Beyond Revenge (The Ransom Series) (15 page)

I hand him the keys without a word and
jump into the back seat where Jack is already s
itting
on the other side and putting his jacket over Morgan’s exposed body.  I pull
her to my chest and hold her head against me protectively as she sobs into me,
her breathing ragged and her body trembling.  With each heave of her chest
,
my heart breaks a little more.

“I’ve got you.  He can’t hurt you
anymore,” I say soothingly while caressing her back and running my fingers
lightly through her hair.

She reaches her
hand up to my neck desperately, as if
clinging on to me for dear life
.  My throat instantly constricts
when I feel that it’s covered tightly in bandages.  As I take in
the similar bandaging on her other hand and remember the bruises and cuts on
her face
,
I turn to Jack with concern.
 
“How is she?”

Jack looks at me uneasily.  In his lack
of reply
,
Robert turns around from the driver’s seat. 
He looks just as worried as I feel.

I glance back down at the broken,
crying girl in my
arms
, wondering just how successful
Mark has been at destroying the most beautiful thing in my life, before
returning to meet Jack’s gaze.  “What the hell did he do to her?”

“She escaped,” he says simply.

My eyes instantly go wide.  I want to
know more
,
but I don’t want to talk about this in
front of Morgan.  I just need to be here for her, to make her feel safe and
loved, to give her all the comfort I’ve been prevented from giving
her
for
over
three months.  I tighten my grip
on her
,
wishing desperately that I could take away her
pain and fear, but I know it’s not that easy.

Robert observes me holding his
daughter, and some of the worry leaves his face.  He
look
s forward and starts the engine. 
As he turns the car around,
I take o
ne last glance at the cabin, catching the
moment
the
roof collaps
es
down into the
rest of the building just before Robert drives us down the rough and narrow
dirt road.  The burning house disappears from view.

“I need to look at that,” Jack says
quietly next to me, nodding at my arm.

When I hear his words
,
I remember the drips of blood that came down from me when I was
hovering over Mark in the cabin.  I’ve not paid any attention to where the
blood came from.  The terrified woman in my arms has been my utmost priority.

I look down
at
my upper arm and see the blood dripping down from a
large
horizontal mark in the skin.

“It
’s just
a
graze,” I say, returning my attention to Morgan in my lap.

Jack doesn’t shrug the wound off as
easily as I do.  He tears off a
long
piece of his
shirt and
ties
it firmly
around my arm over
the wound to stop the bleeding.

By the time we get back to the main
dirt road, Morgan’s body is no longer shaking in my arms.  She has mercifully
fallen asleep, and other than the occasional
tremor in her limbs and
whimper from her lips
,
she is resting
peacefully against me.

I move a few stray strands of hair away
from her battered face that glows in the light from the dashboard of the car.  Anger
swells inside me to see her new marks and bruises and the bandages on her hands,
but
I
can’t give in to it.  I have to maintain
control.

“Was this her punishment for escaping?”
I ask Jack quietly.

He shakes his head.  “She injured her
hands while escaping
her
handcuffs when we went into
town
this morning
.  She was out in the
woods
for hours before we saw her on the road on the way back to the
cabin.  She tried to run
,
and Mark chased her.”  He
pauses before continuing, lowering his voice.  “He said she told him to do
this.  She demanded that he hit her.”

A painful lump forms in my throat at
the thought of this.  I know exactly what she was thinking.  Too many times
before when Mark beat me I egged him on, trying to get him to hit me hard
enough to knock me unconscious so I didn’t have to be awake to live through the
physical and emotional
pain he was inflicting on me. 
I don’t doubt Morgan experienced the exact same feeling.

I want desperately to peek under the
jacket that covers Morgan’s body to
look at
the rest
of her and focus on
her midsection in
particular, but
I don’t dare move for fear of disturbing her.

“How
’
s the
baby?” I ask Jack, trying to hold back the emotion that wants to spill out of
me at the thought of the
tiny
human growing inside
her.

“Your baby’s fine,” Jack replies.

I give him a sideways look.  “She told
you, then?”

Jack nods.  “She didn’t mean to, but it
slipped.”  He gives me a slight smile before his face turns more serious. 
“You’ll make a great father, Leo.  You’ll both make great parents.”

It’s impossible to hold back my
emotional response any longer.  I’m going to be a father.  I have Morgan safe
in my arms, my unborn baby resting comfortably in her belly, and we’re taking
them both away from a hell I couldn’t save them from soon enough.  I’m finding
the pieces
of
my broken world and can start the slow
process of putting
them all
back together.

I can fix us.  I just need time.

“Thank you,” I say to Jack as tears
roll down my cheeks and onto Morgan’s hair.  “Thank you for everything you
did.  I’m so glad she had you with her.”

Jack smiles at me
thoughtfully
.  “She’ll make it through this.  You both will.”

I hope he’s right.

I’ll do anything to make this right.

His Support

∞

I was lost.

Even before the
upside down turn.

The destruction
and reinvention of me.

Perhaps the
finding of my true self.

Discovery of life
and love.

And he led me
there, holding on.

Never letting go.

My rock.

He will bring me
back.

