Ever After (4 page)

Chapter 7

A week went by, and then two. Things were falling into place. Scotty finally got the cast off her leg, and she walked with a slight limp that would subside with time, but she was otherwise physically healed. Aaron was enrolled in day care, and Scotty and I watched him when we weren’t working, and the nanny, Angeline, watched him when we had to work late or something came up in the evenings. He really wasn’t much trouble, as he was a quiet sort. His vocabulary seemed remarkable for a little boy who had been neglected for all of his young life. Scotty had confided in me that her mother had never learned to read. So, I would imagine that the poor kid probably had very little chances to acquire language skills, yet he spoke remarkably well.

The entire thing made me ponder how Loretta managed to give birth to not one, but two, intelligent children. Scotty was brilliant, and Aaron certainly seemed to be developmentally appropriate. Genetics were a funny thing. But, then again, perhaps Loretta was smarter than she let on. The alcohol, the men, and her lack of education worked against her, but perhaps her basic intelligence was high.

I certainly hoped so. One thing was for sure - Loretta getting on her feet was important to Scotty. More important than she ever let on. She deserved to have a real mother, and I wanted that for her, more than anything.

Loretta was able to Skype once a week from the treatment facility, and she already was looking better. Her skin didn’t look quite so sallow, and she appeared to be getting plenty of rest. She also was looking quite a bit less puffy in the face, and it appeared that she was also losing weight.

I was starting to notice just a hint of beauty on her no longer ruddy and sallow face. Her eyes were the same color of green as Scotty’s, and her facial features were really much the same. She was looking so much better, just being off of alcohol for this short period of time. I would imagine that there was the possibility that Loretta might just be something of a stunner, like her daughter, once she was sober for a long period of time and she lost about 150 pounds.

She also seemed much more coherent than the first time I met her, of course. Her speech was getting clearer, and she was sounding less illiterate than before. I wondered if being out at the treatment facility, which catered to the very wealthy, was rubbing off on her and her speech patterns somewhat.

Scotty was thrilled to see the changes in her mother, changes that were happening rapidly.

“Look at me, Scotty,” Loretta said, while she looked into the screen. “I’ve lost 20 pounds already! They’re feeding me nothing but healthy stuff. No processed foods, just lots of veggies and organic meats. Do you know about organic meats? They taught me a little bit about that. They say that diet is very important to mood, and so it’s going to be important that I keep eating like this so that I might be able to stay off that damned sauce.”

Scotty smiled, big. “You look great, mom. Really, I can’t even believe it. Twenty pounds in just two weeks. That’s amazing!”

“Well, you know, the doc here says it’s mostly water weight. Apparently I had a lot of extra water because my liver wasn’t functioning very well with all that booze. But I feel about 100 pounds lighter, I really do. I’m also exercising a lot. They make me do it every day for an hour. I have to take these classes with these weights and mats and stuff. And I go for long walks every day. This place is beautiful, Scotty. Really beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it. All this green, and flowers and trees and birds and stuff. I love to walk around here.”

“I’m so proud of you,” Scotty said. “Really proud.”

“I’m proud of me,” Loretta said. “But I don’t like those needles they put in you. I mean, you can’t really feel them, they’re so tiny, but I hate the thought of them being in there. But, you know what, Scotty? I feel amazing after that’s done. After they take those needles out, I feel just great. You should try it.”

“Oh, you’re doing acupuncture, I guess? I heard that’s really good for all kinds of things. I never heard it being used for alcoholism, but I’m not surprised.”

“Yes, acupuncture. I kept forgetting what they called it. Acupuncture. Oo, boy, Scotty, I really didn’t think that I could feel this spoiled.”

“What about therapy, mom? How are you doing with that?”

“Well, that’s not so great. I hate talking about myself. It’s just so embarrassing.”

“I know, mom. I’m doing therapy myself. I’ve been going every day, every evening, really, at 6 o’clock. I think it’s really helping me, too.”

