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“We have many commonalities,” Connor counters with barely a blink. “Why choose this one?”
Frederick leans back in a comfortable position, no longer stressed that we’re here together. “You both have been violated by Scott—”
Connor doesn’t wait for him to finish. He grimaces strongly and says, “Violated is a grossly exaggerated term to describe what Scott did. He pissed on my front yard. He’s the equivalent of a rodent scurrying from a nearby tree and urinating on my property. That’s it, Rick.”
My eyes slowly grow. I’m watching an unfiltered version of Connor, something only seen in a director’s cut edition, and I shouldn’t really be privy to it.
My brother-in-law glances at me, as if reminding himself of my existence, but he doesn’t sweat it or bat an eye. “That word, I’m sure, belongs to Daisy. Let’s talk about that.”
I smile. “But I’d rather talk about rodents urinating on lawns.”
Frederick cuts in, “Daisy, what do you think about the word violated? Do you think it pertains to you?”
So we’re going here? I take a deeper breath. “Yes,” I say. “Because what Scott did was awful and unconsented.” My skin crawls just picturing Scott and his friends watching me on tapes that I never knew existed.
“Awful is too kind,” Connor says.
Frederick shifts his papers again. “What words would you use?”
“Heinous, flagrant, egregious, despicable—but even better, he deserves none of my time pondering his actions or what he is. I’ve spent too much on him already.”
Frederick pauses. “You won. He’s in jail. You don’t lose just because you feel from the events, even after they’ve ended.”
Connor looks to me. “This is Rick’s way of telling me to cope with sentiments I can’t understand. He forgets that I’m not like everyone else.” He turns back to Frederick. “I’m not wounded. I’m irritated by the constant need to discuss what’s dead. It helps most people, like Daisy, but I’m not most people.”
I can’t tell who’s right. Maybe they both are. Maybe Connor struggles to reach the bottom of his emotions, ones he truly thinks don’t exist within him. Maybe it’s Frederick’s job to pull them out.
“You’re human,” Frederick tells him. “It’s human to be affected by trauma long after the trauma ends.”
Connor rubs his lips, his agitation more than apparent. “I willingly did what I did. I skewered a rat on my lawn and made him eat himself. I feel justified. We should really be discussing last night’s events.” Before Frederick can speak, Connor asks me, “Did you sleep well?”
“The best I ever could.” I know he can catch the lie in my smile. I pick at a tear in the leather couch cushion.
“How many hours?” Connor asks again. “Were you frightened?”
I wonder if Rose’s concern sent Connor here, wanting more answers about my health. I don’t want to worry her or him, so I stray from seriousness, my eyes widening in mock horror. “Fifteen hours of sleep. It was insanity. You should’ve been there, total party in my bed.” I smile at that funny innuendo.
“Is she always like this?” Connor asks Frederick like my runaround antics would be exhausting after a while.
Frederick wears a kind-hearted smile. “Sometimes.”
I swing my legs from side to side, unable to rest my chin on my knee. “Why are you so interested in what happens beneath my sheets, Connor?”
He just stares blankly at me. “It’s like chasing a puppy that runs after its own tail.”
I smile again. “I’m the puppy?”
“Obviously.” He checks his phone like someone texts him. Definitely Rose. “You were crying?” he asks before setting his deep blue gaze on me again.
“I imagined a life without chocolate.”
“And unsurprisingly, I don’t believe you.”
“You don’t believe that a world without chocolate is absolutely, entirely devastating?”
Connor’s brows furrow like I’m a fool if I think I’m fooling him. “I believe that you like sprinting in pointless circles.” Another text lights up his phone. My sister’s concern suddenly yanks at my heart.
“I didn’t sleep at all,” I finally answer.
Connor contains his emotion. I can’t read him.
So I add, “But tell Rose that I plan on taking a nap when I get home, and that I already feel better.”
“I will.” He texts Rose in front of me, not shocked that I figured out why he’s here.