I am found.

∞

My eyes shoot open.  My entire body
jumps as I feel like I’m endlessly falling and there’s nothing to stop me, but
something catches me.

A bed.

A hand in mine.

“Morgan?”

The voice calls to me, and in the
second it takes me to sit up and orient myself with my immediate surroundings through
the rapid breathing of my chest
,
I feel completely
lost and afraid.

Then I see him
and
focus on him.  I throw my arms around his neck,
tightly shut
my eyes, and
sob against him
.  I hold on
to him like he’s the only solid piece of land in the surrounding ocean of chaos
that wants nothing more than to drown me, to pull me to its depths and never
let me go.

But I take comfort.  I know Leo will
pull me out of it, and he won’t let me go, either.

“It’s okay.”  Leo’s voice cracks as he
says it.  He’s grasping on to me just as tightly, though his touch still
remains gentle and soothing, his skin warm against me.  The familiar feeling of
his deep breathing against my body slows down my sobs.  My ragged draws of
breath become more even, settling back into a normal pattern.

My eyes open
,
and I pull back to take him in.  His dark hair hangs down in his face,
partially hiding his eyes.  There’s scruff on his chin and jawline, adding to
his overall look of exhaustion.  I see relief there, too, though.  I see
happiness and the man who protected me and loved me and did anything and
everything to save me.  I see all of Leo
and
all my
love for him in that one glance.

“I just can’t believe it,” I say
through my tears.

It’s strange to be sitting next to
him.  I’ve dreamed of this
for so long
: what he would
look like, how he would feel in my arms,
how much comfort he would give
me just with his presence.
  I’ve been waiting for this
,
and now that it’s here
,
I don’t know what
to think or how to feel or what to say.

We have so much to make up for.  How do
we possibly begin to put the pieces of
ourselves
back
together?

“You should turn around,” Leo says as
he nods toward the other side of the room behind me.

My head turns in that direction
,
and I’m immediately overwhelmed by a new wave of tears.

Across the small
motel
room we’re in, on the other side of
the
second bed in the room, my parents are standing there, hand-in-hand, looking
back at me.

Mom rushes across the room, breaking
out into heavy sobs the moment she has me in her arms.  I hug her back and cry
my own drenching tears into her shirt.  It feels like
it’s been
ages since I’ve seen her and felt her
motherly
comfort and warmth.

It’s then that I realize how much I’ve
taken her for granted in my life.  I should consider myself lucky to have a mom
who cares for me as much as she does, someone who has always been there for me
and will continue to be.  Not everyone has such a loving parent in their lives.

I feel damn lucky.

When we pull back from our embrace
,
we both laugh slightly as we try and fail to stop the tears
rushing down our faces.  We’re just big sobbing messes
,
and it only gets worse when Dad comes up behind us and pulls us
both against him into an enveloping embrace.

“I’m sorry about everything.  I’m so
sorry,” I plead with them.

Dad lets go of us and gives me a tearful
yet serious look.  “You have nothing to be sorry about.  Absolutely nothing. 
You’re safe.  That’s all that matters.”

I nod my head in acknowledgement
,
but I still feel awful
for the choices I’ve made
.  “I missed all of you so damn much.”  I look
from my
parents
back to Leo behind me and realize that it was true
they were working together.  “How the hell did Dad not kill you the moment he
saw you?”

Leo’s face forms into the most exquisite
smile, bright and free.
 
“He warmed up to me
eventually,” he replies as he shares a look with Dad.

They seem comfortable together, like
Leo fits into
Dad’s
world perfectly even though they
couldn’t be from more different
backgrounds
.  It’s
such a strange blending of my former life and the life I’ve been living the
last s
even
months.

It’s clear that I’m not the only one
who has changed.  I was at the center of it all, but this experience has
inevitably affected more than just me.

There are so many questions I want to
ask.  I can barely keep them all in.  “You got my message, then?  Did the pine
needle help?”

Dad
beams
at
me. 
“It
led us to California.  You narrowed our
search area from the entire world down to one state
.
”

His words slowly absorb into me. 
“California…” 
I knew we were in the forest
,
but I never would have
translated that to California.  “How did you find me in the entire state of California?”

“Jack,” Leo replies.  “His cigar habit
led us to you.”

I stare at him blankly
.  “I don’t
understand.”

“I could smell
the hint of
his cigars on your letter. 
It made me realize
he’d make Mark buy more at some point
, so we sent
pictures and information out to every smoke shop in the state. 
When he took Jack out to get medical
supplies
yesterday
morning,
they made a stop at a local cigar
shop.  Your dad got the call from the store clerk who gave us directions into
the mountains.”

I sigh in relief then realize that
someone from Leo’s story is missing from the room around us, and my words come
out in a flurry of panic.
 
“Where is Jack?  Is he
okay?”

Leo grasps my hand, bringing
me
back down from my worried state.  “He’s fine.  He’s outside having
a smoke as we speak.”

“Thank God,” I say as my bandaged hand
rushes to my chest to calm my racing heart.  For the first time I take in the
rest of my body, surprised to find myself wearing my own clothes: a baggy gray
T-shirt with my high school’s emblem on the front and the hint of my favorite
navy blue sweatpants around my waist peeking out from underneath the bed
sheets.  They’re so familiar and comfortable.  They feel like home against my
skin.