“That’s great, Scotty. I had hoped that you would get a head shrinker. God knows I screwed you up enough that you definitely need it. I’m sorry for that. I mean, I have to make amends as part of my program, to the people I hurt, like you. And Aaron. They’re teaching me about what that means. I need to make amends to you, Scotty. I don’t know why you still love me, but I’m so glad that you do.”

Scotty nodded her head. I looked at her, seeing that her face was masking how she was really feeling. She had told me that a lot of what she was talking about to Adele was about her mom. She hadn’t really gotten to what had happened to her with Mr. Lucas yet, at least not in any kind of depth. It turned out that she really had a lot of pent up feelings regarding her mother, so that was what the focus was for her therapy at that moment.

But, looking at her, smiling so big and laughing with her mother on Skype, there wasn’t even a hint of the hostility that Scotty told me she was feeling for her mom. I was amazed, as I wondered if she was that good of an actress or if Scotty was feeling better about her relationship with Loretta.

“Well, I think that our time’s almost up,” Scotty said, looking at the clock. “I love you, mom. I’ll talk to you next week.”

“Next week,” Loretta said. “I’m gonna look even better when you see me next, Scotty. And feeling better, too.”

Scotty kissed her fingers and put them on the screen, as the visage of Loretta faded from view.

I pondered Scotty, my head in my hand. She was such an enigma. She continued to stare at the screen, that was now blank, a huge smile on her face. She turned to me with tears in her eyes.

“She looks amazing, Nick. And she seems so, I don’t know…coherent. I really don’t want to get my hopes up, because she has dashed them so many times before, but I feel so hopeful, really. Hopeful that she might actually be able to get over her addiction, once and for all. Do you think it’s possible? I mean, she’s been a heavy drinker since she was 12 years old. Is it possible?” Scotty’s eyes looked bright, and her face was lit up. I smiled at her, thinking that the odds were
against Loretta, but not wanting to tell Scotty that. I wanted her to have a positive mind-set about it. Yet, I felt bad for blowing smoke up her ass.

“I think so, Scotty. She has a very comprehensive plan out there that focuses on overall wellness, not just her disease. That’s what she needs to kick it. Staying that way is going to be challenging, but I’m enrolling her in some top-notch programs out here, so she really has a good chance of making it.”

I thought again about Ryan. His addiction was horrible. And, it was a much harder drug than alcohol. Heroin was known to be one of the addictive drugs in the world, and he was a heavy user for many years. He risked his life, time and again, for the junk. He alienated his friends. I barely was able to stick by him through much of it. I almost gave up on him time and again. Yet, he managed to come through it, finally.

So, maybe there was some hope for Loretta after all.

∞

What wasn’t going well, however, was the issue with the arrest of Paul Lucas. It had been two weeks since Scotty saw the police, and gave her story. The arrest was supposed to happen within a matter of days. Yet, there didn’t seem to be any progress at all.

I called them every day, as did Scotty. Every time I called, Angie either wasn’t there, or she answered the phone to tell me that it was still in the works, but they were waiting for more evidence.

Whatever that meant.

“More evidence?” I said, incredulous. “How much more evidence do you need? You saw the pictures, and you collected the rape kit samples. You heard Scotty’s story. I don’t understand at all what the delay is. You do know that every day that he’s out there is another day that a predator is loose on the streets.” I could feel my blood pressure rising as I talked to Angie. She had seemed so much like she was on our side when we talked to her at the station. Like she was going to be getting out there yesterday to serve him with an arrest warrant and take him into custody. Yet, here she was on the phone giving me the song and dance about how the arrest would happen any moment.

I wanted his ass in jail. Yesterday.

“Well, Nick, it’s complicated,” she said.

Complicated. Complicated. That seemed to be a code word for something that she wasn’t wanting to tell me.

So, I hung up the phone, steaming, and called Ryan.

He answered on the second ring. “What’s up?” he asked.

