Chapter Eighteen

Veronica

I felt like I had just watched Jude crack himself open and reveal his innermost being to me. The pain that he was feeling was obvious, radiating off him toward me, and I wanted nothing more than to wrap myself around him and take that ache away from him. I wanted to soothe him and protect him, guarding him from whatever else might come to hurt him. The reality of the memories that I brought up and the agony that I caused him when I forced him to face the Christmas decorations again sat heavily on me and I felt like I was crushing beneath it, but I didn't want to let it. He had poured himself out to me and the only way that I could show him how valuable his honesty was to me was to do the same for him.

I sat the cup of coffee that had long-since gone cold on the tray that had been set up between us and stood. Stepping up in front of Jude, I loosened the blanket from around myself and eased the bottom of his shirt up to reveal my thigh.

"You once asked me where I got this scar," I said.

He nodded, lifting his hand to run his fingertips along the length of the scar. I had pulled away from him the first time that he touched the scar, but this time I stood still, allowing him to explore it. I didn't feel embarrassed anymore. It wasn't a sign of shame, but one of courage.

"You wouldn't tell me where you got it," he said.

"Do you still want to know?"

He looked up at me. His eyes were tinged with red and the years were more evident in them, but I could still see him there.

"Yes," he said.

I nodded and drew in a breath. I lowered the shirt back into place and wrapped the blanket tightly around myself before sitting on the bed beside him. I needed the closeness of his body. I needed to feel him near me when I sank backwards into memories that I had kept myself from revisiting for years. Not since I told Javi had I given anyone a glimpse into that night and, beyond my grandmother, he remained the only one who had heard the full story outside of who I could only remember as a sea of anonymous faces hovering above suits who held truth and future in their hands. Though I felt that I had told as much as I could to them, I knew that there were details that I hadn't shared with them. They were still lodged within me.

"I didn't always not have a family. I had parents and a sister. We were so close. One night we had been out bowling. It was a few days after my sister's birthday and she had had her birthday party with her friends, but my parents always insisted on us celebrating important days just as a family. They didn't want us to ever question how much they loved us or to not have memories of us all together when we grew up. Lessie chose bowling for our family outing weeks before her birthday and we had both been looking forward to it so much. I had even balled up a bunch of aluminum foil and rolled it at empty paper towel rolls to practice. I was so sure that that was going to be the night that I finally knocked over more than four pins."

"In one roll?"

"In total. I loved bowling, but I was terrible at it. I don't really remember bowling that night. I know that we went, and I know that we drank root beer floats. I can still see Lessie taking a huge sip of hers and smiling at me with the end of her nose smeared with ice cream. She was so beautiful. Everybody always talked about how different we looked because my hair was so dark and hers was pale blond. Everything about her was soft and light. She looked like an advertisement for an ice cream parlor in the fifties that night. I had convinced myself that one day I was going to grow up to look just like her. Somehow my hair was going to change color and I was going to have our father's pale complexion like her. The one thing about us that made us look like sisters was our eyes. She had the same blue eyes."

"The bowling alley was just a few blocks away and it was warm that night, so we had walked. Taking walks with my family was one of my favorite things to do. My parents would stroll along holding hands, smiling at each other like they had some little secret between them. They loved each other with absolutely everything that they had inside of them. I think that that's what made that night even harder."

"What happened?"

"We were walking home from the bowling alley and I thought I heard footsteps on the sidewalk behind us. I didn't say anything because I didn't want them to think that I was just being a baby who was afraid of the dark. I had convinced my parents to let me stay up with my sister during her birthday sleepover and watch the movie that they watched, and I didn't want them to know that even though it was a completely silly movie, it had terrified me. I knew that that would make them not want to let me stay up late anymore or keep me from watching movies. So, I just ignored them. Then I heard the footsteps get louder and realized that the rhythm wasn't even. There were too many steps for it be just one person."

"There were two?"

"Three," I said. I could still hear the sound of the footsteps in my ears and I steeled my mind against it. "I looked over at my father. I knew that he would make me feel better. He would tell us to move out of the way so that the people behind us, who were probably joggers, could go past, or he would turn around and recognize the people now getting close enough behind us that I could hear the distinctiveness of their steps against the pattern of our own. What I hadn't noticed was that ours were getting faster. By the time that I looked at my father, we were almost running. Rather than looking relaxed, he looked terrified. His face was set and his eyes were wide. He was focused ahead of us, getting faster as we went. In an instant, he looked at me and told me to run."

"Did you?"

I nodded. I pulled the blanket closer, trying to ward off the chill that was starting to settle in on my body.

"I tried to. I could see our house. It was just ahead. I took off running toward it, then glanced over my shoulder to see if Lessie was with me. She wasn't and I paused to let her catch up. By the time that I started running again, I could hear muffled screaming and I instinctively knew that two of the men who had been behind us now had my parents. I heard my sister scream for me to run and I took off as fast as I could. But I didn't know what to do. All my life my parents had tried to instill in me what I should do if there was ever an emergency. Suddenly, though, all of that was gone. I couldn't remember anything that I was supposed to do. I didn't run for help. I didn't scream. I ran for my house. The doors were locked, but I knew that there was a key hidden. I got it and I went inside. I just left my family behind." I hung my head. "I should have done something. If I had gone to a neighbor's house right then, it would have stopped."

