Tainted Love: contemporary womens fiction love story and family saga (Behind Closed Doors Book 1) (16 page)

“What?” He frowned at me. “Wait a minute.” He scrambled to his feet. “Are you saying I’ve raped you? Because you’ve never once said no to me.”

“I’ve been saying ‘I didn’t want to’ or ‘I wasn’t in the mood’ meaning ‘no’ for the last five years. This is just the first time you’ve listened.”

“So you are saying that technically, I’ve raped you.” I looked at him. “So when was the last time I raped you?” He didn’t believe me. “I want the specific details.”

“Fourth of July weekend, it was the Sunday, so July sixth. Two thirty four P.M. The girls were in the pool with Caleb. We were having colleagues from the practice over for a barbeque later, but you’d just come home from playing golf and Georgia was at the mall. I was wearing a new blue sun dress and you were very fond of it.” His eyes changed. “You were wearing your white slacks and your favorite sports shirt. When I told you I didn’t have time, I needed to change into my swimsuit because the girls were in the pool, you said—”

“‘I’ll help you change.’ You were just being a little resistant. You’d not wanted to have sex since Caitlin was born.”

“Calvin… you punished me for having Caitlyn by forcing me to have sex with you, and that’s how we got Zoe.”

“No I didn’t… I’d never do that to you.”

I nodded.

“You’re lying.”

I shook my head.

“You know I hate it when you lie to me.”

He was becoming angry. Old Cal angry, and it started to make me nervous. “Remember the anger management sessions.” But I knew he was already past what they’d taught him there, if he even went.

“Why? Because you’re going to divorce me? You’ll never divorce me. No one will ever love you but me. Who would love a woman past her prime with two ankle biters? You will always come running back to me.”

I stood up. “You need to go. Before you do something we will both regret.”

His hand gripped my throat and began to squeeze. He cut off the air to my lungs and I was unable to make a sound. He lifted me off my feet as he asked, “What, this?” His other gripped at my thigh and pulled my leg around him as he smiled. “Or did you really mean
this
?”

Chapter Thirty-Four

18
th
March 2000

Every time I close my eyes I feel his fingers tighten around my throat, around my thighs, on my... I can’t be in the dark. I can hear his voice. He’s asking me if I had fun.

I know he doesn’t know where we are anymore, but I’m standing at the window, watching, waiting.

I’m always looking over my shoulder. I know he’s somewhere around. He’s just waiting for the right time.

There’s a bag in the trunk of Robert’s rental car and one with cash in the closet. I’m ready for the second we have to move. For that moment the girls say they’ve seen him.

Consider this a warning, little brother. You may never hear from me again.

Chapter Thirty-Five

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Date: 09/07/2000 11:32:00 AM

Subject: Hello Little Brother

I’m sorry you haven’t heard from me, it really must have been hard for you all. I don’t know how he found me this time, but we had to leave the new place so fast.

I got your email address from Robert. That’s how I’m corresponding with him too. I think
he’s
intercepting the mail somehow.

Gawd! I sound like a paranoid crazy fool.

We’d just settled in New Jersey and I’d received my first paycheck when he appeared. There was money for rent and bills I hadn’t yet paid when I saw him talking to Zoe. I watched him out the window because the bastard followed us home. So I drew the drapes and switched out the lights at a reasonable hour and set about gathering the important stuff. It took hours, you know. I crawled around on my knees just so he wouldn’t see my shadow.

I don’t know what I’d do without Robert. He’s been so patient with me. Robert told me if I took the girls out of state, Cal
would send the police after us. I don’t care, little brother. Really, I don’t, because he wants the satisfaction of stalking me. But the US is a very big place, and we’ve crossed a number of state lines. So Robert’s wrong. There have been no police and it’s just
him
on his one-man quest to terrorize me.

So we’re in a new city, we have a new name, and we’ve started another new life. I have a new job in an office, and it has a pretty good benefits package. We live in a nice part of the city. We have a two bedroom apartment overlooking a park. The girls have settled into school really quickly. Zoe’s joined the amateur dramatics club and Cate has joined the junior cast of the local show choir. Things are good for us here. We’re off to a really great start.

