Statistic (23 page)

“I was assigned to follow Brent a long time ago. I’ve been on this case for almost two years, Aurora. I saw you out on that one date with him and then we met on that stupid site. I was genuinely on there looking for a real relationship. I just didn’t expect it with you. I never thought in a million years I would end up involved with someone who was smack dab in one of my cases. Hell, I can and probably will lose my job for being so involved in this. I slept with someone I was supposed to be protecting from that monster.” He scrubs his hands down his face, and closes his eyes. He is hurting and I can see it. But I am too damn it.

“I don’t want your excuses.” I shoot back at him without even caring how much my words will probably hurt him. There is a part of me that doesn’t want to hurt him. And then there is a huge part of me that wants to tear him to pieces and emotionally gut him. Just like he did to me the minute I realized so much of our life together had been based on lies.

“I fell in love with you. Not the woman I was supposed to be watching and protecting. I love you, Aurora, and I know that I lied, but that comes with my job sometimes. I wish it wasn’t like that and if you ever forgive me, I promise I will never ever lie to you again. Never. I swear on everything that is holy.” I can see a tear starting to form in one of his eyes before he quickly blinks it away.

“I let you into my life. I introduced you to my son, Jackson. Do you understand how big of a deal that is? You lied. You betrayed me and my trust. How can I ever get past that?” I don’t even know what to say. What am I going to tell Liam?

I had allowed myself to become so quickly attached to him, and his family only for it all to go to shit. I should have known my life was never meant to be calm and happy.

“Aurora, not one minute of my time with you and Liam was a lie. Nor was introducing you to my family. Yes, it sucked not letting everyone welcome you properly into the whole police family. But, that isn’t a choice I got to make when I took this case. I wanted to make sure this man didn’t kill anyone else. He is dangerous and has been praying on women for almost five years. When you walked into the middle of this case, it became personal to me. The minute I walked in your house and saw him strangling you on your living room floor, I couldn’t imagine my damn life without you. I saw all those other women he strangled and killed. Tossing them to the side like garbage. You aren’t garbage. You are the love of my fucking life and he was killing you!” His words shock me. So many admissions in one statement.

Love, and death. His case and all the women that came before me. Almost five years, the same amount of time he lived being a widower. I can’t help but wonder if the loss of his wife turned him into the monster he became. I wouldn’t make excuses for Brent or the nightmare he has caused for countless families, but underneath the sociopath killer was a doting father I watched care for his son on so many occasions.

“Max. Where is Max?” my mind thinks of the innocent boy stuck in the middle of this. The same child who became best friends with my own son. The little boy who is only a few short months older than my son.

“His son?” Jackson asks, not recognizing the boy’s name.

“Yes.”

“He is in the custody of child services. There is no other family willing to take him.” Jackson says with a shrug of his shoulders. My heart breaks for the boy who not only lost his mother from the start of life, but now no longer has a father. I can’t even imagine leaving Liam behind without me or Colin.

“I want him,” I say without even thinking about the long term repercussions. That boy deserves more than being thrown into the system. To live with some low life pieces of shit who are just looking for a state sponsored payday. Or worse.

“I can get you the number for child services, but I don’t have that kind of pull Aurora.” Jackson says as he starts thumbing through some numbers in his phone.

“Get them on the line. I want him in my care when I am finally released from this shithole.” I demand. Maybe romance isn’t in the cards for me. Maybe I just need to focus on helping this little boy get on with his life now that he has been abandoned in life. I need to help him. Keep him from turning into the same kind of monster his father became.

Or at least this time I would really die trying.

Jackson

A long time ago, I met and fell in love with the most wonderful woman in the world. She was everything my mother always said a woman should be. Loving, patient, nurturing and most of all, she dealt with my shit. And boy did I give her a lot of that.

I never thought I would have to walk this world alone. But when she left, that is exactly what I have had to do. Each day.

From that day on I tried to replace her. Repeatedly.

Nothing worked.

Nobody could match her.

My love for her and life dwindled.

My rage began to build.

That is when I met him and our game took shape.

I never wanted to be a monster. But that is exactly what I became. What I will always be.

I never expected Aurora Alexander to walk into my life and make me want to be a better person, but she did. I hated her even more than all the others because of that. She made me realize there was something wrong with me. She made me know I could never have that happily ever after again. Even though I would try my fucking damnedest to get that fairytale ending.

I couldn’t help myself.

I couldn’t stop my own actions.

I only hope that one day she will be able to forgive me for the damage I know I caused in her life and hope her trauma doesn’t turn her into the bitter and jaded person I became after my world crumbled.

I hope that she can still shine in this world even though my actions will dull her bright light.

If you read this. If anyone reads this. Please never show my beautiful Aurora this note. Please never know who I am or what I have done because I know without a shadow of a doubt that she would never forgive me.

I want her to know that she deserves happiness. Let her know that despite the bumps and bruises in her life, she deserves to be loved and cherished. Just like I cherished the woman who walked out on me all those years ago.

I don’t expect forgiveness. I don’t deserve it either, and I know I never will.

I just want to be free.

And Aurora is my freedom.

Each day is a blessing.

That is the motto I have lived my life by since I was released from the hospital. Every morning when I wake up in the same home I was nearly killed in, I smile because I am alive. I am here with my son, doing the best that I can for him. I won’t let what Brent did taint the person I am or dictate who I will become. That would just be giving him and what he did way too much power in my life.

