I bury my face in my knees, rocking on my tailbone despite the dull ache, as hot pressure builds in my chest.
But a gentle hand on my forearm halts my anxiety free fall. I peek over my arms at Brantley. His hazel eyes are soft, kind. “It’s okay, Fi,” he whispers. “We’re here for you.”
I’ve always shoved aside my trauma and focused on the people I love, but maybe I can’t anymore. I nod and lick my dry lips. “My mom started seeing Dennis when I was ten. I hated him from the get-go. Something about him was off, and when he was around, my mom would drink more. He was obsessed with her in the beginning. He called her Red, and they used to fuck loudly in the living room after I went to bed.” I wrinkle my nose at the memory. “But some nights, she’d pass out, and he’d get frustrated.” I pick at the skin around my nails. “It was my fifteenth birthday the first night he came into my room.”
My voice falters and I swallow down saliva and bitter bile. Seb stiffens at my side, and I hear B mutter, “Fuck.”
I can’t look at them.
What if what Dennis did to me disgusts them? What ifIdisgust them?
“Did he…” Seb’s voice is gravel.
“At first, he just touched me while he touched himself. I—” A sob escapes my lips.
Seb reaches for me, but I flinch away. I can’t let him touch me while I talk about it. His hand drops.
I take a deep breath and let out a shaky exhale. “The night I turned eighteen, he started fucking me. He called me Red like he did her, and he made me make the noises he liked. He said he’d hurt my mom if I ever told anyone. I went to summer camps when I could, and I moved away as soon as I was accepted to Whitmore U just to get away, but a couple times when I went home it happened again—only I fought him. But it didn’t matter. He was too strong, and I wasn’t strong enough.”
Shame heats my cheeks and travels down my neck, and I can’t stop crying. “I’m sorry you guys got caught up in all this.” I sniffle wetly. “But I couldn’t let him hurt me again. Or hurt someone I love like he hurt me. When I thought he had Charlie…” My words dissolve into gibberish, and I wrap my arms tightly around my body.
This time when Seb reaches for me, I don’t resist. He pulls me into his lap, and I bury my face in his chest, my tears and snot making a mess on his bare skin.
A gentle hand runs across my back, combing through my damp hair.
“Don’t apologize.” I realize that B now sits behind me, pressed close. “None of this was your fault, Fi.”
I don’t know how long I stay curled in Seb’s embrace, listening to the beat of his heart. The sound challenges the demons running rampant in my mind, clawing their way back into my consciousness. If I think too hard, I can smell Dennis’s cologne, feel his breath on my neck and the rough scratch of his mustache against my skin. I start to shake and dig my fingers into Seb’s biceps.
“So how’re we going to take him out?” B asks.
“Actually, I have a kind of a plan for that.” I twist my mother’s bracelet around my wrist absently. “But it does still involve the authorities.”
Seb and B exchange doubtful looks.
“Go on,” Seb says when I don’t immediately talk.
“Sometimes Micah would sleep over. We thought Dennis wouldn’t come into my room if Micah was there. It seemed to work for a while until one night when we were sixteen. Micah normally slept in bed with me, but he had a cold and thought it would be better if he slept on the floor. Dennis didn’t see him on the other side of my bed when he came in. Micah woke up when I started crying; he witnessed the whole thing from only a couple feet away, and Dennis never knew.”
“Why didn’t he try to stop it?” B doesn’t sound angry, just sad.
“Dennis was a lot bigger than us. He was scared. And I’m glad he kept quiet; he just would have gotten hurt.”
“So how does this help us now?”
“I called Micah before you guys left. He’s going to confess everything to Detective Lin. If someone can actually catch Dennis, they would have him on assaultandfirst-degree child molestation charges.”
“So we just have to draw him out,” Seb surmises.
I nod. “And I’m the bait.” My voice shakes, and fresh hot tears blur the room.
“Fiona, he won’t hurt you again,” Sebastian says, his voice steady.
I give a tearful laugh. “You can’t be so certain. Anything could go wrong.”
“No, Bastian’s right. We’ll figure it out. We’ll do this safely somehow.”
I sit back with a sniff and turn to look at B. His jaw is taut like he’s grinding his teeth, and his gaze is fiercely possessive. He’s sitting cross-legged behind me, and his hand is still on my back, his touch warm and firm. His other hand rests on Sebastian’s thigh.
