Beyond Revenge (The Ransom Series) (18 page)

“Hold me?” I ask quietly, and Leo
raises his eyebrows at me.  “I’m going to try to sleep again, but I need to
feel your arm around me.  I want you to hold on to me and your baby.”

Leo nods and helps me back down to the
bed and against my pillow.  He turns off the lamp on the nightstand before
climbing under the covers, pulling himself closely against me until his entire
body is spooning mine.  His arm reaches around my side until his hand rests comfortably
on the round portion of my belly.  His warmth and touch help to put me at ease.

I take a trick from Leo’s book, taking
deep breaths for him to hear and feel so that he can match his breathing to my
own.  Within minutes I can feel him relax into me fully, and
with
the deep breaths and the comfort and protection I feel under his
touch
,
it doesn’t take long for sleep to find me
again, without nightmare
s
this time.

Her Compassion

∞

She knows me well.

Better than
myself.

She sees in me
what I am blind to,

helps me find my
way,

keeps me grounded,

alive and reaching.

But something
holds me back.

Deep inside it
remains,

hidden but not
forgotten,

eating away at me.

I must make
amends.

∞

The three months I’ve lived with Morgan
in this house have been by far the happiest months of my life, and I know
they’re only going to get better.  Morgan’s increasingly larger belly is our
visual reminder that soon we will have even more to love in our lives than just
each other.  I know the baby is there, that our child is technically already
with us and we don’t have to wait until the baby is born to call ourselves
parents, but none of it will seem real until I hold the life we created in my
arms.

It seems like just yesterday that I
felt the baby move within Morgan for the first time, but that was almost two
months ago now.  She felt the flutters in her belly for a couple weeks before
she knew for sure that it was the baby moving inside her.  She called to me
frantically, and I feared the worst, thinking she had fallen or cut herself or
some horrible thing had happened to her, but she just wanted me to feel it.

She threw my hand to the lower part of
her belly and rested her
hand
on top of mine.  It
started as the tiniest movement felt underneath her skin, but then baby wanted
its presence to be known.  The next kick was so strong
that
my
entire
body jumped at the movement.  Morgan
and I laughed at
the baby’s
sudden show of strength
,
its actions seeming
appropriate
given its parents and how strong we’ve had to be for so long.

I’m getting more used to sitting still,
to staying in one place.  Since the moment Mark took me in as a boy
,
I swear my life has been nothing but going, in a constant state of
getting one thing done to move on to the next thing, moving from place to
place, never taking a moment to breathe or truly live.  I’ve finally had a
taste of that in these months with Morgan secluded away from the rest of the
world other than occasional visits from her parents and
J
ack.  We’ve been able to relax, to work some of the fear and worry
out of our lives, to become closer than we’ve ever been, and I should be happy
at both her progress and mine.

So why do I find myself miserable on
this day?

Morgan knows me too well.  From the
moment we rolled out of bed this morning
,
she could
tell something was off with me.  I tried to play it off–tiredness, I told
her–but
I find
she’s ready to cut right through my
bullshit during breakfast.

“What’s bothering you, Leo?  Don’t try
to deny it.  I know something’s up.”

I poke absentmindedly at the scrambled
eggs on my plate.  They’re the last of our egg supply until the next time
Robert and Cindy visit, so I should be enjoying them, but I can barely stand
the thought of eating right now.

I set down the fork and turn my
attention to Morgan and her worried expression. 
I hesitate a moment,
taking in a deep breath before speaking. 
“Tomorrow.  It’s
the anniversary of the day Stella died… the day I got her killed.”

Morgan immediately
gets
down from the stool
next to me at the
island
in the kitchen.  She wraps her arms around me from behind as best she can.  Her
belly sticks out enough that she can’t connect her hands around my midsection
anymore.
 
“You didn’t get her killed.  You can’t blame
yourself, Leo.”

There is comfort to be found in her words,
but the guilt
I feel inside forms a solid wall that
blocks
me from it.
 
