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He pushed her gently into the chair he’d pulled out for her, then sat in the adjoining chair and clasped her hands.
She hadn’t said a word, but David knew. And felt the acid burning of vomit rising to his throat.
Help me. The plea was a demand, issued as urgently as he’d ever spoken to whatever higher power was guiding his life.
I’m here.
Okay, then. He took a deep breath.
“Ellen?”
“I ran out of gas.”
He probably shouldn’t be holding her hands, shouldn’t touch her at all.
She needs you. Listen.
He did. To his heart. He released one of her hands and smoothed the hair back from Ellen’s swollen cheeks, brushed it off a forehead grimy with sweat and God knew what else.
He was going to see someone in hell for this.
Later.
“He…he…” She began to shake. Violently.
David couldn’t remember ever being more scared. And only once before in his life had he felt this sick.
Steady.
Yeah. Yeah. Steady. He knew what life was about. All of it. The happiness. And the suffering, too.
“Someone hurt you when you ran out of gas?” he asked, compelled to get this over with. To get to the healing part.
r /> “I hitchhiked,” she said through chattering teeth.
“And someone picked you up.”
When she nodded, David’s heart sank.
“It was a man,” he said.
With a second, jerky nod, she confirmed his worst fears. But he continued, anyway, getting her to tell him where the man had taken her.
“He told me if I didn’t take my clothes off, he’d rip them.” She was shivering, huddled in her chair, but speaking clearly now, as though she was somehow detached from it all. “And when I didn’t, he started to—so I…” She faltered and started to cry again, more softly.
“So you did.”
“Yes.” The whisper was barely audible. And tore through David with such ferocity he didn’t know how he stayed seated.
I’m the wrong man for this one, he thought grimly.
Steady.
You be steady! The angry words were spoken only in his mind.
I am. Always.
Anguish ripped through him. Hers. His. Too much anguish.
