“Don’t start.”
Kelly is quiet while I work, still rinsing her mouth out. Her cut hand is sealed around the plastic cup when she brings it to her lips, but the water circling the drain is that same reddish-pink color. I rotate her body to find the source, then notice the slash on her back.What the fuck is this?It’s about five inches long and thankfully not any deeper than it already is considering yellow subcutaneous tissue is peeking out. I whip out my phone and dial 911. Had I known about the giant gash on her back, I’d have done it sooner.
“Where is your emergency?” the dispatcher answers.
Luckily, I spotted the number on my way up the porch steps in preparation.
“What’s going on, sir?” they ask.
“We need medical services. My wife was attacked, she’s injured. She has a large cut on her back and hand, she has possible chemical burns from gasoline, and has ingested some—I’m unsure how much. She has marks around her wrists as well.”
I’m assured people are on the way. The dispatcher attempts to get me to answer a few more questions. I politely explain thattending to my wife’s injuries is more important and I’ll give my statement when the cops arrive.
“Oh, and the house across the street is on fire,” I say before ending the call.
My wife’s injuries.
Kelly shivers, so I turn up the temperature of the water. Her shivering quickly intensifies to shaking.
She’s coming down from the adrenaline.
“It’s gonna be okay,” I mutter, brushing some of the hair from her face, and squeeze the back of her neck three times, telling her those three words I desperately want to confess. I should have told her sooner, it’s just one more way I let her down. But I don’t want the first time she hears it to be when she’s groggy from sedatives and shaking. Instead, I say three other words. “I’ve got you.”
But do I?I didn’t have her when she was drugged or when the zip ties were digging into her wrists. I didn’t even have her when she was being stalked. When I had the opportunity to protect her. I was too busy looking at the wrong people, not paying attention to the signs.
“Kelly, I need you to listen to me carefully,” I demand. “I tripped on that extension cord.”
She glances up at me, shaking her head.
“I tripped,” I insist.
It was my past that caught up with her, and she was forced to save herself. I hate that. It never should have gone this far. Maybe if I had gone to the cops in the first place, things would be different, but I was selfish. This is one thing I can do for her.
I can’t stop seeing her thrashing in that chair, fighting for her life while she was waiting for me to show up and be a shield.
Kelly nods, her teeth clacking loudly. She hisses while she moves into a sitting position, then leans against the side of the tub wall, tucking her knees into her chest. “I-if-f I have t-to go tothe h-hospital,” she says, “you’re driving. We’re not wasting our wedding money on an ambulance ride.”
After spending hours at the hospital, then several more in questioning, it’s well past midnight by the time we drag ourselves through the door of Logan’s loft. The exhaustion has left us barely standing.
When we step inside, Casper and Odin are passed out cold on the sofa—Casper sprawled on his back, one arm flopped out, one foot on the floor. Our pup takes up the rest of the space. When the door snicks closed behind us, both of them jolt awake.
We weren’t sure what was going to happen after getting a lawyer and talking with police, so Casper was on house-sitting duty until we returned. Thankfully, we were released without issue but we’ll need to stick around until the investigation is closed. I’m not concerned. There’s enough evidence at Piper’s house and her digital footprint is all over my phone. Besides, the extension cord was an accident.
“Everything okay?” he asks through a yawn.
I nod, heading for the stairs.
“How ya feeling, Junior?”
I give him a thumbs-up; I’m not using my voice unless I have to.
“Fill you in on everything tomorrow,” Logan says. “You gonna crash here?”
He shakes his head, stands, and cracks his neck. “Nah, I gotta get home. Just glad you both made it out.”
It’s been two days, and neither of us has left the apartment other than to take Odin out for a walk. Logan shut down the shop temporarily, and Frankie is rescheduling all the appointments at Black Rabbit for the next ten days due to a “burst water pipe.” I told him he should have said gas leak, but he didn’t seem to find the same humor in it I did.
This is the first day I don’t smell gasoline on me—finally we can lie in bed together without the slight sick scent between us. We tried all the soap we had access to, then baking soda and vinegar, but in the end, it was lemons that did the trick. Logan was so careful while helping scrub it over my skin, avoiding my wounds. I see the way he looks at them, like they’re taunting him, and it breaks my heart. He insists I stay in bed to let my body heal. Most of the time, he reads beside me, but I can tell he’s distracted, it takes him too long to turn the pages.