When I bring
up
my
hand
to brush
a few loose
strands of hair from
my face
,
my
body instantly shivers.  Mark’s scent is
still
on me. 
The remnants of how he touched me and
violated me and
tried
to force himself on me in those final hours is still etched into my skin.  I
have to get it off even if that means scrubbing the skin raw.

“I need a shower,” I say, observing the
worried looks on my family’s faces around me.  My eyes go to the one place that
a child can always look to for support and comfort.  “Mom, can you help me?”

Her
concerned
face
softens
into a smile,
and she looks ready to burst
into tears again.  “Of course.”

Leo pulls the rest of the bed sheets
off me
as
Mom helps me up from the bed and doesn’t let
go of me.  I give Dad and Leo a small smile before unsteadily making my way
into the bathroom.  Mom closes and locks the door behind us.

The moment my eyes meet the mirror in
the revealing fluorescent light
ing from
above it
,
I realize just how much of a mess I am.  My hair is disheveled and
its dark red coloring is almost completely gone, making me look like my normal
self except for the large bruises and various cuts
on my face
.  It’s impossible to look at my injuries and not remember the man
who put them there.

I have to look away.

Mom grasps my shoulders, facing me to
her.  “You okay, sweetie?” she asks softly.

I nod, afraid to speak for fear that
releasing my voice might unleash a
new
avalanche of
tears.

She doesn’t seem convinced by my
answer, but she lets go of me to turn on the shower anyway.  I start to pull at
the bottom of my T-shirt
,
but Mom’s hands take over
instead.  “Let me help you with this.”

She lifts the shirt up over my head and
carefully removes it, then inches my sweatpants and underwear down my legs. 
Before I was taken I would have been
more
self-conscious
about standing naked in front of anyone, even my mom, but after everything I’ve
been through
,
it seems ridiculous to have that kind of
worry now.  I’ve had it so much worse than baring myself physically to others.

I look down and take in the bump
clearly visible in my belly.  My bandaged hand instinctively moves to touch it,
my fingers raking over the skin that hides and protects what I hope to be the
piece of love that Leo and I share growing inside me.  When my gaze returns to
meet Mom’s eyes
,
I see that she has silent tears
running down her cheeks, and my throat instantly tightens.

“I’m not ready,” I
whisper
.  My control is quickly vanishing.  Panic consumes me.  “How am I
supposed to be a mother when I’m this broken?  How can I get over this?  I
don’t know what to do.”

Mom envelops me in her comforting arms,
holding me tightly as we both cry against each other.  Between her touch and
the warmth of the steam filling the room from the shower, my worry starts to
dissipate and I regain some amount of control.

She holds me there until I’m
finally
ready to let go
and pull back
.  With
her hand on my shoulder
,
she
encourages
me to look at her.  “I’ll be here for you every step of the way. 
Dad and Leo will
be
, too.  Even Jack.”  She wipes away
a stray tear and smiles at me.  “We’re all here for you.  You’re not alone in
this.  You’ll make a wonderful mother.  I just know you will.”

I take a deep breath and try to find
comfort in her words.  It’s hard to remember that I’m actually free, that my
family is here with me and I don’t have to be trapped and tortured in a strange
place anymore.  Though I’ll have a constant reminder of what happened to me
inside my belly, I have the opportunity to move forward now.  I can find
normalcy again.  I can embrace life and love and leave as much of the pain and
heartache behind as my mind will let me.

Mom checks the water temperature and
helps me step into the shower
while holding
on to my
bandaged hands lightly.  “Don’t get these wet.  I’ll wash you.  I’ll scrub it
all away.”

I nod at her appreciatively and keep my
hands above me as the warm stream of water rains over the rest of my body.  Mom
steps over to the counter to get something before
returning with soap
lather
ed
in a washcloth.

I recognize the lavender scent and
smile.  “You brought my favorite soap?”

“I wanted you to have some familiar
things, some pieces of home.”

My smile only widens at this as Mom
takes the washcloth against me, rubbing gently but with the subtle force that I
know will be needed to erase any hint of Mark from my skin.

When I’m completely scrubbed down and
rinsed
,
it’s time to wash my hair.  I get it wet and
lean my head back as
Mom
massages my familiar
clean-scented shampoo and conditioner into my hair and helps me rinse it all out.

By the time she turns off the shower
and helps me towel dry
,
I feel infinitely better, like
I’ve just washed the last s
even
months off me with the
memories of Mark down the drain.  I’m
more than
ready
for this clean start
to my life.

Mom wraps the towel around me tightly. 
“I have more of your clothes in the room.  Let me get you something clean to
wear.”

In the moment it takes her to open the
door and sneak out, I catch sight of Leo sitting on the bed.  He looks at me,
and when our eyes connect
,
he flashes the largest
grin.  I see in him a glimpse of the happy and carefree Leo I shared dinner
with the night before we were ripped apart from each other.  It’s a relief to
know that part of him still remains.  I can only hope to find that same person
within me again.