The therapy has been twice a week. I need that outlet to discuss the trials and tribulations I am dealing with in my own mind while I walk through life with a smile on my face. For one full month I have smiled even though I am pretty broken on the inside. I miss Jackson, but I would never admit that to anyone but my therapist.

He lied to me and that is more than I can forgive right now. And boy do I have a laundry list of things and people I really need to forgive. I know while I felt the life drain from my body I went through a long list of people who I needed to bury the hatchet with. But now that I am here and existing, it is far too hard to focus on that.

Two days after I was released from the hospital, Max was released into my care through child services. I was the closest thing the boy had to any real connection in his life. Knowing his father wouldn’t be coming back and having to discuss that with him was heartbreaking. Alas, I was probably the best person to talk with him about it. The state has continued to look for a permanent home for him in the case that I won’t be willing to keep him long term, but I don’t see that being the case.

In his daily recovery, Liam was the best thing for him. Colin had stepped up and let Max come on some of the weekend visits, because the only thing Max had clung to in this whole ordeal was his best friend, Liam. I know it won’t be long until these boys look at each other as brothers and I am alright with that because the reality of the situation is… Max needs a mother. He always has and I think in some fucked up way, Brent was trying to replace his late wife with a group of imperfect women that would never hold a candle to her.

I pity him and the words I spoke to him in the end, I meant. I forgive him for everything he did. I can’t hold onto that kind of hate or fear in my life hoping that some day it will wash away or that I will magically hit a point where it doesn’t bother me anymore. I am sure in the back of my mind it will always bother me.

I feel safe once again. Something that has been a foreign feeling since the first break in at my condo. I know that he can’t hurt me again. He is buried in the Lakeview Cemetery, under a big beautiful tree covered in Spanish moss. Someplace he would have loved.

I shouldn’t care that he is content in the afterlife, but when you share a friendship with someone, a connection like we had it just doesn’t mysteriously disappear overnight. I cared for him, and even though I know now that many things he said and did were lies fueled by severe mental illness, I just can’t hate him for it.

Hate is an unwelcome emotion in my life.

I’ve done my best to try and move on with my life, and even decided to try and go on another date. Wesley continued to call in the days and weeks after the attack, which was plastered all over the local news.

ATTEMPTED MURDER: DATING SITE STRANGLER STRIKES AGAIN

LOCAL WOMAN ESCAPES SERIAL STRANGLER

SINGLE MOTHER MAKES UNSAFE DATING CHOICES

DATING SITE DIVA ALMOST LOSES LIFE

The idiotic headlines were intolerable. The details of my life that were plastered for the public to see became embarrassing and I wondered if and when life would ever become normal again for me. Not only did it impact my life and my child in the way that I couldn’t even leave my house without someone trying to take pictures of us, but the scrutiny I got when I took Max in was absolutely appalling.

What people forget is the fact that not only was I a victim, but so was Max. He didn’t ask to be born, or dragged along on Brent’s wild ride of a life. This boy deserved every chance at life that Liam did and I would bend over backwards and give that to him as long as the state of South Carolina would allow me to. I can only hope that down the line after all the red tape is handled, that I can finalize an adoption of Max and help him to forget all of the trauma any of us have gone through.

Wesley.

My darling Wesley. He meant well, but all along he continued to think our relationship would start back up in where it left off in the bathroom of that restaurant bathroom. Which would not be happening anytime this century. After a nice evening of wining and dining, we parted ways. I went home to my boys who had been tucked into bed by Miss Pam.

The one thing I came away from that date with was closure. I knew Wesley wasn’t the man for me and whatever happened between us in a moment of lust so many months ago was just that. Lust. We were two lonely, and apparently horny, people who saw a moment of opportunity. Nothing more and nothing less.

The kind of man he was just didn’t do it for me. The showing of money and the flaunting of things he took pride in wasn’t a life I could see myself fitting into with my children. While in the back of my mind I knew he had a daughter, there was rarely much talk about her leading me to know exactly what kind of parent he truly was. The same kind Colin was when we first parted ways.

Which is fine. Just not fine for me. Or fine for my life.

Today, I would be helping throw a baby shower for Jillian. She is due in three months, and everyone was so anxious to shower their precious little baby girl with gifts. I made quick friends with her two younger sisters to plan the event. The young girls had virtually no idea what they were doing except for when it came to ordering dessert.

Co-parenting with another woman who I often found myself jealous of was certainly trying. I couldn’t help but think back to the way Colin treated me when I was pregnant with Liam, days that were supposed to be my happiest but turned the darkest because of him made me green with envy of the way he doted on her during this time.

People live and they learn. They grow up and they learn how to better themselves from the wrong they have done in the past I could say that I was genuinely proud of Colin for the way he was moving on with his life in the right direction. Finally.

As the rented hall began to pack in with friends and family to celebrate Jillian’s first child, my mind went back to Jackson and the what if’s we had said about having more children. I shake my head and try and clear the thoughts from my mind. That is all over now.

“Stop looking to miserable,” Jillian comes up to me and whispers in my ear. She laughs as she pokes me in the side. “You need to call him and stop moping around.” she says, reminding me that everyone on earth really knew exactly what was already going on inside my head.