The Only Shark In The Sea (The Date Shark Series Book 3) (21 page)

Gently, he picked up Gypsy from her lap and set her on the floor. The little dog barked once in annoyance, but then went unnaturally still as Vance reached forward to slip his arms beneath Natalie’s body. Gypsy seemed rather intuitive when it came to Natalie’s needs, and she watched in a strange reverence through the entire process of Vance lifting her into his arms and cradling her seemingly frail body against his chest.

Never once did she bark or object as Vance carried Natalie. In fact, the little dog scampered ahead and led the way to Natalie’s bedroom, bumping her nose against the door to push it open for him. Vance smiled at the helpful gesture and pushed it open the rest of the way with his foot. The rich lavenders and periwinkles matched Natalie’s naturally soft nature and the deep tones of the furniture seemed to ground the room to provide a comforting stability.

Gripping the edge of the comforter in her mouth, Gypsy tugged it backward for Vance. He chuckled at the dog and laid Natalie carefully down on the bed. He had to play a bit of tug-of-war to get the comforter corner back from Gypsy, but she finally let go and he pulled the blanket over Natalie’s body, pausing in the middle of the motion when he saw the expression on her face.

When he’d picked her up, there had been zero emotion, zero reaction even. He’d been too busy paying attention to Gypsy to notice when the change had occurred, but it almost looked as if she were smiling. It wasn’t very noticeable, just a small upturn at the corner of her mouth, but it was vastly changed from the broken deadness he had seen earlier.

Vance settled the blanket around her shoulders, but hesitated leaving. Gypsy was already curled up on the floor as close to the bed as she could get since her stubby little legs would never allow her to climb up with Natalie. She would let him know if Natalie woke up. That should have been reassurance enough, but Vance didn’t leave. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was doing as he walked around to the other side of Natalie’s bed. Leaving the room just seemed so…difficult.

It was almost lunch time. Guy had promised to run to Vance’s apartment during his lunch break to bring Vance what he needed for the next few days. He’d call when he got to Natalie’s. It wouldn’t be long. Lying down for a few minutes just to make sure Natalie was going to be okay would be fine. He’d be up and gone long before she woke.

He was careful not to touch her or get too close as he laid down. Rolling onto his side, he watched her expression to be sure he wasn’t disturbing her. The only change was a slight relaxation that rolled through her entire body. The longer he lay next to her, the more she relaxed. The change was startling as he realized he’d never seen her look so peaceful. He was so accustomed to her furrowed brow and tense features that she seemed almost like a different person.

Reaching forward, he brushed her hair back from her face, not because it seemed to be bothering her, but just to see what would happen. He was rewarded by a brief deepening of her faint smile. It was there and gone in a moment, but Vance’s hand froze as he really looked at her. He’d never noticed before how beautiful she was without the burden of constant fear. Relaxing back against the pillow, he wondered what it would take to see that peaceful beauty when she was awake. He was still contemplating that thought when exhaustion got the better of him.

Chapter 23

The Effort

Natalie woke slowly, which wasn’t a common occurrence for her. Nightmares often plagued her sleep, and even when they didn’t she almost always woke with a start, heart racing as her ever present fear kicked in to keep her company for the day. The calm with which she woke was unsettling, while at the same time strangely delicious.

Blinking slowly, she wondered why it was so light. Her mind felt foggy and she couldn’t quite remember what day it was or how she had ended up in bed. The last thing she remembered…cold flooded through her body as the memories resurfaced. Talking to Detective Morrow, telling her story, Vance listening. That last thought made her crash more than anything else, which was both confusing and shocking. What must he think of her after hearing the truth?

Her chest began heaving as her fingers curled around the comforter. Wretched tears poured down her cheeks and fell into her hair no matter how hard she tried to stop herself from yet another round of crying. Sensing her distress, Gypsy whined and whimpered from the floor, unable to reach her. A sudden shift in the mattress beside her very nearly made her scream, but the muttered curse that followed had a bewildering effect.

Vance jumped away from the bed, eyes wide. “Natalie, I’m sorry,” he pleaded. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I just laid down for a minute…to make sure you were going to be okay. I was worried, I…”

Her breathing slowed with every word. The tears stopped altogether. The fingers that were strangling the blanket relaxed. Sluggish understanding crept into her mind. He had been there the whole time. Lying next to her as she slept…as she truly, honestly slept. That should have terrified her, having him that close to her. She had never slept so peacefully, certainly not since running away from her parents, likely not since she was a small child.

Backing up from the bed, Vance looked as panicked as she usually felt. “No,” she begged, “don’t go.”

Vance frowned. “You…want me to stay? In here?”

She nodded before she let herself think about it for too long. Afraid she’d change her mind if she didn’t speak quickly, she said, “Lay down again. Please.”

