For a quick minute, Pam felt betrayed.Then she thought about Marcy’s situation and her own, and the choices she might have made if the tables were turned, and she couldn’t remain angry.Upset, yes, and frightened—very frightened.She put her arm around Marcy as much to steady herself as to offer comfort.
“How much does he know?”
Marcy sniffled.“Just that you see Cutter in Maine.I told him I don’t know what you do when you’re at school.”She raised fearful eyes.“He’ll do something.He’s an evil man.”
Pam knew that all too well.Sinking down on the bed, she gave Marcy a pleading look.“I can’t stop seeing Cutter.He’s my life.”Then the unfairness of it all hit her again—her father’s senseless death, her mother’s hospitalization, John’s tyranny.With a hard swallow, she squared her jaw.“I’m nearly eighteen.I can do what I want, and I want to be with Cutter.If John has trouble with that, that’s his problem.”
John kept her on pins and needles for two days before showing up at the dorm.In a private corner of the living room there, he confronted her.
“I told you not to see him, but you did it.”He kept his voice low, but it was no less deadly than his look.He wore an impeccably tailored business suit that added to his aloof demeanor.“I warned you, Pam.I even asked you if you’d seen him, and you lied.That wasn’t very nice.”
She thought of lying again, but it was too late for that."I love him.”
His lips curled.“You don’t know the meaning of the word.”
“IloveCutter.”
“Then unlove him, because it’s over.”
She shook her head.“I’m seeing him.”
“Over my dead body.”
“What is it you hate so about him?He’s good, and he’s kind.He works hard.He keeps up the morale of the others.Is it because of that that you hate him?Or are you still sore because Daddy liked him?”
“The man is a waste.”
“Daddy didn’t think so.He wanted to leave him Little Lincoln.”
She scored with that one, if the muscle that twitched in John’s jaw meant anything.“What are you talking about?”
“I heard the two of you talking once.Arguing.Daddy wanted Cutter to have Little Lincoln.Why didn’t he get it?”
“The old man must have changed his mind,” John said.He didn’t blink, but came close before catching himself.“He must have realized what a mistake it would have been.Cutter Reid is trash.He’s nothing, he’s going nowhere, and I’ll be damned if he’ll have you.”
Pam was infuriated by the insults.“He already has,” she informed John, uncaring when his eyes grew darker and more vicious.
He was very quiet for a minute.“Is that true?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll get him on rape.”
“It wasn’t rape.”
“You’re a minor.I’ll get him on a corruption charge.”
“I begged him for it.”
“The court won’t give a damn.You’re a minor.He violated you.”
“What he did was beautiful.What you did was the violation.”
John went rigid.Pam had never seen him quite so angry.“Don’t you ever,” he muttered, “ever say that again.”
But she was fighting for her life.“I’ll say that and more if you bring Cutter to court.I’ll embarrass you, John.It’ll all come out.”
He gave her a look of pure hatred, and for a minute she wondered if he’d lose control.In the next minute, though, he straightened his shoulders and started for the door.
