Loving Rowan (18 page)

I
know this place
.

Some smells are etched in my memory, and it was as if I’d never been away. This house used to always smell this way after being shut up for the winter, damp and musty. No other place has ever smelled quite like it.

In the summer, we would come here every weekend and slowly the smell would lift, only to start all over again when the house was locked up for the winter.

Andrew had smashed the glass in the front door to get in. His parents hadn’t owned this place for years, and we were not meant to be here. I could only imagine that he’d chosen it for the nostalgia of the place.

So many summers we had run around on the beach, just down the road from the small house. We’d camped on the floor as there weren’t enough beds, and before we got to our teenage years, the three of us used to put our mattresses together so we could talk when we were supposed to be sleeping.

This place brought back memories, but the mere fact we were here brought my anger bubbling to the surface. Andrew had hit Kyle so hard with that vase, he’d gone down with a thud, and I was terrified that he wasn’t just knocked out. What if he’d really hurt him? Don’t people die from blunt force trauma to the head? What if he was dead, and Mia was all alone?

The cold wind blew through the hole in the glass door. The panel wasn’t completely gone, but it was enough for the place to feel icy. I shivered as I pondered the fate of my husband and daughter. Any good memory of this place was gone for good after what Andrew had done.

I’d fallen asleep in the car, despite my hands being bound. My dad always said it was the easiest way to get me to sleep, and I had slept through many journeys to this place. When Andrew shoved me in the back of the car, I’d tried to fight back, but he taped my hands together. I might have been almost as tall as him, but he was always bigger and stronger than me.

He tried to talk. I ignored him. Determined not to let him win, the only time I spoke was to ask to go to the bathroom. That was humiliating enough. He wouldn’t remove the tape, and had to help unbutton my jeans so I could pee. The only thing Andrew was interested in was talking me into leaving Kyle and going away with him. Leaving my family behind.

I could see how time was shifting by the changing light in the room. Shadows shifted as the sun moved across the sky, and I tried to concentrate on that rather than him. Somehow, I had to get out of this.

Andrew’s hand rested on my neck, and I couldn’t help but cringe at the touch. In the past, it would have been so welcome, but now it was the last thing I wanted. He’d spent the best part of a day just talking at me about how we should be together. How Kyle couldn’t love me as much as he did. How he’d always loved me. But nothing was going to turn my head or make me change my mind, because apart from the fact that I loved my husband more than anything, and I was terrified that he had been killed, Andrew made one very big mistake.

He’d left Mia behind.

My breasts ached from not feeding her, and while he was going on and on, all I could think about was how much she would be fretting without me. We were so tight, and I worried about there being enough frozen milk for Kyle to feed her, about how he would cope with her while I wasn’t there. He was a hands-on father, but I was the one who took care of her most of the time.

She was only a baby, but she would know her mother wasn’t around.

I wanted to hold her, smell her, touch my lips against her soft little cheek. The pain of being separated hit me again and again, and I feel a release of milk, leaving two growing wet spots on my shirt. He didn’t even notice.

“Are you listening to me, Rowan?” he asked.

“Are you kidding me? I want to go home. I want my baby.”

He sat down beside me. “Rowan, I need you to understand why I did this. I need you to understand why we should be together.”

I glared at him. “You are crazy. My baby needs me, and you’ve done the worst thing imaginable to both of us. Go to hell, Andrew.”

“I know you’re upset, but I promise it’ll get better.”

“Fuck you,” I screamed, and spat in his face. He stared at me, wiping his cheek with his hand. The tears were rolling down my cheeks at his inhumanity. He had wilfully separated me from my child, and I would never forgive him for that.

“Rowan, this isn’t you. Can’t you see how bad he is for you?”

“You know, all those years, I sat in the background, just hoping you would fall in love with me. I felt small, awkward. I hated the face and body I inhabited because I felt it wasn’t good enough for you. Kyle makes me feel more beautiful than I ever felt possible. He’s the one who made me feel, Andrew. The one who accepts me for who I am, and loves me for it. You never thought I was good enough for you.”

He glared at me, his lips twisting into a snarl as I battered him with the words, the only weapons I currently had available.

“It’s your fault that Charlie’s dead. Did I tell you that? If it wasn’t for you, she’d still be alive,” he snapped.

Tears stung my eyes as I shook my head. “There is something very wrong with you if you think that.”