Wary, Vance moved slowly. The mattress shifted as his weight settled back onto the bed. She could barely feel his presence, but that subtle change in her position was so reassuring, she sighed and never wanted to move from that spot.

“I’m sorry I scared you,” Vance said quietly.

“You didn’t.” She breathed in deeply, taking in the moment of peace. “I didn’t even know you were there until you jumped up.”

Vance shifted, drawing her eyes to him. He looked at her, brows pinched together. “But…you were upset and crying. I thought…”

She shook her head, the movement so small it barely even rustled the pillow case.

“Why then?”

Natalie closed her eyes as a swell of panic tried to rise. “I remembered telling you about my father and I was afraid…” She swallowed down the fear lodging in her throat. “I was afraid of what you must think of me now.” Her chest rose and fell heavily with each deep breath.

“Think of you?” Vance questioned. “Why would hearing the truth about what your father did to you change the way I think about you? All it did was help me understand you better.”

Disbelieving, Natalie pulled back from him. “You must see me differently now. How could you not? Don’t you see how damaged and broken I am?”

“Broken?” Vance leaned up on one elbow and studied her. “Natalie, I’ve never thought of you as broken. Hurt, injured, yes. Damaged? Not beyond repair, if that’s what you’re thinking. What he did to you was cruel. Not just after he found you with Thomas, but all of it. No parent should ever treat a child like that. The way he treated you left scars, but his actions don’t make you who you are. If anything defines you, it’s your strength.”

Frowning, Natalie turned to face him. His reaction was nothing like what she expected. It was reassuring, but confusing as well. The two days she’d spent tied to her front porch naked, everyone saw her. Maybe not the entire town, but enough of them. No one helped her. Most didn’t even look at her. The few who did, looked at her like she was lower than the dirt they walked on. There’d been no compassion in their eyes, no pity even. There was a good chance they all knew why she had been tied up, and they all seemed to think she’d gotten what she’d deserved.

Her hometown was small and close-knit, but not a single person ever lifted a finger to help her. Natalie suffered in silence. She could only assume there was a consensus on her punishment, on her worthlessness. It broke the last of her strength and confidence. If everyone who saw her there on the porch thought she deserved to be publicly humiliated because of her disobedience, they must have been right, weren’t they?

She couldn’t understand whether Vance’s reaction had been unusual, or if her entire hometown had been wrong.

For the past seven years, Natalie hadn’t gone a single day without thinking of that one moment of weakness with Thomas, her father’s punishment, and the town’s passing of judgment. Vance was wrong to say what happened didn’t define her. It had done exactly that for seven years. Every decision she’d made was motivated by that singular event. Changing her name, choosing a major, moving as far away as she could, living like a virtual ghost, never making attachments or leaving an impression.

Vance said her strength defined her, but he didn’t understand. “I wasn’t strong then,” she whispered. “When he finally untied me and dragged me back to the basement, I let him. I spent two weeks in a locked room when I knew how to escape. I chose not to.”

All the compassion she had wished for and never seen during those two days on the porch was pooled in Vance’s eyes. “Why? It couldn’t have just been waiting for your birthday.”

“For days and days, I ate the food my mother brought me and then went back to staring at the wall. Graduation came and went while I was locked in there and I didn’t care. I had given up. I thought I would die in that room, that one day my mother wouldn’t bring me meals anymore.” Natalie’s heart squeezed as she remembered those days, the pain she
wished
she could feel at thoughts of dying. “Part of me wanted it to happen. I wanted to disappear. It seemed like the only way I’d ever be rid of my father and that town.”

Eyes closed, Vance shook his head slowly. His fingers unfurled toward her, but clenched back into a fist a second later. “What made you finally run?”

“A cupcake,” Natalie said. She almost laughed at the confused expression that sprang onto Vance’s face. If she hadn’t been so overcome with the agony the memories drenched her in, she might have. She knew she owed Vance an explanation for the cryptic comment, though, and summoned up enough courage to continue.

“For two weeks, every day my mother brought me the same meals. Dry toast and a boiled egg with tea for breakfast, bland, simple meals. The day I turned eighteen, the meal didn’t change, but when she set the tray on the ground without speaking, the teacup was upside down. It took me a while to even realize the difference. The days had all blurred together into a never ending fog. I had no idea it was my birthday until I lifted the teacup and found a small iced cupcake beneath it.”

Natalie hadn’t told Vance or the detective much about her mother. She wasn’t as cruel as her father, but she was demanding in her own right and allowed the emotional abuse to strangle the life out of her only child. She had never treated Natalie as her father did, but Natalie thought her almost worse than him for not even trying to protect her.