“Hey. Listen. I need you to make some phone calls.”

“Sure,” he said. “Who do you need me to call?”

“Those Senators you’re working with. I need for you to ask them to keep their ear to the ground. Find out if those Senators that Mr. Lucas is chummy with know anything about what is happening with Scotty. I have a feeling that there’s a rat or two in that police station, and I’m gonna find out who it is.”

Ryan was quiet. “I was afraid of that,” he said.

“Afraid of what?” I said. “Out with it.”

“Nothing,” he said. “I have my suspicions on what’s happening, though.”

“What kind of suspicions?”

“Well, there’s a pork project that concerns that precinct and others around it. They’re considering some block grants that would increase the funding for the beat cops and the detectives. Nobody wants to interfere with that, if you know what I mean. It’s going to mean millions in additional spending, which is desperately needed of course.”

I did know what he meant. All too clear. When there’s going to be a vote on something like that, nobody could risk have Senators defecting. Which Mr. Lucas’ Senators would surely do if that precinct made an arrest.

I rubbed my temples.

“When is this thing going to come up for a vote?”

“Not until the next session, so it’s going to be several months at least.”

Several months? Several months? And then, after that issue is resolved, there were bound to be other things that would crop up that would preclude Mr. Lucas being arrested. I started to feel extremely angry about the injustice of it all. Not that I didn’t expect this. I did. But I somehow thought that, at the very least, the bastard would be arrested. I really didn’t think that he would serve prison time, because he would hire the best attorney to keep him out of prison, but I really wished that, at minimum, his name would be dragged through the mud and he would lose his friends and hangers-on because of it.

I thought that there would be some kind of punishment for him, even if he never served a day in prison. Yet, if there wasn’t even an arrest, he was going to get away with it completely.

Well, not if could help it. Plan B was looking more and more likely.

“You still there?” Ryan asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “I just have to figure out what I can do. Thanks for the honest assessment,” I said.

I hung up, feeling a little bit defeated. I poured myself a glass of Scotch, and pondered my options. It was looking increasingly unlikely that there would even be an arrest made. Well, maybe there would be, after the funding issue was passed. But, I was starting to doubt it.

I drummed my fingers on the desk. I could hear Scotty upstairs, hanging out with Jack. Aaron was in the living room, watching television. Scotty didn’t know how many times I had called Angie, because I didn’t want to worry her. She called frequently, as well, but she had no idea how fruitless this was all starting to seem. She was charmingly naïve, and honestly thought that there would be an arrest made at any moment.

I thought about the possibility that Scotty might be able to press charges down on St. Croix. But that was tricky. The bastard would have to return there, willingly, as there generally was not going to be extradition for something like this. And he apparently only went there once a year. It would be difficult to know when he might be returning there. Not to mention the fact that Scotty was going to have a revisit a place that held a great deal of pain for her.

No, that wouldn’t work.

I was trying, in my mind, to think of a way, any way, that I could avoid my other plan. That other plan was dangerous, to say the very least, and risky. One false move, and it could all go to hell, and I would be the one in prison. Or dead.

And Scotty would be left to face her terrors all alone.

“Loverboy,” Jack was shouting down from the bedroom. “You have to come up here and settle a bet.”

I rolled my eyes. I usually enjoyed hanging out with them, but not right at that moment. I needed to think about my options here. Think about what it was that I was probably going to have to do to make sure that the predator never could get my Scotty again.

“Just a second,” I said. I had to be alone with my thoughts for just a little while. I spun around in my chair a little bit, going back and forth, back and forth. The problem that I was having, at that moment, was that I couldn’t really separate my
emotions about this monster from my rational brain. I had such a visceral sense of rage at that man, for violating Scotty and creating such a fear in her that she was having a hard time moving on. I didn’t want to do anything in haste, and out of anger. I wanted what I did to him to be coming from a place of cool rationality. That would be the only way that the plan could work.