Don't Look Back (5 page)

No she wasn’t.

She opened her eyes and the door greeting Maya with, “Hey, glad you could make it. Come on in.”

Maya, dark hair turning slightly grey, stood at five feet two inches – maybe. She stepped into the foyer and asked, “You didn’t sound right on the phone so I ordered a pizza to be delivered here. I’m starved.”

Pushing aside bad memories and worries about a possible stalker, Jamie hugged her friend and told herself to relax. Everything would be fine. The bad stuff in her life was over.

Right?

4

Jamie watched Maya pull away from the curb and turned to Samantha as she closed the front door. “She knows me so well. I can’t believe she could hear all the stress in my voice . . . crazy. And even though I’ll struggle to get up in the morning since it’s,” she glanced at the clock, “12:15, I’m glad she came over.”

Samantha grabbed the pizza box and headed for the kitchen. “It was nice.” Her expression stated the exact opposite.

Jamie followed her and watched as her sister tossed the box into the trash. Concerned, she asked, “What’s wrong?”

“I’m bothered.”

“By?”

“Everything that’s happened tonight.”

Jamie blew out a sigh and slumped into the nearest chair. “I was trying to forget it.”

“Well, I can’t!” Samantha’s outburst flew from her lips and Jamie flinched, staring at her sister.

She held out a beseeching hand. “Sam, I’m sorry, I – ”

“Where’s that picture, Jamie?” Desperation flashed before she could cover it up.

Keeping her cool, Jamie stood. “I don’t know. I hope Mom has it . . .”

“She doesn’t.”

Jamie paused. “What? How do you know?”

“She called my cell while I was in the restroom. I didn’t tell her what was going on, of course, just asked her if she’d taken the picture from your mantel.”

“And?”

“She was indignant that I’d even ask.”

Her stomach dropped at that pronouncement. Somehow she’d held out hope that her mother had taken the picture and forgotten to mention it.

Even though she was 99 percent sure she hadn’t.

And now that it was confirmed, Jamie felt confused – and scared. “I’m going to bed.” Turning on her heel, she left the kitchen, ignoring Samantha’s protest.

Ugly fear she’d thought she’d conquered battled to rise up in her, mocking her newfound safety, her determination to succeed and escape the constant reminders of her past.

Pain beat through her. Tears leaked from her eyes against her will.
Oh God, either save me or let me die!
She wailed silently, refusing to
cry out this time. The heavy plaster cast on her lower left leg weighted her
down. The handcuffs around her wrist kept her bound to the iron bed.
Wetness trickled down the inside of her arm and around to her elbow.
The smell of her own blood stung her nostrils. She heard the doorknob
jiggle and fought the urge to vomit. Tilting her head back, she stared at
the ceiling and caved.

She screamed and screamed and screamed.

“Jamie?” The soft voice pulled her from her wide-awake nightmare with a gasp. She gripped her head in both hands, then pulled her fingers through her curls.

“What, Sam?”

“I’m sorry,” came the heartfelt apology.

Jamie closed her eyes, then turned to hug her sister. “It’s all right.”

Tears filled Samantha’s eyes, then she blinked them away. “I’ll be right across the hall if you need me.”

“I know. Thanks.”

Sam gave her one more searching, apologetic look and walked into the bedroom that she considered hers.

Jamie sighed and dropped onto her bed, staring at the rose-patterned comforter. She knew Sam was apologizing for more than just losing her cool in the kitchen.

A rebellious teen, Jamie hadn’t wanted anything to do with authority or rules. At the age of eighteen, she’d been sure she’d known it all, could handle anything that came her way. Almost ten years her senior, Samantha hadn’t agreed.

The party had been wild. Jamie had been high on life and something she’d willingly smoked. Then Samantha had shown up.

“What are you doing here?” eighteen-year-old Jamie hissed.

“Saving your hide,” Samantha insisted as she pulled Jamie out of the arms of an intoxicated young man, threatening to arrest him if he ever came near her sister again. “The cops are on the way and I’m getting you out of here.”

Furious, Jamie flung an arm at Samantha, who ducked and shoved her sister in the car. At first Jamie just sat there, fuming, then she growled, “You are not my mother. Why don’t you just stay out of stuff that’s not your business.”

“You’re my sister. That makes you my business,” she retorted. “Look, we’re almost home. Sleep it off and we’ll talk in the morning.”

“I’m not talking to you,” Jamie screamed and grabbed the wheel.

Samantha slammed on the brakes and shoved Jamie with a hard hand to her shoulder. She yelled, “Are you trying to kill us?”

Jamie jumped from the car and slammed the door. Samantha cruised along beside her and rolled down the window. “Fine then. Walk home. Maybe it’ll cool you off and slap a little sense into your head.” She tossed Jamie’s heavy coat out of the window and drove off.

Jamie remembered feeling relieved – and cold. She grabbed her coat. Home was only about a mile up the road and she needed the time to herself, to decide what to do about Samantha and her constant interference in her social life. But deep down she knew Sam was right.

Tears clogged her throat. She hated the rift she was causing between the two of them – and the worry she saw in her mother’s eyes every time the woman looked at her lately. She really needed to get it together. But she was just so afraid of the future, unsure about what to do with her life. She walked that fine line of being eager for independence and scared of it all at the same time.

Then a stinging pain hit her leg and she knew no more.

Jamie jerked as though she could feel the dart biting into her flesh all over again.