“I know I shouldn’t feel this way, but I
do.  It’s
unavoidable
.  I was supposed to be there for
Stella
, but I let her down.”  I try to swallow away
the tightness in my throat.

“Maybe you need to talk to her,” Morgan
suggests.

I turn around within Morgan’s arms to
face her.  “What are you saying?”

“Visit her grave.  Explain how you
feel.  Tell her you’re sorry and ask for forgiveness.”

“I don’t know if I can.”  My eyes dart
around the
kitchen
uneasily.  “I haven’t been able to
bring myself to visit her grave.  I couldn’t even go to the funeral because of
the police presence there for Mark while they had him out of prison for the
service.”

Morgan’s hands find my face.  She
grasps me gently but forces me to look in her eyes.  “Maybe that’s exactly what
you need.  Closure.  You didn’t get to properly celebrate her life and mourn
her passing.  She just left you in this world.”  Her lips meet mine in a chaste
kiss.  “Go to her.  Take whatever time you need to feel better about this and
move forward.”

I immediately shake my head.  “I won’t
leave you.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“I can’t leave you here alone.”

Morgan sighs at me with a slight smile. 
“I’ll see if Mom and Dad can stay with me.  Will that make you feel better?”

I consider her offer, and even though I
don’t like it, I give in.  “
Okay
.”

It doesn’t take much to persuade Robert
and Cindy
to make the drive up to us.  They’re more than
happy to have an excuse to see their daughter and her growing belly.  They
arrive in the evening, and while they all chat happily in the living room
after dinner
, I try to remain focused on dishes and cleaning
in the kitchen, looking for anything to distract myself from the thought of
what I’ve signed myself up for tomorrow.

The morning comes painfully slow, and
by the time the sun rises, I’m completely exhausted.  I was awake in bed all
night, holding Morgan tightly to me as thoughts of Stella emerged from the
hidden place
deep
in my mind, the part of me that lingers
in the darkness that I desperately try to keep at bay.  Once those thoughts
were out, I had no hope of sleep, so I rested my body but not my mind.

As I’m prepping some gear to bring with
me just in case, more out of habit than anything, I wonder if my mind will rest
better after this or if I’ve just opened Pandora’s box and screwed myself out
of sleeping ever again.  I try to remain positive as I
check my gun and
pocket
my switchblade.

I grab a burner phone and the car keys
from the drawer in the kitchen.  It’s the first time I’ll actually use the old
gray Jeep that Jack left with us
for
emergencies. 
I’ve kept it in driving-ready condition since the day we moved in.

“You’re not going to stick around for
breakfast?” Cindy asks from the dining room table where Robert and Morgan are
already seated with plates of pancakes in front of them.  Morgan looks at me
with concern.

I open one of the cupboards
that
is
stocked full of non-perishable foods and pull out a couple
granola bars.  “I’ll eat these on the road, but thank you.”  I smile at Cindy
and look between her and Robert.  “Thanks for staying with her today.  I’m
sorry it was
on
such short notice.”

“Not a problem,” Robert says as he
pools syrup on his plate.  “We’ll take good care of her, but you be safe out
there.”

I nod at him and walk up behind
Morgan.  She starts to scoot her chair back to stand up, but I lean down and
wrap my arms around her first, stopping her from moving.  She laughs at me as I
bring my head down next to hers and quickly kiss her cheek.  She turns around a
little within my grasp so we’re facing each other better, and our lips meet in
a brief but loving kiss.

“I’ll miss you,” I
whisper
, looking in her eyes and feeling her belly at the same time.

“We’ll miss you, too.”  She smiles back
at me.  She knows I love it when she includes the baby like that.

The moment I let go of her, I feel like
to grasp on to her again and stay here, but I know I need to do this.  I need
to find a way to let go of my guilt about Stella or I’ll never truly move
forward.  I need this, and it’s solely up to me to make it happen.

“I’ll see you all later tonight,” I
call
out
as I move toward the door, unable to
bring myself
to
look
back
at them
before I
leave the house and get in the Jeep.

The two-hour drive alone with my
thoughts is more excruciating than I
expected
it would
be.

