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She felt Greer’s questioning stare on her. “I’m sorry to hear that.” Her words sounded shaky. Leave, dammit.
Marshall glanced in the box, then her. “But Callahan hasn’t had another brush with the law. We did find some rather disturbing items in his home, including sex toys I presume he intended to send to you. One was a pair of handcuffs, and they weren’t the fuzzy kind. It’s the sort of thing that makes me uncomfortable about where he was going with this. So if you”—he looked at her friends—“or anyone had something to do with his death, it may have saved your life. But still, we have to investigate. It’s a crime to tear a man apart, no matter how much of a scumbag he is.”
“Son of a bitch,” Greer said. His hands tightened on her as she slumped against the couch, and then he pulled her against his body, his arms like a shield over her collarbone.
Oh, God. Had Frankie been planning to rape her again? That overshadowed anything else in her mind at the moment.
Marshall seemed to be giving them time to fess up.
“We didn’t know who the guy sending that stuff was,” Shea said. “You can see from the letters that he never signed them.” They’d been crude letters, detailing what he wanted to do to her body, and she’d forced herself to read them because she needed to know how much he knew about her. Or if they contained an explicit threat.
“Was it because of your earlier experience that you didn’t report the stalking?” Marshall asked.
She shrugged, though it felt as though she wore an armored suit that smelled of a citrus cologne. “I didn’t see it as threatening. Only gross and annoying.”
Wrapped in Greer’s embrace, she felt safe in a sea of chaos.
Marshall gave her his business card. “If there’s anything else you know or remember, please give me a call.” He took a step toward the door but turned back to her. “Ms. Baker, if anyone ever hurts you like that again, call me.”
As soon as he left, Darius wheeled in front of her. “The guy’s dead, Shea. You don’t have to worry about him anymore. Isn’t that great?”
Thank God Darius hadn’t asked for more information. If only Greer would let it go.
He turned her to face him. “What happened? What was he talking about, if you’re hurt ‘again’?” His concern turned her to mush, and then his expression changed. He cradled her face, and as much as she wanted to push away, she couldn’t. “Oh, Shea.”
She heard it all in his voice—that he’d figured it out from the detective’s words. Raped “another” woman. She felt her expression crumple even though she tried to hold strong.
He pulled her against him, stroking her back. Her cap’s brim bumped against him and it fell to the floor.
No, she had to push away. She would fall apart right here, and he would continue to hold her and soothe her, and it felt so good because no one had done that afterward. Not even her mother, who had the same opinion the cops did: that she deserved it.
She managed to move out of his embrace by reaching for her cap. She shoved it onto her head, pulling down the brim. “I’m fine. It was a long time ago.”
“What are you two talking about?” Darius asked. At least he hadn’t gotten it.
That was the difference between them, one of many. She wondered if Darius just had no emotions, nothing to squash or tuck away.
“You’d better go,” she said to Greer, her voice thick. “You don’t want to be late for your shift.”
He was looking at her, probably giving her the same look he’d been giving her since the bathroom incident. The Why are you shutting me out? one. She couldn’t tell, thankfully, because the brim of her cap blocked his eyes from view. At least he’d also pushed back after the bathroom incident and gone on, continued dating. He’d been cool to her afterward. That’s what she wanted. Even if it stuck a knife in her chest.
“I do have to go. Walk me out.” He took her hand, giving her no choice but to be dragged along with him.
The air was even more chilling now that the sun was setting. He paused by his Jeep, turning her to face him. “Shea, that’s why you hide yourself, isn’t it? Why you freaked when I accidentally saw you naked.” He pulled off her cap. “Three of them?” His agony at the thought wracked his face.
“I don’t want to discuss this. I freaked because I don’t want people to see me naked.”
“Because you’ve got curves—”
She pressed her hand over his mouth, feeling the full softness of it. “I am not interested in discussing my curves or my past.”
“You’re hurting, Shea. It’s why you shut down on me. I lost a friend once, because he was hurting, too. Holding in a painful secret. I left for a while, doing construction out of town, and when I came back, he’d taken his life. He couldn’t take the pain anymore.”
“I’m not going to take my life. I’ve survived, gotten over it—”
“You haven’t gotten over it.” He tugged at her oversized shirt. “You hide your body. All those years you lived with us, you hid yourself. Did you think we’d hurt you? Attack you?”
He had no idea. “Of course not.”
