She slipped her hand into his, linking them together. And only then did Alex let his own tears come again, just as quietly as Cassie’s. He told himself that there was solace in knowing he hated himself even more than Cassie could. As penance, he counted his way off to sleep, imagining in flashing succession the ravaged faces of his father, his mother, his wife, and his son—all of the people he’d failed.
THIS TIME SHE DID NOT HOLD HERSELF BACK. EVEN THOUGH SHE knew Alex was awake beside her, she was crying. It was not just a matter of leaving, as Alex thought. It was a matter of freedom. She could leave Alex and never be free; look at what had happened when she went to South Dakota to have Connor. To truly make a break, she was going to have to make Alex suffer as much as she did. He couldn’t let her go—hewouldn’t—unless she did something to make him hate her. So she would have to do what she had scrupulously avoided doing for four years now—become one of the people who had hurt him.
She tried to convince herself that if she really did care about Alex, she’d force the break, since having her as a crutch for his rage was only worse for him in the long run. It wouldn’t mean that she didn’t need him anymore. And it certainly wouldn’t mean she didn’t love him. Alex was right when he said they had been made for each other. It just wasn’t in a healthy, wholesome way.
She remembered Alex standing on the porch at Pine Ridge, telling her she was a part of him. She remembered him holding his hands over her own as they fished without poles in a frigid Colorado stream. She remembered sitting beside him, watching the pair of lions in the Serengeti. She remembered his taste and his touch and the heaviness of his skin against hers.
She did not understand how she had ever reached this point, where she loved Alex so very much that, literally, it was killing her.
Cassie watched the night take on different and somber shades of black as she ran her options through her mind. She closed her eyes, and to her surprise, saw not Alex but Will, tied to a sacred pole during the Sun Dance. She felt the heat rising from the plain, heard the running of the drums and the eagle-bone whistles. She pictured the moment Will tore himself loose, the rawhide ripping through his skin. It had driven him to his knees, but it had been the only way to break free.
The damage was permanent; there would always be scars. But even the angriest marks faded over time, until it was difficult to see them written on the skin at all, and the only thing that remained was your memory of how painful it had been.
Cassie slipped her hand into Alex’s, trying to memorize the temperature of his skin, the smell and the very sense of him lying beside her in the night. These were the things she would let herself keep. She rubbed her thumb over the soft lines of Alex’s palm, stroking into his grasp an apology for what she had yet to do, and the gentle broken edges of a goodbye.
CHAPTERTWENTY-SEVEN
FORone awful moment, Cassie looked at the pinched, expectant faces spread before her and she thought,They won’t believe me. She figured they would just laugh out loud.Alex Rivers? they’d say.You’ve got to be kidding. And then they’d snap up their notebooks and rewind their video cameras and leave her standing ashamed and alone.
Swallowing her terror and her pride, she shifted on the metal folding chair the hotel concierge had placed in preparation for the press conference. She smoothed down the pleats of her dark blue skirt.Look like a schoolgirl, she had been advised.Nothing savvy, nothing sexy. As if she had invited the attention, the abuse.
Beside her on an identical chair, Ophelia was holding the baby.
Connor had the hiccups, small ragged sounds that Cassie couldn’t help thinking sounded like sobs. She knew that at almost two months of age, he could not understand and he would not remember. Just as she knew that every time he reached for her, she would do a double take, seeing his father’s image in his silver eyes.
Clearing her throat, she stood up. Almost immediately the crowd of reporters quieted, snapping to attention like a huddle of storybook soldiers. “Good morning,” Cassie said, leaning toward the microphone, touching it lightly with her hand.
It let out a shattering scream. Cassie stepped back, startled. “Excuse me,” she said, a little more softly. “Thank you for coming.”
She thought how absurd she sounded, as if she’d gathered a group of friends for a tea party. She considered how much easier that would have been, rather than this unconditional surrender to a pride of hungry lions. She had no more illusions; Alex had taken care of that two nights ago. These people were not her friends, never had been. They knew of her only through Alex; they had agreed to come only because they thought she’d say something about him. Cassie herself was incidental.
If the reporters mentioned her at all after taking away her story, she would be painted as some kind of pitiable freak, or a moron for being unable to stand up for herself all these years.
Cassie unfolded the tiny piece of paper she’d read over a hundred times since breakfast that morning, her prepared press statement. Ophelia had coached her about making eye contact, about modulating her voice to a low, even pitch—all tricks of actors to appear more sympathetic to an audience. But as her fingers froze at the edges of the frayed sheet, shaking it visibly, she could not remember at all any of the things she had practiced. Instead she began to read, reciting like a secondgrade schoolchild who was too busy sounding out the unfamiliar words to give the performance any meaning.
“My name is Cassandra Barrett. Most of you know me as Alex Rivers’s wife. We were married on October 30, 1989, and our marriage has been the subject of media attention on several occasions, most recently the birth of our son. Yesterday, however, I filed for divorce from Alex Rivers on the grounds of extreme cruelty.”
The statement, coming less than a month after the united show of support Alex and Cassie had given atLAXwhen they arrived with Connor, created a current of whispers that volleyed over the heads of the reporters and wrapped themselves around Cassie’s neck, choking.
She gripped her fingers on the edge of the podium, stumbling over the last sentences on the page. “After this press conference, any inquiries can be directed to my lawyer, Carla Bonanno, or to Mr. Rivers himself.”
She took a deep breath. “In the interests of promoting the truth, though, I’m willing to answer some of your questions now.”
Hands shot up in front of Cassie, blocking her view of the one-eyed cameras. Voices tangled over each other. “Ms. Barrett,” one reporter shouted, “are you still living with Alex Rivers?”
“No,” Cassie said.
“Has he agreed to the divorce?”
Cassie glanced at her lawyer, sitting off to the left. “The papers will be served today. I don’t expect him to contest it.”
Another reporter pushed himself to the front of the throng, waving a microphone beneath the podium. “Extreme cruelty isn’t common grounds for divorce, Ms. Barrett. Are you trumping up your charges to expedite the divorce, so you can get your hands on his money?”
Cassie’s eyes widened at the snide tone of the man’s voice, at the absolute gall that would let him ask something so personal. For God’s sake, this was hermarriage. This was herhusband. “I have no desire to take anything from Alex.”Except myself, she thought. “And I haven’t exaggerated the charges.” She lowered her eyes, realizing that she had come to the point of no return. She carefully cleared her face of emotion and lifted her head again, staring at everything and nothing all at once.
“I’ve been physically abused by Alex Rivers for the past three years.”
I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. The litany ran through her mind, and Cassie wasn’t sure if she was crying out to God or to Alex or to herself.
