Worth the Fight (Accidentally on Purpose) (12 page)

Chapter Thirteen

Emmy was having another nightmare.

I was sitting up in the living room, staring at some infomercial on the muted television. I couldn’t sleep because I was so damn worried about the paternity testing. I would take care of any child that is my own, but I didn’t want to resent my own child if I lost Emmy because of it. I was contemplating how I could still be a father to Claire’s kid and keep Emmy and Lucas with me when I heard outright sobbing from the bedroom. I jumped up and rushed into the bedroom.

“Em?” I said softly as I approached the bed.

When she didn’t respond but continued sobbing, I knew she was still asleep. I sat down on the edge of the bed and gently shook her. She lashed out suddenly, landing a punch right on my jaw. It stung, but that’s not why I stopped touching her. Clearly, she thought it was part of her attack. Hesitantly, I reached out and smoothed her hair out of her face. She flinched but she didn’t freak out again. I laid down beside her and continued to run my hand over her hair.

“Em, I’ll never let him hurt you again,” I whispered though I knew she probably couldn’t hear me, or if she did, she probably wouldn’t remember.

“You’re going to be okay,” I said. “I will always take care of you and Lucas. I won’t let anyone hurt you again. You’re safe with me, Em. Always.”

The sobbing had faded, though she still shuddered every few seconds, and a few tears still managed to push through the corners of her eyes. I continued to smooth her hair and murmur my vows until her breathing evened out and the nightmare passed. I stayed there with her for a long time. I knew I couldn’t be there when she woke up; so after a long time, I lightly pressed a lingering kiss on her forehead before forcing myself back into the living room.

*~~~*

“Sterling Corporation, Mayson Grayne speaking,” Mayson answered in a bored tone.

“You should leave that evil place and come work for a real man,” I said huskily into the phone.

“If you keep talking to me like that, I may comply,” Mayson laughed. “What’s up?”

“I just wanted to say hello and see how you were doing,” I said innocently.

“Uh huh. Really, what’s up?”

“Can’t a guy call and check up on his friend?”

“Of course he can,” she said. “But that’s not why you’re calling me,
friend
.”

“Okay, okay,” I conceded. “I actually have something s
erious to discuss with you.”

“Spit it out, Kessler,” she said with a soft sigh.

“Okay,” I said with my own sigh. “I’m just going to get to the point. Did Kyle hit Emmy?”

I heard a sharp intake of breath on the line. “You think so, too?”

“So, you think he did?” I pressed.

“Well…” she hesitated. “After you moved away, Kyle took her to Miami for a long weekend. She came back with a cast on her arm. Apparently she broke her wrist.”

“What? Really?”

“Yes. She said she was very drunk and she fell down.”

“But you didn’t believe her?” I asked, trying to ignore the pressure building in my ribcage.

“Absolutely not,” she stated clearly. “How much has Emmy told you about my past?”

“Not a whole lot. She doesn’t really bring up other people’s demons. I know you had some rough years when you were younger.”

“Rough is an understatement. In a nutshell, I was on drugs, I was bulimic, and I had an affinity for abusive loser boyfriends – one big bad one in particular. The whole I-fell-down-because-I-was-drunk bit had been used by me many times in the past. She should have known better than to use that excuse on me.”

“So, you’re convinced Kyle did it,” I concluded.

“I am, especially since from that point on she just seemed to get more and more depressed. Still, I may have allowed m
yself to be fooled, but the very day that cast came off, Kyle gave her a bracelet. She claimed it was just a gift for her recovery, but I’d bet my ass it was an ‘I’m-sorry-I’m-an-asshole-and-broke-your-arm’ gift. And I would catch her staring at the bracelet, not with admiration, but with…I don’t know…bitterness…sadness.”

I was suddenly nauseous. “The bracelet…is it…does it have leaves on it and diamonds?”

I heard a gasp. “She
wears
it? Oh my god! That’s so…so…I don’t know…fucked up!”

