didn’t even know that was her name. I’ve seen her a few times in the yard and waved politely, as you do.”

“So why would she have fabricated a story for you and Shaw if you have no relationship with her?”

I wish I knew. “I don’t know. Like I said, every one’s version of a story will differ in their eyes. What she saw from across the street is what she believes. What we experience is ours. There would only be a problem if her story
really
differed from ours.” I threw out the line, but will he be dumb enough to hook it?

“He should be ready to meet you outside in ten minutes.”

“
What
?” Is he for real? Nate isn’t being charged? What did the Caine woman say? I want to ask all those things, but as Sheriff Noel rises and opens the door, waiting for me to follow, I dare not argue. He was releasing Nate, and I won’t have to explain to Nona that once again I have destroyed her family by sending her grandson away again.