"You were just a child," Jude said. "If I can't be held responsible for not being able to stop my son being taken when I was an adult, how can you possibly blame yourself for something that happened when you were far too young to have that kind of responsibility? You should have been protected, not thinking about protecting anyone else."

I brushed a stray tear that had fallen to my cheek and kept going.

"When I got inside, I hid under the bed. I remembered thinking that very night before I went to sleep my father would check to make sure that there were no monsters there waiting for me, but now I was curled up under there and the monsters were actually in my house. I could hear them downstairs coming through the door that I had opened. I couldn't understand what they were saying. For so long after the police asked me over and over what they said, telling me that it mattered, that it might give them some indication of who these people were and why they targeted my family. But it was like I had filtered it out like my brain had stopped the words from getting all the way in."

"Did you ever remember?"

I nodded.

"A long time later I could remember little bits and pieces. Not whole sentences. I didn't know what any of it meant. But I remembered that they were talking to my father. They were asking him where something was. They said that they knew. That was all I remembered. Just that they said that they knew. Then one of them started coming up the stairs. They remembered that I was there. I got out from under the bed and tried to run, but he found me. He dragged me down the stairs to the laundry room where the rest of the family was tied up. I stood there looking at my parents, thinking how small and helpless they looked and that gutted me. I had always thought of my father as being so strong and powerful, and that my mother could have done anything that she wanted to. I had never for a second doubted either one of them or what they could do. But there they were at the mercy of these men, my sister at their feet."

"What did they do to you?"

I hesitated. I felt like I was in a stand-off with the words that he wanted me to say. They were enemies, the monsters that I had been afraid of as a child taking a new form. But I closed my eyes, squeezing them tightly, remembering first my grandmother then Javi telling me that I didn't need to be afraid anymore and that every time that I let those words scare me, I was giving the men power again. They had taken enough from me and I shouldn't allow them to steal my thoughts as well. I filled my lungs with a breath, bringing with it the comforting smell of Jude and soap, and pushed ahead. I forced myself through the painful barrier that tried to keep me from telling the whole story. I dug my fingertips into the darkest, most guarded recesses of my heart and clawed out the memories.

It caused a sharp pain, but I gritted my teeth against it and continued on.

I told Jude every detail. I didn't look into his face. I didn't want to see him flinch.

"They didn't like that I had run from them and thought that I would be a good form of leverage to get my father to tell them what they wanted to know. The three of them were tied up, but they left me untied. One of the men started cutting my clothes off and I moved, so he cut me. The other two were still digging through the house so he was the only one of them that was with us. I was so scared, but I looked at my father and, in that minute, I suddenly remembered everything that he had taught me. I knew that the man was planning something horrible for me. Of course, I know what that is now, but I was so young then. That's one of the things that I am more thankful for than I can even tell you. Not knowing the types of thoughts that were running through his head and what he wanted to do to me in front of my father protected me. It made it so that I was clear headed enough to know that something was about to happen, and when it did I had to act. I was bleeding, but I didn't feel any pain. Now I was almost naked, but I didn't care. The man reached his hand toward me and my father managed to move enough against restraints that he could kick him.

It wasn't very hard. I'm sure it didn't even hurt. But it startled the man enough that he let go of my wrist and turned toward my father. In that second, I ran. I don't remember getting through the house. I don't remember going out the door. I don't remember anything until I was in the hospital. My grandmother was sitting beside my bed and at first, she looked so happy just to see that I was awake. Then I realized that she had been crying and I knew that something was wrong. I asked for my parents and I asked for Lessie, but she just kept telling me that I needed to rest and get better. Then my room was full of police officers and they were asking me questions…"

"You felt like the world was coming down around you," Jude said.

I nodded.

"It was totally overwhelming and the fact that they wouldn't tell me what was going on made it even worse. I didn't understand why my parents weren't there to help me or to explain to me why these men were asking all these questions. I didn't understand why my grandmother was there with me and why she always seemed so sad when I woke up. It was almost a week before they finally decided that I was stable enough for them to tell me that they were all gone. I had run out of the house and gone to our next door neighbor's house, but they weren't home. I had to go to four other houses before I could find someone that would help me. I didn't remember any of that. The only reason that they knew was that the investigators followed the trail of blood from the house, through the yard, and to each of the houses. I felt like I had failed them. I had gone as fast as I could and did the best that I could to get help, but it wasn't enough. They reassured me that there was nothing that I could have done because most likely the man killed them even before I made it to the neighbor's house. But all I could think was that I should have gone to that house first. If I had, maybe... Maybe they would have been able to stop him."

"You can't let yourself think that way," Jude said. "There was absolutely nothing that you could have done. All that matters is that you were able to get out. Your father's last act what to save your life, and by running, you made sure that he did it."