“I told her, Row. I told her how I felt about you. On our wedding day, I saw you with that man, and all I could think about was that I’d made the wrong choice. It was all I could think about for days afterwards, so I told her.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I was screaming, my entire body shaking with rage and sorrow.

“She took off, and I went after her. She was so upset and she just ran until she couldn’t anymore. I could see her, Rowan, I could see her struggling for breath, and I tried to save her. I tried to calm her down and called an ambulance, but it was just too late, and too much.”

I tried to catch a breath between sobs. This was just so much to take in. “It’s your fault; not mine. I loved Charlie. As envious as I was of her, I would never have wanted to hurt her. Why the hell did you say anything?”

“Because I wanted to be with you. You’re so sweet, and gentle, and loving. Charlie was all those things too, but she just wasn’t you. I realised far too late, and I’m so sorry for that. But we can be together now.”

I shook my head. “The only reason you want that is because you realised I wasn’t hanging around waiting for you anymore. I love Kyle, and Mia. Mia is my flesh and blood. You’ve torn me apart for the last time, Andrew. Kyle will come looking for me, and you are so screwed when he finds you.”

He sighed. “All I want is to talk to you, makes sure you realise how much we need each other. It was always the three of us, Rowan. Now it’s just us, and we need to stick together.”

“Don’t you understand that I could have been your friend? Now you’ve done this, you’ll get nothing more from me. Not love, not friendship—nothing. I want Mia, I need her. She needs me. You’ve ruined everything.”

“She could have killed you,” he yelled at me, and I shrunk back away from him.

“What?”

“That fit you had. It was all because of that baby. I could have lost you because of her.”

I could barely breathe. Now all his fucked-up reasoning was coming out. Charlie’s death had pushed him over the edge to the point where I didn’t even recognise him. All the years I’d loved him, I’d had no idea he was capable of any of this. I didn’t know him at all.

“She’s just an innocent child, I need to know she’s okay …” The heat of my rage was overwhelming. I didn’t care what happened to him; he could go to hell now. “I was ill. It might have been because I was pregnant, but it wasn’t Mia’s fault.”

“Relax. That baby is fine. I’m sure
he
is too.” He rolled his eyes at me. Nausea washed over me at his nonchalance.

“How is she going to get food, Andrew? She needs her mother.”

He looked at the floor, and I had no idea if I was getting through to him or not. Whatever happened, I had to find a way back to Mia. She was my concern. Kyle would be going out of his mind with worry too. I ached to be in his arms.

D
usk was falling
for the third time since we’d arrived, and my stomach rumbled with nothing to fill it all day. Andrew had given me water, but I don’t think he had even thought about food.

“I need to go to the bathroom.”

He sighed. “Okay, come on.”

I stood with his help, and he led me to the bathroom where he unbuttoned my jeans, and left me to do the rest. I was glad that I’d only needed to pee so far, though that wasn’t going to last forever, and I had no idea how I was going to deal with anything else. It was awkward, but I sat, wanting to sleep, but needing to stay awake. I wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction of asking for help in any other way.

He buttoned my jeans again when I was finished, pulling the zip up that last little bit.

“This is embarrassing,” I said.

“It’s just temporary, until I know I can trust you.”

“Andrew, this has to stop. You can’t keep me here.”

“I just need you to understand,” he whispered.

“I understand that Charlie’s death left you fucked up. It wasn’t fair that she died, but you have to let me go. I’m not yours to keep.” I sat back down on the couch, glaring at him.

A helicopter went over the house, and we both looked up in surprise. The only time anything like that was usually around was when they were policing the beach for someone lost in the water, which didn’t happen often.

Andrew stood. “Do you think that’s …” He didn’t finish his sentence as the phone on the table started ringing. He just left it, the sound echoing through the room.

“Nobody knows anyone is here, probably a wrong number.”

It rang again. This time he picked up the phone, answering the call, presumably to get rid of whoever it was.

“Yes, she’s here,” he said calmly.

It’s someone asking about me.

“We don’t need any help, thanks. She’s safe; we’re fine.”

“Help,” I screamed, “help me.”

He glared at me, hanging up the phone. It rang again and he picked it up, throwing it on the floor.

“What are you doing?,” he asked. “We need more time to talk.”

“I’ve done all the talking I want. I need to go home, Andrew. Please let me go home.”

The phone was still ringing and I closed my eyes, imagining Kyle on the other end.

I love you. Please find me.

Andrew bent, picking up the phone and looking at it. “You need to talk to whoever that is, or they will just keep calling,” I said.