Fucked up indeed. I had not seen her wear it in a while, but now I was wondering if all of the times she did if it just made her somehow feel closer to Kyle. Why would she want to feel closer to Kyle if his violent act is what got her the bracelet in the first place?

I ran a hand through my hair as I considered this. “Do you think he hurt her more than that?”

“She had an occasional small bruise here and there,” Mayson sighed. “Not enough for me to believe he was pushing her around, but it’s possible. Emmy is the last person I would think would let some dick repeatedly hit her, but I think that’s why she took off New Year’s Day.”

“Is that when she left Jersey?”

“Yep. Packed up and left all of a sudden. I didn’t know she was gone until Sam called me to tell me Emmy had been in an accident. She said Em was banged up really good. It all seemed very mysterious to me, but I had no proof either way. Kyle had also disappeared off of the face of the earth. I later found out he was in rehab, had been there since New Year’s Day. That was one big coincidence.

“It was like someone hit a light switch, Luke. New Year’s Eve she was, well, depressed, but still kicking, and then suddenly she was a completely different person. She crawled under a rock and died. Honestly, if she wasn’t pregnant with Lucas, I’m not sure if she would have lived through whatever she was going through.”

I called Sam next. She had the other half of the story. She would be able to give me more details about Emmy’s condition when she arrived in Louisiana. I didn’t bother with the polite greetings. I loved Sam, but sometimes I still harbored some bad feelings towards her for holding out about Lucas, and I didn’t always like the way she made Emmy feel about herself.

“Sam what happened when Emmy showed up on New Year’s last year?” I asked as soon as she answered the phone.

“Why do you want to know about that?” she asked.

I gritted my teeth and pounded a fist on my desk. “Sam, you infiltrated into my family at a time when I wanted no reminders of Emmy. You withheld your knowledge about my son while you were sharing family dinners with
my
family and sitting with my sister through chemo. I want to know about Emmy on that day and you are going to tell me.”

“Get your panties out of a twist, Luke,” she huffed. “I’m just curious. Emmy called sometime after midnight and said she was taking an early flight down. She got here a day late, though. She was in a car accident before she got here. She looked terrible. That’s no big secret. Why don’t you ask her about it yourself?”

“Sam, she’s having nightmares,” I said roughly. “No less than twice a week she has nightmares.”

“About the car accident?” she asked incredulously.

“I don’t think there was a car accident,” I said carefully. If she really did not suspect that Emmy had been abused, I didn’t really want to be the one to break it to her.

“Why would she lie about a car accident, Luke? She sure as hell looked like she was in a car accident. She was all bruised and banged up.”

“Whose car was she in? If there was an accident that banged and bruised her up, there had to be a pretty decent wreck.”

“She wasn’t very specific. I was just glad she and Lucas were okay.”

“You are the nosiest person I know,” I said impatiently. “You sure were lacking in questions that day.”

“Don’t you judge me, Luke Kessler,” she snapped, her southern drawl more pronounced. “Emmy was already d
epressed. I didn’t want to push her. You didn’t see how she was back then. I’m still shocked and amazed she didn’t take her own life.”

I inhaled sharply at the idea.

“So, you never second guessed her story on the car accident,” I said.

“What the hell for?”

“Did you question her about her broken wrist?” I fired at her.

“What broken wrist? What the hell are you talking about? Emmy never broke her wrist.”

Samantha was so clueless, and I should have known as much. If Mayson or Sam had any hard facts, Kyle probably wouldn’t still be breathing. I knew in my gut that he had hurt Emmy and Emmy had protected him by lying to her family and friends.

Even though I would never physically harm Emmy or any woman, I felt responsible for the trauma she endured. I practically pushed her into the situation and wished terrible things on her. I was just as much responsible as Kyle was. If I found that Lucas had been harmed, too, I would never ever even attempt to find forgiveness for that.

“Emmy broke her wrist,” I sighed. “Late September, early October.”