The walk from the parking lot down the
pathway through the graveyard seems endless.

Seeing Stella
and Elise
Castili’s name
s
carved into jet
-
black tombstone brings me to my knees.

“I did this,” I whisper, my head
falling into my hands.  They’re trembling slightly.  I feel like I’m losing all
control as thoughts of Stella flood back to me. 

The moment we first met, I was numb
from all the crying.  Only hours before, my parents had been killed within feet
of me and I had been shot.  My arm was bandaged and still painful from where
Jack had removed the bullet.  There were dried specks of my dad’s blood all
over my shirt.  I was an absolute train wreck, yet the moment I walked into the
Castili family home, Stella greeted me with a smile and bouncing locks of long
dark hair.  She took my hand and led me to her room.  She got a wet washcloth
and helped clean the remaining blood from my skin.  She didn’t ask questions. 
She wasn’t afraid.  She was there for me when I had no one, and
in those
moments she made everything okay
.

The first time I knew something was
wrong in the Castili household was the day we were rewarded for good behavior
with as much ice cream as we could eat.  It was cookies and cream, Stella’s
favorite, and we practically finished an entire carton between the two of us. 
She should have been the happiest kid in the world, but she was sad that
night.  I asked her what was wrong, but she didn’t want to talk about it.  She
sat on her bed with her legs curled up
in
to her chest,
and then I saw it.  There was bruising visible on her
side
where her
shirt
was
slightly
pulled
up.  I looked to her eyes and could see that she knew
I saw it, but she didn’t say anything.  She just cried and cried, so I held her
and promised her she wouldn’t have to cry anymore.

The next day I disobeyed every command
Mark gave me and smashed the hood of his precious classic Ford Mustang with a
baseball bat. 
My continued disobedience and resistance kept his focus,
and while m
y childhood innocence was lost and my life was
forever changed, I never found Stella bruised or crying again.
  She was
able to grow up with as normal of a life as she could within the confines of
her family’s place in the criminal world.  Each time I returned to my room with
new gashes and bruises, she was always there for me, her eyes conveying their
silent gratitude as she helped treat my wounds and gave me the strength to keep
going.

The day she was killed
,
I was supposed to pick her up
at the house
.  She wanted to do what normal seventeen-year-old girls wanted to
do: go to the mall.  She had been so sheltered in that house with Mark, rarely
allowed to go out and forced to be home
-
schooled
with
me
all her life.  It was like she was given her freedom the
moment his was taken away.  Even Elise seemed relieved that Mark was in prison
and no longer affecting our daily lives.  She knew exactly what Mark did all
those years to Stella and then to me, but she was powerless to stop him.  She
didn’t escape life with him unscathed.  She hid her own bruises and cuts well.

With Mark gone, we could all breathe a
sigh of relief.  We could all live again, but the life I wanted was one I
couldn’t have.  I felt indebted to Mark.  There were few constants in my life,
but one that stuck with me was that he saved me.  When my parents were killed,
he put a roof over my head and food in my stomach.  He gave me purpose in his
business.

He was also a brutal monster, and I had
to keep Stella far away from him.  I
stayed
close to
Mark with the hope that by the time he got out of prison, Stella would be free
in the world and out of his reach.  I had to force my heart to move on from
loving her.  I thought if I could forget about her by busying myself with other
women, maybe it wouldn’t be so painful to let her go.

My one-night stand was more like an all-night
stand, and I slept in late the next morning.  I rushed to get out of there and
get to Stella as fast as I could, but when I pulled up to the house
,
it was too late.  Elise was out in the driveway
, the guards
from inside standing uselessly behind her as she
clutch
ed
Stella’s lifeless body to her chest, sobbing into her
daughter’s
hair and caressing her face like she might just be sleeping
and
could
wake up at any moment.  I collapsed next to
her, my hands shaking, my entire being ripped out from inside me as I realized
I failed her.  After years of
living
with her and
protecting her and taking all of Mark’s shit in her place, it took just one
moment of my neglect to end her life.