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“That wasn’t his place,” Red snarled.
“He was going to investigate a few things, he wasn’t writing it off as a nothing situation, he’s probably there now.”
“The girl,” Red said. “I give two fucks about the man, I need to know the child is okay.”
Porsche rung her hands, unsure about what she understood as truth verses what she believed might be.
“Sydney was sleeping and then started screaming, we both went into the bedroom. At first she was afraid of her dad until she realized who it was.” Porsche tried to track every nuance afraid to miss a red flag. “She’d wet the bed and I offered to help her clean up. I had to talk her through cleaning herself through the curtain because she hadn’t been allowed to take care of herself for a while now.”
“Fuck.” Red leaned his thick arms on the desk and brought his hands together.
“After she was clean and calmed down I stayed with her. Asking questions,” acid burned along Porsche’s throat. “Here I thought I hated answering probing questions, I tried to ask in round about ways.”
“Feeling sympathy for Doc?” he asked and Porsche nodded.
The truth trapped away, for good reason, the words hurt when they weren’t locked away from the rest of the world. As if speaking brought them to life and the pain and panic in that moment would be facing you again. Why open the closet where the monster lurks when you can simply put a chair in front and keep it locked away? Now here Porsche was trying to pull the pain from the child abused in a way that had her body trembling around men.
“She just laid there not saying much other than she wanted to stay here in Turnabout. How she liked your mama and the ladies all wearing capes.”
“Capes?” he questioned.
“Their cuts,” she said. “She kept saying I needed one and your mama too. Storm and Batgirl don’t have husbands, she said, you don’t need husbands to be a hero.”
“I’ll make sure the women know how the little girl sees their cuts.”
“Red, they need our help,” she said. “Mike’s a hard headed man ready to snap—”
“Or one who already did,” he countered holding the phone up as his fingers began tapping on the screen. “We aren’t exactly anti vigilante shit.”
“As long as you know the details.”
“Bingo, and don’t worry, the man may be able to kill a man with a bobby pin, but so can Hack.”
“And you,” she countered since the man was a retired Ranger.
“Nah… well… maybe, no but I know the good and bad places to stick a syringe.”
“There’s a chance he’s already run,” she said.
“Hack did tell me the man breached our perimeter.” He let out a long sigh. “Let me call an emergency meeting. This can’t wait until morning.”
Red had already texted the people as he tossed his phone on the stack of charts only to have it erupt with buzzes and pings.
“Red, do you want me to stay?” she asked. “If you’re leaving someone needs to man the front desk.”
“No, I got this.” He shook his head. “Doc’s gonna kill me for tagging her in again, but might as well have her up and ready to take on the kid if we need to do it tonight.”
Porsche left the clinic, her mind whirling. Part of her wanted to wander to the second floor of the clubhouse into the meeting room and find out the truth. Only a few women had ever been invited in the space outside of when they were asked to clean and never in a meeting. There was no way she could get to sleep without taking the whole bottle of pills and that might be taken the wrong way by Doc and the others.
Parked and sitting in her car she could see the clubhouse in her rearview mirror. Heavy booted men were making their way through the front door. Some yawning from having been pulled from sleep by a not to be ignored text. Her fingers drummed on the steering wheel weighing the options and coming to only one conclusion.
Slamming her door closed she mixed in between the men gathering and met up with the prospect Kid tending bar.
“Thought you could use help,” Porsche lied as she watched the men ascend the staircase.
“Probably later,” Kid replied wiping down the bar top without so much as a nod of hello from the men. “They seem a bit distracted. Probably a last minute rescue, you think?”
“More than likely,” she said, eyeing the movement of dark leather through the doorway and praying she’d missed Mike’s arrival because the alternative was the man had ghosted with Sydney in the time it took to get back and forth with Red, which would steal the child’s future further.