“She never said nothing,” Sam said in a high voice. “Why wouldn’t she have told me that?”

“I don’t know,” I said, running a hand over my face. “How was Emmy’s behavior after the accident?”

She seemed reluctant to let go of the broken wrist part of the conversation, but she sighed heavily and moved on.

“Like I said, she was depressed. She stayed in her room. She stayed in bed. She didn’t talk to nobody or do anything but lay there and sleep or stare at the damn walls. It was like she up and died – at least until she took off like a bat out of hell for France.”

I trembled with anger. Why hadn’t anyone helped her? Why did they let her suffer alone? Why didn’t anyone ask que
stions? I wasn’t there and it seemed clear as day that she was abused, yet everyone overlooked it?

“No one helped her,” I said in a tight voice. “Why didn’t anyone help her?”

“We couldn’t help her if she didn’t want to be helped,” Samantha argued.

“Bullshit!” I yelled. “You are the most overbearing woman I know, Sam. While it was still fresh, you should have made her tell you and you should have helped her. Now she’s had all of this time to build up defense after defense. She’ll never admit it now because she’s spent so much time in denial.”

“Admit what!” Sam yelled. “What the fuck are you eluding to, Luke Kessler? And how the hell did my daughter break her wrist? You seem to know so much. Why don’t you answer some damn questions now.”

I closed my eyes for a moment and took a few deep breaths. It wasn’t my place to tell her. Emmy needed to tell her. Hell. Emmy needed to tell me.

“I thought mothers had spidey senses,” I said sourly.

“Emmy never broke her wrist,” Sam said indignantly. “She would have told me. I don’t know where you’re hearing these things.”

“Your spidey senses suck, Sam,” I said bitterly. “Emmy broke her wrist right after I left Philly. She broke it while she was in Miami with Kyle. She told Mayson she fell down after drinking too much. Mayson suspects that is why Kyle gave her that bracelet she wears.”

There was a moment of silence. When Sam spoke again I could hear a trace of doubt in her voice. “Emmy drinks like a damn fish, Luke. It’s very possible she fell down, and Kyle Sterling gave her that bracelet because she worked her ass off for that dick.”

I ran my hand over my face again. Samantha Grayne was anything but a dense person. The fact that she had repeatedly overlooked signs of Emmy’s abuse but could smell whether or not the woman was on a dry spell was troublesome. She was in Em’s face about everything else but this one thing that ultimately changed Emmy’s life. I was disappointed and hurt for her. How many other traumatic experiences had she had throughout life and didn’t have her mother to depend on?

“You go ahead and continue to keep your head in the sand,” I said dryly. “Don’t tell her we spoke about this.”

“You think I’m a bad mother,” she said softly.

“I think…” I chose my next words carefully. I was angry and hurting for Emmy, but I knew that Sam loved her daughter, and I know what it’s like to close your eyes to what’s in front of you and imagine that things are different than what they really are. I did it when I knew Emmy loved Kyle and I did it again after Em moved in. “Sam, I think that we all made mistakes, but…I’m not going to continue to pretend that Emmy is fine. I’m not going to continue to be blind and deaf to the fact that she’s in pain. Something happened, Sam. I don’t know what, but it wasn’t any damn car accident.”

“What do you think happened, Luke?” she asked defiantly. “My daughter was in a car accident. She would have told me otherwise. We don’t always see eye to eye -”

“Try never,” I interrupted dryly.

“-
but
,” she stressed, letting me know she wasn’t going to acknowledge that. “Emmy would have told me if something else happened to her. My mind won’t even go there because it’s just incomprehensible.”

And that pretty much summed it up. Sam had her head in the sand. Fine. I didn’t want her to handle it anyway. I needed to handle it.

But I had no idea how the hell I was going to handle it.

After hanging up with Sam, I checked my schedule for the day. My afternoon was virtually open – open enough for me to skip out of work for the rest of the day after lunch. I picked up the phone and called Emmy.