Dear Tabitha (29 page)

“Of course, Marta. I wouldn’t dream of locking my daughter away from the world. She’ll have everything that I didn’t when I grew up and when I lived here. She’ll have freedom,” I state with a harsh tone to my voice.

“Yes, she will. I’m so happy for that.” She looks away again and wipes several more tears from her face. I notice that her head has fallen slightly to the side and I watch her chest rise and fall unevenly. Her aide comes over to take her vitals.

“She needs her rest. Come back in a few hours when Sara is due home from all of her after school activities. You’re welcome to wander the property or have our driver, Carlos, take you around the city.” She dismisses me as she hooks up some fluids into Marta’s port.

I know exactly where I want to go, and I find Carlos and instruct him to take me there.

Present

Age 24

D
URING THE
entire plane ride, I research any known addresses and business establishments for Tony Constantino. While I don’t find much, one place located on the outskirts of Portland keeps showing up in search threads. My first stop will be this Tony’s Place, and that fucker had better not have done anything to Tabby.

I hail a cab outside of the airport and give the driver the address. He pulls up in front of the stark building twenty minutes later and turns to me. “Are you sure this is the place, mister? It doesn’t look like it’s even open. I’ll wait here so you aren’t left stranded.”

“Okay, thanks. Keep the meter running,” I say as I hop out of the cab.

I walk up to the door and reach out to open it. “Hello? Is anyone here?”

Rustling noises come from one of the rooms off to the right just inside the doorway.

“Just a minute,” a burly voice says. More rustling and a few curses come from behind the closed door.

A large man emerges, and he’s every bit as burly as his voice sounds. “What do you want? We’re closed,” he states and clenches his fists.

“I’m sorry, but I’m looking for someone. A woman. Her name is Tabitha Fletcher.”

The man raises his eyebrows. He knows her name. I can tell as recognition sweeps across his face. “She’s not here. You just missed her.”

A feeling of dread takes over and I’m about ready to jump this guy. He knows something or he’s done something to her. I just know it.

“Where is she?” I ask. My heart pounds and my jaw pulsates. I’m alert and ready to respond with any means necessary. So help me God, if he’s done anything to her, I’ll kill him.

“She’s not here. That’s all I’m gonna say.” He turns back to the office and starts to walk away.

“Listen, Tony. You better come clean with me. I know what you did to her, and if you’ve laid a hand on her again, I’m going to kill you. Right here. Right now.”

He whips around and stares at me, looking bewildered. “What did you just call me?” he asks.

“Tony Constantino, right?” I answer.

“Who are you,” he asks me, “and how the fuck do you know Tony?”

Shit, he’s not Tony. He’s every bit of what I pictured Tony to look like.

“I’m a friend of Tabitha’s, and I know what Tony did to her. Now tell me where she is and I’ll leave you alone.”

“Like I told her when she was here, I don’t want any trouble from anyone. I’m trying to keep this club in business, and I don’t want to be associated with anything from the past. Okay?” he raises his hands in the air in a surrender-like pose. I still don’t trust him as far as I can throw him, and given his tremendous size, that wouldn’t be too far.

“Okay, so if she was here, where did she go when she left?” I ask.

He drops his hands and takes a matchbook from his pocket. He jots an address on the back of it and hands it to me.

“She went there,” he answers. “Are we good now?”

I walk backwards out of the door. “Yeah.” I jump back in the cab and give the driver the new address. He says it’s five minutes away and we take off to find Tabby. I just hope I’m not too late.

~

We pull up to an old cemetery and I’m confused.

“Is this the address that I gave you?” I ask the driver, waving the matchbook across the seat.

“Yup, it sure is,” he says as he turns back to me. “I’ll keep the meter running.”

Why the hell did Tabby come here? I hop out of the cab and look around the grounds. It’s an older cemetery, but it’s well kept. I walk quickly through the headstones, scanning the property for her. I hear screams and break out into a sprint in the direction they’re coming from. It’s Tabby.

“You fucking monster!” she yells.

I weave through headstones and around a large mausoleum, and that’s when I see her. My heart drops.

She’s kicking and screaming and tearing up the ground around a headstone. She’s alone.

“You fucking monster! You ruined me! You destroyed me! You don’t deserve to be dead and in the ground! You deserve to suffer like me! You fucking bastard! I HATE YOU!” She punches the cement that I assume is Tony’s grave.

“You broke me, you fucker! Shattered me! I couldn’t live for years because of you. I didn’t know how to love. I was paralyzed and afraid. You stole everything from me, you fuck! EVERYTHING!”

I rush over and grab her from behind so I can try to stop her from hurting herself. She thrashes in my arms as she continues to scream. She starts to fight against the hold that I have on her and becomes frantic with fear.

“Shhh, Tabs, it’s me. It’s me, Alex. It’s okay. I’m here.” I whisper into her hair. I take her hands in mine to wipe the blood that’s pouring from her knuckles. She really did a number on herself punching and clawing at the headstone.

Her sobs become shallow, and I can tell a panic attack is coming. I spin her around so she can look into my eyes. Her face is pale and her eyes are glazing over.

“No! Tabby, stay with me! Don’t let him win again! Stay with me, do you hear? It’s me. It’s Alex. I’m here and I’m going to help make this better. Okay?”

I grab hold of her face and see the recognition dawn in her eyes. Her breath starts to even out and she whispers, “Alex?”