"That's what kept me going as I got older," I said. "When they let me out of the hospital, I went to live with my grandmother. It took a long time for me to feel safe again. I didn't want to leave the house. I never wanted to be alone. I couldn't even hear the sounds of the washer or dryer without panicking. But she was right there. She was with me and she made sure that I knew that she loved me. Over time, I started to feel better. Then it all crashed down on me again."

"What happened?"

"They hadn't identified any of the men. We had cameras around our house, but they all had hoods and gloves. There was nothing to go on. I had accepted that they were never going to be able to and was actually relieved because it meant that the police weren't there all the time bothering me and trying to get me to somehow magically remember something that I hadn't in the years since. Then they told me something that they hadn't -- they had a fingerprint. All this time I thought that they didn't have any evidence at all, but then I find out that while they were upstairs, one of the men had taken off his gloves and there was one clear fingerprint. Just one. But it was enough to start making traces and all of a sudden, I remembered something. I don't know what it was about that fingerprint, but it was like it unlocked everything that I had been holding back since that night. I still didn't remember everything, but I started to remember more about the way that they looked and sounded and the things that they said."

"Why were they there?"

"My father's business partner had been dabbling in some things that were very illegal and these three men apparently thought that my father had something to do with it. They assumed that because he was the man's partner, he must have not only known what was going on but be involved. They hadn't been able to find some fairly damning information and a lot of money and they decided that it must be being kept at our house."

"Your father didn't know anything," Jude said.

It wasn't a question, but a statement. An acknowledgment of my father's innocence.

"No," I said. "They had already linked the fingerprint to one of the men and with everything that I was able to tell them, they got all three. They immediately flipped on my father's former partner. The police dragged him in and it didn't take long for him to crack once they told him about all the evidence that they had. There was really no way around it. I have never felt so much fury in my entire life as I did when I had to sit there in that courtroom and look him in the eye while he talked about what happened. He had come to see me in the hospital. He had sat with my grandmother and me at the funeral for all three of them. That whole time he pretended like he was so concerned about me and so devastated about everything that happened. He would well up in big tears whenever he talked about my father, and he even had a banquet in honor of him at their business and put up a plaque and everything. All along, he knew exactly what had happened and that it was his fault. Then that business had to be liquidated to pay restitution for everything that he had done. I got nothing from everything that my father had built and worked for."

"That's incredibly unfair. But you were really brave to go to court," Jude said. "I know that that couldn't have been easy."

"I almost didn't do it. The judge gave me the option of doing video testimony so that I wouldn't have to be in the room with the four of them. But Javi and my grandmother, mostly Javi, convinced me that it was something that I needed to do. He said that he would support me and be there for me no matter what I decided to do, but that if I never faced them, I would regret it. What I had to say was important and it was going to make it that much easier to ensure that they were convicted and got the most punishment possible. I didn't do it for me. I did it for my mother, my father, and my sister."

"Just like I lived for my wife," Jude said.

I nodded.

"So, I understand. I might not have gone through the same thing that you did and I hope that I never experience anything like that. But I can understand what it feels like to have someone else destroy your life. Or at least what you thought that your life was or was going to be."

"How long have you been living with Javi?" he asked.

I knew that wasn't what he was really asking. He was skirting around something that he didn't want to ask because he didn't want me to hear the words.

"Since I started college," I said. "My grandmother died a couple years ago." He nodded and I let out a long breath. "I guess I have my own version of the bedroom and nursery."

He narrowed his eyes at me.

"What do you mean?"

"When she died, she left me everything. The money that she left is what's been carrying me through. But that's not all that she left. I also got her house."

"Her house?"

I nodded.

"The house that she raised my father in, and where I grew up after they died. She owned it free and clear, so I do, too, now. But I haven't been able to go back in it. Not since right after her funeral. Everything is still in there. A few people went in just after to clean and find the papers and things that I needed, but they left everything else just as Nana had it. I don't want to go in and change anything. It's like I feel like the house remembers her."

"And you don't want it to forget."

I looked at Jude and he reached out to stroke the side of my face. I turned my cheek into his hand, closing my eyes to enjoy the warmth of his skin. My lips touched the heel of his hand and I grasped his wrist, not wanting to lose that contact. Jude shifted so that his body faced mine and wrapped his arm around my hips, lifting me up and settling me into his lap. I could sense that he craved our connection as much as I did. We needed each other in that moment. We had made ourselves completely vulnerable and now we needed to soothe the rawness, to fill the hollow, empty places left gaping by all that we had poured out to one another.

I wore nothing beneath the shirt and I rocked my hips against him, feeling the pressure of his hardening erection through his thin cotton lounge pants and knowing that he could feel my heat. Our mouths met and, in an instant, the shirt was on the floor. Jude held me tightly against his bare chest as he lifted his hips to slip his pants off so I could feel his hard-muscled thighs beneath my own.

My eyes closed and I let the heat and pleasure of his body carry me away.