The reason I have contacted you is because I was having lunch with the girls at work. Well, there’s only three of us really, the rest are all men in our office. Carol, my boss, is a few years older than me, with grown up children like Georgia and Caleb, and then there’s Bree, a very sophisticated young single mother who I also work with.

I’ve definitely grown closer to these girls than I have anyone else before. It’s really strange to have real friends. People who I know would do anything for me, especially Carol. I’ve never had that. Not even when I was at school. Yes, I was a popular and I had lots of friends, and even throughout my married life there were many people we saw and entertained but there’s never been anyone like Bree and Carol in my life. I guess the closest has been you, Robert and Gina... and then... well, no, not even
him
.

Bree’s husband died of cancer last year and she was talking about her will. She asked me what would happen if I was hit by a bus. Who would take care of the girls? Now, I’ve never thought of this before. Well, of course I’ve thought about dying. You know, when he...but I’ve always pushed it to the back of my mind and now I’m out. It’s been months and I’m fairly sure we’re safe.

But what if I WAS hit by a bus? What would happen to Cate and Zoe?

They’d go back to
him
, wouldn’t they? I don’t want that to happen. They’re not safe with him. The whole reason I left like this is because of them. So, I’ve updated my will, Darryl. He gets nothing, nada, from me. Robert’s petitioning for a legal separation on the grounds of domestic abuse, and I’ve made additional provisions for their care. They’re not becoming piggy banks for him.

I know you’ve never met them. But you know everything there is to know. You know how important it is to me they believe he was a good father and me as a mother who was fair. Neither Georgia nor Caleb can give them that. They’ve already taken sides. But you’ve never had a favorite. I know I’ve pretty much dragged you into my corner, D, but you were never mine or Cal’s. You’ve never been tainted by this situation as a child, because you left for college before it got bad.

I’ve named you as my preferred guardian and asked Robert to make it so. You must promise if something happens to me, and my babies aren’t in your care, you’ll do everything you can to get them back, even if it means telling the whole world
everything
you know.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Date: 04/23/2001 16:52:47 PM

Subject: Happy Easter

We have had the best Easter weekend ever!

Carol and her husband invited Bree and I, with the four children, up to their cabin on the lake. I’d love to tell you which lake it is. D, it’s beautiful. And I know you’d love it there but I just don’t want him finding out where we are. It’s not that I don’t trust you, because I do, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he has someone in your office reading your emails when you’re not at your desk. Yes, I know, and yes I am THAT paranoid... and YES, I am that scared of him finding us.

So, anyway,
our weekend
...

Bree picked us up for the drive to the lake. Did I tell you we’ve moved out of the city? I think six months in one place is just too long when you’re trying to avoid your husband, don’t you? I’ll tell you more about our new house another time. I can’t wait to share with you... Zoe learned to SWIM!!! Yes... again.

She said she didn’t know how. Of course she knew how, we had a pool. But we also had lots of inflatable toys and she wore a life jacket, so really she just flapped her arms and legs and the water carried her everywhere. This time she actually swam. No life jacket. No inflatable toys. There was just Zoe and me in the lake, and once she knew how, with her red hair she was like a fireball through the water, you just couldn’t stop her! It was A-MAZ-ING!

Oh, I tell you, D, I knew it was going to be a great weekend when we pulled up outside a beautiful two story log cabin. It had a wooden wraparound porch, a few rowing boats moored to a wooden dock, and there was just this peace... you know, birds tweeting, the breeze rustling in leaves… I could have stood there all day. Even the sound of four children laughing as they chased each other, shattering the silence, didn’t alter my feeling of inner peace.

The cabin has four bedrooms. Carol and her husband, Lee, were going to sleep in the main living room, but you know what I’m like these days, and it’s worse in new places. So I told her not to worry about it, the bed was big enough for me to share with the girls. Of course, I didn’t sleep. I sat in the window seat watching the moonlight on the lake, closed my eyes for a bit, let the deep relaxing breaths take me away somewhere nice and cozy... but he’s still there. He’s always there. He’s always waiting to wake me up.