He just let it ring and ring before putting it back on the table.

“We need to sort us out before anything else happens. They can wait.”

“Andrew, there is no
us
. Not in that way. Let me go home.”

He started to pace, clearly shaken by the call. Who had it been? At least whoever it was knew I was safe. Andrew had told them that much.

I tried to keep focus, but I was physically and mentally exhausted. The only thing really keeping me awake was the constant ache of my body telling me to feed my baby. My baby, who was so far away from me.

I began to rock, trying to draw comfort from the thing that gave my daughter peace. At home, I would sit and do that with her for hours. She was such a sweet little thing, but sometimes she needed the reassurance of being rocked in her mother’s arms. Now I tried to find the same comfort.

“What are you doing?” Andrew asked.

“I need Mia.”

“Rowan, you need to listen, and understand what we have to do now. We can go away together, pretend that nothing ever happened and it’s just us. The way it was at the start.”

“That was a long time ago,” I said, looking at him. He was slumped in a nearby chair, tired, and I guess, deflated that I hadn’t given in.

“Do you remember all the fun we used to have at your parents’ place? Playing among the trees? There was always somewhere to hide.”

“Of course I do. It was also where I married Kyle. You know, my husband? The man I love, who I have a daughter with.”

He frowned, placing his hands on his knees and rubbing, digging his fingernails into his skin as if he were trying to keep control.

“I told him to stay away from you, you know. He was never good enough for you.”

I shook my head. I wasn’t even going to engage with him now. My eyes were so heavy, and all I wanted to do was to lie down and go to sleep. His face was strained too, and I knew he must have been feeling something similar.

A few hours later, the phone rang again. By now it was dark outside, and the temperature was starting to drop. I could hear the weariness in Andrew’s voice.

“I told you, she’s fine. I guess you can talk to her. She’s safe, you know.”

He held the phone to my ear, and I nearly cried at the thought of Kyle being on the other end. Instead, a woman’s voice came down the line.

“Rowan?”

“Yes,” I whispered, trying desperately to contain the tears as I made contact with another human being.

“Just yes or no answers. Are you alright?”

“Yes.”

“Does he have any weapons?”

I closed my eyes, knowing what was coming. “No.”

“Hang in there.”

The line went dead, and I started to cry at the thought of Mia, out there without me. I knew she had Kyle, but it was me she needed. My anger began to build again and my exhaustion amplified it.

“I hate you,” I whispered. “I hate you, and I wish I’d never met you.” Andrew recoiled as I spoke, each word hitting its target as my voice grew. “I loved you so much. More than anyone else in my life, I loved you. You threw it all away; you threw me away, and I’m glad you did, because I found true happiness when you let me go.”

“Don’t say that, Rowan. Please. I love you.” He fell to his knees beside the couch.

“But you don’t. Not in that way. It was only when you didn’t have me hanging off your every word that you decided I was important to you. We were friends, Andrew. The best of friends. But, that was a long time ago and we both moved on, even if we didn’t realise at first.”

He was crying now, and for some perverse reason I wanted to comfort him. Old habit, I guessed. With my hands taped together, I could do nothing but watch as he broke down in front of me.

I closed my eyes as the door flew open, and heavy footsteps came past me. Shaking, I slowly opened them again, watching as Andrew was pulled to his feet and led out of the room. Surrounded by men clad in bulletproof vests and carrying guns, I began to sob as I realised I was safe.

One of them sat, pulling out a pen knife and cutting through the tape that held my wrists together. I took deep breaths to try to regain control. I didn’t even know how long I’d been separated from Kyle and Mia. I’d be back with them soon.

“Rowan? Are you okay? Can you walk?” The policeman had kind eyes, and despite his scary appearance, I threw my arms around his neck and clung to him.

“You’re free,” he said. “Your husband is outside, just a short distance from the house, and there are paramedics to check you over.”

I released my grip, leaning back. One of the others appeared with a bottle of water. “Here, you might need this.”

“Thank you,” I whispered. I took a big drink before standing, wobbling after sitting for so long.

Kyle.

It had been dark, but the area around the house looked like day with the huge beams of light from all the police vehicles. I took a deep breath of the fresh air before spotting him. It was over; this whole horrible thing was over.

In the distance, they were hustling Andrew into a police car, and he took one last look at me before disappearing.

“I’m sorry, Rowan.” I heard him call before they drove away.

And then I ran.