I nod my head and smooth her hair around her face. I wrap her bloody hands in the bottom of my shirt and can feel her blood seeping onto the skin of my belly.

“Yes, it’s me. I’m here, Tabs. It’s me.” I pull her to me and kiss her forehead, letting my lips linger.

“How?” barely escapes her lips.

“Kirsten. She gave me your flight information and I was on the next plane out. I couldn’t let you come here alone.” My lips stay pressed to her clammy skin.

“Alex, you don’t understand,” she starts to say.

“I do. I understand. You’ve come here to do this.” I gesture to the grave. “He doesn’t even deserve to be in this sacred ground. We should do all of these good souls a favor and dig him up and set fire to his bones.” Wow, that’s quite a sick and demented thought.

She smiles weakly and lets out a small laugh. “No, Alex, let’s not do that okay?”

“Are you ready to go? Or do you want to break a few more bones in your hands?” I ask her.

“Ouch!” she says as she pulls her hands from my tee shirt. “Oh, what did I do?” She looks over her fingers and knuckles to observe the bloody damage.

I pull her hands into mine and say, “I don’t think they’re broken, but we need to get you washed up so we can see if you need stitches.”

“Okay,” she says calmly and lets me lead her toward the car.

She stops and turns around, saying quietly, “Goodbye forever, you fucking scum. I hope you’re burning in hell right now.”

I look back at his gravesite and silently hope the same thing, although hell may be too good a place for him. I’m hoping that there is someplace worse.

“Oh my God, Alex! Look at what I did to your shirt,” she says as she tries to wipe her blood from me.

“Hey, it’s okay, Tabs. It’s only a tee shirt. I have a few more where this one came from,” I assure her in the calming voice that I used to use with her years ago.

We walk up to the cab and the driver glances at the blood. He nonchalantly says, “You didn’t kill anyone, right?”

“Nope, he’s already dead,” Tabby says with a smirk on her face.

“So, it’s the two of you now?” the cab driver asks.

“Um, I think so. I sent my driver back to the house,” she says and turns to me. “Alex, there’s something else that you need to know.”

We slide into the back seat of the cab and she gives him an address in Lake Oswego.

“Whoa, fancy neighborhood, pretty lady. We’ll be there in about twenty minutes.”

“Where are we going?” I ask her as I raise my eyebrows.

“Marta’s. Tony’s mother’s home,” she answers.

Tony’s mother? God, this is getting weirder and weirder by the minute. I’m thankful that he’s dead and she wasn’t hurt by him, but why are we going to see his mother?

She takes a deep breath and looks out the window.

“I’m here to get Sara, Alex. My Sara. Marta’s raised her for the past seven years, and now I’ve come out here to take her home with me.”

Holy shit! Sara? Her daughter that Tony stole from her and gave away for adoption?
That
Sara?

“Tabby, I don’t understand,” I state incredulously.

“Tony never gave Sara away. Well, he did, sort of. But not up for adoption. He took her from me and gave her to his mother to raise. He lied to me when he said that she was going to another family. All of the paperwork that I signed back then was fake. None of it was real.”

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. This shit only happens in Lifetime or Hallmark movies, right? Her daughter is alive and well and living with Tony’s mother? What the fuck? How is she just finding out about this now?

“Why now, Tabby?” I ask.

“Marta is dying. She wants Sara to come live with me,” she says.

I honestly can’t believe this. It’s incredible. “So you’re here to bring your daughter home with you to Philadelphia?” I ask. I feel like I’m firing the questions at her but she’s answering them willingly.

“Yes, and I’m going to meet her for the first time when we get there,” she says and looks out the window.

Oh my God. “Tabby, this is incredible. What can I do? How can I help?”

“Oh, Alex. I don’t know what to say. First of all, I can’t even believe that you’re
here
. Honestly, what made you fly out here?” she asks, shaking her head.

“I thought you were coming out here to a trap. I came for you, to protect you, to save you,” I say truthfully.

She looks down at her bloody hands. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you when I left. I should have told you everything, but I didn’t know how. You wouldn’t have had to come out here. I was never in any danger, Alex. Except from myself.”

I wish that I could be the first person that she tells these things to, just like she used to. I want to erase all of the time and years lost between us and become that person again.

I take her hands into mine and kiss her palms. “I’m so glad that you’re okay, Tabs. When I heard you screaming? I don’t know. I just lost it. I thought you were about to be hurt or worse. Oh God. I’m so sorry that you had to go through all of that alone.” I lean my forehead against hers.

“I needed to do it. I never got to say goodbye to him the way that I wanted to. Sure, when I escaped, I clobbered him on his head with a paperweight and wished that I had killed him back then. But I never got to tell him what I thought of him and what he did to me,” she says and closes her eyes. “He needs to know that he didn’t win. I did. I beat him at his game and despite my breakdown back there, I won. I’m finally free.”

“Well, after that back there, I’m sure he heard you, loud and clear. He’s probably spinning in his grave right now.”

We approach a large wrought iron gate and the cab driver turns to us. “Is this your stop, miss?”

“Yes, you can let me out here,” she says nervously and turns to me. “I need to do this alone, Alex. Okay? I don’t want to confuse Sara when I meet her for the first time. She’ll be home from school in a little while, and I need to get cleaned up before she gets here.”

Her eyes are pleading with me, and I understand that she has to do this alone. She looks nervous and my heart clenches for her. I want to be by her side as she meets her daughter for the first time, but I know that I can’t.