The weekend was totally crazy! The kids ate
so
much candy I’m surprised they have any teeth left. We played baseball and paintball and volleyball. Carol’s older kids came up; her daughter has a three-year-old. The families in neighboring cabins came over for a barbeque on Saturday. Things were even more crowded and a lot crazier. The girls loved it. Me, not so much. It made me a little nervous but I coped.

We drank wine and cocktails all night and ate lots of burgers, steak, hot dogs, and a variety of marinated meats and seafood off of sticks. I just let the girls do and eat whatever they pleased, because it was their vacation too. Their father would never have let them have so much fun.

It was liberating. I felt just a little bit freer, you know, because there’s still that little voice saying, “Cal doesn’t like that”, and I know what will happen when Calvin doesn’t like what he finds.

On Sunday, we had a more chilled out day. Lee took the kids for a walk through a nature reserve after breakfast. He said it helped with his hangover, but Carol disagreed. He was getting out of clearing up the wreckage left from the night before. Personally, I think he got the bum end of the deal. Even with Carol’s two adult children to chaperone, the kids would have been hard to handle all morning with a hangover, and we were done and drinking coffee within the hour. Well, you know me and my history with cleaning.

“I should have just stuck the broom up your ass,” Carol grinned at me as she put my coffee on the wooden patio table. “Then I could have gone back to bed and left you to it.”

“Damn girl! You’re in the wrong job.” Bree looked at me. “You ought to open your own business.”

I shuddered at the thought. I will not make money from what he did to me, D.

“No, thanks.” I smiled back at Bree. “I like what I do. I was a housewife for twenty plus years and my ex liked a certain standard.”

I didn’t mention him often, if at all. When I did he was referred to as ‘my ex’. It was easier that way. Most women understood the phrase. They picked up on the “the bastard hurt me beyond all repair, let’s never talk about him” those two little words implied, though most women weren’t talking about the physical hurt he’d caused.

“You know,” Carol said quietly, “it’s been nearly a year since you moved here.” It had, but I didn’t see where she was going with this. “You show no signs of ever going back to him.” Not in this lifetime. “Maybe you should, I dunno, maybe consider taking your rings off.”

You know, I don’t know why I still wear them. It’s been over eighteen months since I left him. But they’re part of me, and for some reason I’m just not ready to let them go.

“Lily.” Bree’s soft palm took my hand as she whispered my cover name. “When Tom died I never thought I’d get over it. I never ever thought I’d take my wedding ring off. It wasn’t a sign of our marriage. It was a symbol to the world that I belonged with Tom. He trusted me with his heart, his happiness, his world. How did the world know I was this person if I didn’t wear his ring anymore?” She smiled at me. “But I did stop wearing it, Lily. And then I found this really nice guy, who’s really good with my kids. Who has kids of his own and they’re the same age. He wants me to meet them.” She was lucky. Her new guy had an amicable separation and made arrangements with his ex-wife so she could meet Bree before Bree met the children. “I did move on. I loved Tom, and a part of me will always love Tom but it was time for me. And you will meet someone new when the time is right too.”

My insides quaked at the thought, D. I had the perfect husband. He was sweet and he was caring… when he lashed out, it was because he was worried about me. When he supported me through the most difficult time of my life, he took care of me and you and the children. He loved me and he worshipped me. He did. I know he did because he looked at me like I was the biggest and rarest of diamonds, and he was the poorest of men who’d just happened to stumble across me one day.

And it was all a lie!

I looked at my left hand. Suddenly, I understood why Cal had held on to his and Emma’s wedding rings for so long. I knew why he kept them on the shelf in our bedroom even after he’d married me. They meant something. They’re so much more than a piece of jewelry. They’re so much bigger than a symbol of marriage. They say who you are, that you belong. You’re committed. You’re trustworthy. You hold the key to someone else’s heart, their world. Without this, how do you know who you are?