She’d awakened, handcuffed to a bed. Horrified, she’d struggled until the blood flowed from her shredded wrists. And then
he
had entered the room.

Now, sitting on the edge of her bed, she pushed her sleeves up and examined her scars. A minor consequence of her disobedience and rebellion. Her futile attempt at escape. The worst scars were the ones she couldn’t see.

On her wrists, the marks crisscrossed each other, the skin healing raggedly, fusing together awkwardly as it had healed only enough to be torn apart once again by her continued fruitless struggles.

Not for the first time in twelve years, she questioned herself again. Why had she struggled so? Almost anyone else would have realized it had been a losing battle and given up.

But not her.

Why not her?

Why had she lived?

Drawing in a shuddering breath, she berated herself for dwelling on the past. “You can’t change it, but God can use it. Let him.”

Just saying the words out loud brought her a measure of peace she’d never been able to explain. So she didn’t try to analyze it, she just accepted it for the gift that it was.

Her Savior. Her Lord. Her strength.

She reached for the Bible she kept on her nightstand. Stacking the pillows behind her, she leaned back, opened her Bible . . .

. . . and screamed.

5

In the back of her subconscious mind, Jamie registered Samantha bursting through her bedroom door, but she couldn’t pull her eyes from the picture.

“What is it? Jamie! Why did you scream?”

As though in slow motion, Jamie lifted her gaze to lock onto Samantha’s frantic eyes. Her sister had her gun in her right hand as she scanned the room for the cause of Jamie’s panicked cry.

Seeing nothing, she lowered the weapon and approached the bed where Jamie still sat, seemingly frozen to the spot.

With shaking fingers, Jamie reached for the picture, then stopped. Doing her best to control her voice, she said, “Get me a plastic bag from the kitchen and a pair of tweezers, will you?”

Questions hovered on Sam’s lips, but Jamie stared at her until her sister whirled and left the room. Jamie snapped her eyes back to the picture.

How?

When?

But most importantly – who?

Samantha reentered the room with the requested materials and a demand. “What is it?”

Jamie took the tweezers from her sister and very carefully caught the picture between the ends. She held it up and slipped it into the plastic baggie. Handing it to Samantha, she said, “He put this in my Bible.”

“Who? What?” She took the item, looked at it, and gasped. “That’s the picture from the mantel.”

“Yes, it is.” An unnatural calm settled on her shoulders as she leaned back and hugged her arms around her midsection. Shivers danced along her nerve endings and nausea churned in the pit of her stomach.

Samantha looked up. “And you didn’t put it there?”

Jamie just stared at her.

Her sister started to pace. “I . . . I mean, you could have decided to use it as a bookmark, right? And then just forgot about it. Or . . . or . . .”

“I didn’t put it there, Samantha.” Jamie barely recognized her own voice. It sounded flat, devoid of life.

Sam stopped pacing and turned to look at Jamie. “But how? Who?”

“Him.”

“But it can’t be,” came a whispered horrified protest.

“It is. It has to be.”

Wednesday

After a restless night even with Samantha sleeping in the bed next to her, resurrecting an old habit Samantha had formed the day Jamie came home from the hospital, Jamie rose and automatically went through her morning routine.

Samantha. What was she going to do about the woman? Her presence beside her last night provoked old memories. Torments, nightmares. Sam had spent every night at her bedside in the hospital as she waited for Jamie to wake up from the drug-induced coma the doctors had put her in while her body healed. Then after she’d been released from the hospital to her parents’ care, Samantha had stayed by her side, sleeping next to her in the large queen bed. Only Samantha hadn’t gotten much sleep for months. Not with Jamie jerking awake screaming every few hours.

Jamie looked at the scars on her wrists. Deep grooves where the cuffs had cut almost to the bone in some places and healed over with puckered white skin. A vivid, daily reminder of her failure, her weakness. Her inability to escape with one attempt after another until it was almost too late.

With a finger, she traced the area on her left wrist and thought about her past, her tormentor. Her “hero.” As those last words filtered through her mind, disgust curdled.

She’d once thought of him that way. After all, he’d made the pain go away. Briefly. Even though he’d been the one to cause it.

And she’d been so grateful. She’d come to look forward to the small things he did to make her more comfortable, was thankful for the food and water he allowed her to have.

He’d bandaged her wrists when he’d realized the extent of her injuries. Given her pain medication.

Taken care of her.

And even while she’d been relieved at the reprieves, with every fiber of her being she’d hated him. And herself. She couldn’t understand what she was feeling, why she looked forward to his presence and despised it at the same time.

Stockholm syndrome. Where the victim becomes dependent upon the attacker even to the point of defending him or her.

Jamie hadn’t quite gotten to that point, but when Maya explained it to her, she’d been overwhelmed to realize she wasn’t crazy, that there was nothing wrong with her.

Then another emotion had forced its way to the surface.

Pure rage.

And it felt good, just like it had yesterday.

Staring at her reflection in the mirror, she set the comb down and made a promise to herself.

If it was him, if he was the one doing this, if he’d targeted her once again . . .

She swallowed down the nausea.

He. Would. Not. Win.

Not this time.

Shuddering, she brushed her teeth and heard Sam stirring. She finished getting ready for work and walked into the kitchen to grab a bagel she wasn’t hungry for. Knowing she needed to eat to keep her strength up, she forced it down.