AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But then, love didn’t make much sense, did it?
At least, that was what I’d always read about and seen in movies my sister had forced me to watch as a kid.
Matters of the heart were crazy and volatile and fickle.
But, what I felt for Jessica wasn’t like that.
It was calm and deep, and the only ‘frenzy’ came from the fact I didn’t understand the feelings where I’d always been in control of them before…
Jessica, unaware of the epiphany I’d just gone through, gnawed at her bottom lip. “Do we have to talk about this?”
Her voice was soft, and the quaver in it hit me hard. “Yes. We do. Anything that hurts you, hurts me.”
Her gaze flickered my way once more. “You mean that?”
I nodded. “I really do.”
She swallowed. “I-I was raped.”
“I know, sweetheart.”
That had her eyes flaring wide. “How do you know?”
“It’s in every move you make.”
“I-It is?”
I gave her another nod. “Yeah,” I told her with a deep and heavy sigh. “It’s in the shadows in your eyes, the way you hunch your shoulders when a man you don’t know comes into the office. It’s in the way you make yourself smaller in crowds and how you duck your head. When you flinch at small noises and…”
She held up a shaky hand. “S-Stop, please, stop.”
I let my words trail off, but I stayed silent, not willing to say anything, not wanting to scare her off from sharing the truth with me.
A truth that was like a festering wound she had to hide.
How long we stayed there, I wasn’t sure.
In the back of my mind, I knew Eileen would probably be fretting over the state of her pot roast in the oven and that Alex would be complaining about his stomach—that man could eat more than even I could! But I didn’t care. The silence could go on forever if it meant she could speak about what had happened to her.
If she could just share it with me, I knew we’d make this better. For her.
“H-He was my boss. He was kind of high up the chain too. VP of his section.” She released a shuddery breath. “I-I’ve worked with some of the upper ranks before. You’re not the first, although, you are the highest I’ve come into contact with. But I didn’t think anything of it. Until the last week of my contract came around.
“He’d been disinterested before, but I still felt his looks. Still knew what he was thinking when he looked at me.” She quivered and pressed her hands to her lap. I watched her fingers entwine around themselves, making a gnarly knot that I wanted to loosen up, untangle with mine, have her palm press against my own, and all so I could let her know that she wasn’t alone.
Never, anymore, would she be alone.
“H-He cornered me in the stationary closet just off his office of all places. He’d asked me to work late on some contracts he’d asked me to scan over, a-and I did. I didn’t think anything of it.
“He asked me to get him some stationary, and I went. When he followed, I-I tried to get around him but I couldn’t. He was too strong.” She gulped. “A-After, I went straight to the police even though he threatened me and told me what he’d do if I did.”
“What did he threaten you with, Jessica?”
“He said he’d make out it was my fault, turn it all around… Make me look like I was…” She swallowed, clenched her eyes shut.
“Make you the guilty party?”
“Y-Yeah.”