Frederick taps the armrest. “Let’s reroute to Scott Van Wright.”
Connor sets down his phone. “I’m beginning to think you have a fondness for rats and swine.”
Frederick actually smiles. “Daisy, do you have any questions for Connor about what happened? Anything you want to express?”
I think there is something. “You never told me if you saw any of the footage. You had to confirm the tapes were of me. You couldn’t just leave without knowing for certain. So…how?”
Connor’s gaze is cemented on Frederick, Frederick’s cemented on his. Whatever passes between them in the brief silence, I guess could only be described as understanding. An understanding that this topic would be broached sooner or later. That this moment would come to fruition.
“Tell her,” Frederick urges with a slow nod.
Connor doesn’t balk, not once. He slowly but surely rotates to face me. Calmly, he says, “Five seconds. I tried leaving sooner, but I did see you half-dressed.” He pauses. “I didn’t see you giving head, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“That’s what I always thought, and I really, really appreciate it. What you did…”
“Don’t.” Connor’s deep blue eyes never dart away from mine. “Don’t appreciate me, Daisy. Because it wasn’t for you. I manipulated a man and used your evidence to further a ploy that benefited me and my family.”
He can paint the selfish portrait, but that picture is only half-complete.
“Maybe your intentions were never to help me, but you did. And it’s not the only thing you did.” It’s more than just interrupting Julian and me during Princesses of Philly. “How many photographs have you bought? The ones that photographers took of me backstage when I modeled?” I’m not sure if there’s more than just the one from Paris, but I remember that one like a deep, visceral scar in my body. Photographers captured pictures of me naked backstage at a Paris fashion show.
I never knew what happened to them.
They never leaked online. In time, I realized that Connor Cobalt is the only one who had the resources to buy them. To stop them.
To help me.
I believe he did it because he loves Rose, and Rose loves me. What power their love truly has.
Connor observes me for a second, his features harder to interpret. Then he turns to our therapist. “You see, I’m not as self-serving as you believe me to be.”
“As you believe yourself to be,” Frederick corrects.
I drop my feet to the floor and stand up again, hating to sit this long. I start wandering towards the bookshelf.
“Both of
you know that Scott’s sentence will be ending soon, maybe even earlier if he gets out on good terms. How are you going to handle it?”
Connor calls out, “Daisy.” He wants me to go first?
I thumb through hardbacks on a middle shelf. “I wish he could rot away forever, but he did his time. Now he’ll be on the sex offender’s registry.” I look over my shoulder at them. “I think that has to be enough.” It has to. Because I can’t be worried Scott will appear again and hurt us. That fear has no room in my world.
“Her answer is mature,” Frederick tells Connor. “I’m guessing yours will be more verbose.”
Connor arches a brow. “Guessing? Aren’t you supposed to be a professional? I don’t pay you to guess.”
“You tell me,” Frederick says, a smile playing at his lips. He picks up his coffee like this is normal. I smile too, realizing it’s normal for Connor to insult everyone.
Even his own therapist.
“He might be set free in time because of our judicial system, but he’ll be imprisoned emotionally and mentally. I will always see him as what he fucking is. Swine, a rat-snake, someone not worth my time. I’m mostly annoyed by ignorance, by people who think it’s acceptable to directly send me messages about events that did not and will not ever happen. People who believe he’s virtuous.” Connor shakes his head. “I won’t scream and open their eyes and make them hear and see. If they can’t understand reality, then so be it. They’re gnats to me.”
The air is thick.
Connor sits forward to add one more statement, “He will never come within eyesight of my family or Daisy’s family or Lily’s. I’d stomp him down before he reached within fifty miles of us. It’s not an illusion. It’s a fact.”
I realize that Connor may never ascribe the word “violated” to himself, but I think Scott Van Wright definitely violated him at one point in time. His hostility, that I never see, makes me believe that Scott crossed a boundary with Connor that others never do.