She still didn’t know why she gave her the cupcake that day. Never before had she done anything special or kind for Natalie. The only rewards she doled out were for work done well or unwavering obedience. Birthdays did usually merit a special treat, but not if Natalie hadn’t been in her father’s good graces at that time. The oddity of the cupcake was enough to pull her out of the fog and remind her that she may have felt like dying, but hadn’t actually died yet.

It was enough.

“I know it probably sounds stupid, but the taste of the cupcake, it reminded me that I still had a chance to live, to escape and find something better.” She swiped at a tear that rolled down her cheek and turned her face into the pillow to hide. “I waited until night, snuck out of the basement through a window, and then snuck up to my bedroom. The only thing I took with me was the money I’d saved from babysitting.”

“Why didn’t you take more?” Vance asked.

Natalie’s brow creased as she looked over at him. “The money was the only thing that was mine.”

She said it plainly, confused why Vance was even asking. Everything else in her room belonged to her parents. She knew that. Her father had always made it abundantly clear. He had paid for her furniture and clothes, her books and the few personal items she had been allowed. Taking anything more than the money would have been stealing from him.

“Oh, Natalie,” Vance said. His fingers tightened into a fist as he shook his head slowly. “I don’t want this to scare you, but it is so difficult for me not to touch you right now.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I just want to hold you, and I know I can’t, but it’s killing me that you grew up believing you were barely more than a possession to be controlled.”

Her mouth twitched at the idea of him touching her, but it didn’t frighten her nearly as much as it would have only a few hours earlier. She couldn’t even dream of telling him it was okay, but the idea of it didn’t send her running, for once. It took a moment to get past that thought. When she did, the rest of his words slowly sank in.

“When you left your home…” She trailed off, feeling stupid and naïve for even having to ask a question that must have seemed so juvenile to Vance.

He didn’t laugh or look at her like she was ignorant. The compassion she had seen earlier remained as he spoke. “When I left, I took my clothes and computer, books, music, things like that. The dorm I was staying in had furniture already, so I didn’t take my bed or dresser, but if I had been moving into an apartment and none of my siblings had needed the furniture, my parents would have been fine with me taking it.”

“And that’s…normal?”

The corners of his mouth turned up. “Natalie, no family is really normal, but that is fairly standard for parents to allow their kids to take their personal belongings when they leave home.” His expression dulled as Natalie’s own expression fell into shame. He stopped himself from reaching out and looked at her seriously. “You had your money, at least, right? You were able to find somewhere to stay and get new things?”

The hope in his eyes broke her heart. Her answer must have shown on her face because sadness spread across his features immediately. “As soon as I got away, the guilt hit. I could barely breathe. I had no idea what was happening. I thought I was being punished by…I honestly didn’t know if it was him somehow doing it to me or some other being, God or something I didn’t know enough about to understand.”

“A panic attack,” Vance said in defeat.

“I thought I must have made the wrong choice, but I couldn’t bring myself to go back. I just kept walking, feeling like I was going to be swallowed up by some force that would cast a final judgment and expose how horrible I had been. The depression I’d felt locked up in the basement hit again and I couldn’t shake it by myself,” Natalie admitted though it made her shrink in on herself to speak the words.

Vance shook his head angrily. “Don’t,” he commanded, “don’t blame yourself and don’t pull away from me.” She froze, staring at him, not in fear exactly, but with a great deal of uncertainty. Seeing her reaction, he sighed and scrubbed a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you, I just…how long? How long were you on your own like that?”

It took Natalie several tries before she managed to answer. “Three…three weeks.”

“You said you needed help to get going again…”

Natalie nodded, her body relaxing slowly as better memories rose above the worst ones. “A woman. She was homeless, not living under the overpass like I was, but she came there a lot. We’d never spoken. I didn’t talk to anyone. I barely even moved.” Natalie still wondered every day what made the woman want to stop and help her. “One day, she sat down by me and set a sandwich down next to my head. It was the first time I’d felt hungry in weeks. It sounds stupid to say it out loud, but the smell of that warm sandwich got to me just like the cupcake had. It was this reminder that I wasn’t ready to die. No matter what I had been through already, things could get better. I didn’t really believe it then, but I was really, really hungry.”

Smiling, Vance said, “Food is a good motivator. Your shrimp linguine worked pretty well on me last night. Believe me, I understand what you’re saying.”

His words affected her deeply because she knew he meant them. Cupcakes and sandwiches sounded so silly to talk about, but he truly understood what it felt like to be so lost you didn’t even know if you wanted to go on anymore.

“How did you go from sleeping on the streets to graduating college and landing a good job?” Vance asked with a lighter tone than he’d had earlier.

Shrugging, Natalie relaxed. This part of her story wasn’t as hard to talk about. “The woman told me about a women’s shelter. I was pretty weak and I looked awful, but they took me in and allowed me to get cleaned up.”