The Selkie Spell (Seal Island Trilogy) (21 page)

Tara nodded.  “I met him when I was a resident at St. Joseph’s Hospital.  I had no family.  No friends.  No life, except my work.  Which I loved.  It was all I took pride in.  But I was weak.  I was vulnerable.  And I was young and stupid enough to believe that a man could fall for a woman in a matter of weeks.”  Tara’s gaze slid over to Dominic’s face when he tensed.  “I’m not young and I’m not stupid and I’m not vulnerable anymore.”

“Go on,” he said.

“We were married within months, in front of a crowd of two hundred people.  A big, flashy high-society wedding.  Everyone told me how lucky I was.  How fortunate I was to be marrying the dashing heart surgeon.  He was worshiped in the medical community, worshiped in Houston.  Even if I had told someone what he was like at home, no one would have believed me.”

Tara swallowed another sip of the dark beer, letting it calm her.  “He started to work on me.  I didn’t even know it was happening.  He celebrated my successes and triumphs in the ER at first, supporting me.  Or so I thought.  But slowly, in our conversations about work at dinner, I began to feel inferior. I began to see—with his help—that I was making mistakes.  And I started to wonder if I was cut out for it.  If I was even meant to do this profession that I had been so passionate about before I met him.”

Tara watched a gull land on the pier, pecking at a piece of breaded fish dropped by one of the children.  “When I expressed those fears, as anyone does when they first start a profession, he agreed with me.  He didn’t think I was emotionally strong enough or professionally developed enough to handle a position in the emergency room.  He thought I would get more satisfaction, more personal fulfillment from working behind the scenes, from working in a different environment.

“I tried transferring to oncology, then pediatrics.   But I couldn’t find a rhythm in either of them.  I couldn’t establish the confidence a doctor needs to perform her job.”

“Because he was slowly breaking it down every day.”

Tara nodded.  “He was there for me when I came home confused and exhausted.  Always so comforting.  Always so understanding.  I didn’t
need
to make money, he told me.  I didn’t
need
to work if I didn’t want to.  He could support both of us.”

Dominic shook his head slowly.

“It seemed like such a simple thing to take a little time off,” Tara continued.  “To stay home for a few months and reassess.  I’d never kept house before.  I thought it might be fun.  And I loved him.  I believed he was looking out for me.  That he only wanted what was best for me.  That he only wanted me to be happy.

“I had no idea how skillfully he was manipulating me.  How patient and attentive he could be to every detail.  He’d make little remarks at first, little criticisms about how I dressed or how I spoke.  About how I carried myself.  I trusted him.  I looked up to him.  I wanted to please him.

“I tried to become everything he wanted.  I was so desperate for his approval, for his praise.  I was grasping for validation that I was doing a good job, that I was capable of being a good wife, that I was capable of being good at
something
.  When he hit me the first time—a backhand across the face for forgetting to pick up his dry cleaning—I figured I deserved it.  I figured I asked for it.”

“You
didn’t
ask for it.”

“I know that now.”  Tara took a deep breath.  “But I didn’t then.  I was someone else then.  I don’t even recognize the person I was when I was with him.”

“How long were you with him?”

“Six years.”

Dominic closed his eyes, rage forming a thick knot inside him.  “Did you ever go to the police?”

Tara nodded.  “Twice.”

Shock registered on his face.  “What happened?”

“They didn’t believe me.”

Dominic’s hands curled around his pint glass.

“Like I said, Philip is a very powerful man with connections everywhere.  Three years ago, the chief of police of the Houston police department was shot through the chest.  He needed open heart surgery to remove the bullet and repair the main artery.  Philip was the one who operated on him.  He saved his life.  Became their hero of the force.  The hero of the city.”

Dominic let out a long breath.  “Let me guess.  He was also a contributor.”

“One of the top donors,” Tara confirmed.  “We never missed a charity function.”

“He paraded you around in front of them?”

Tara nodded.

“After you’d gone to them, told them he was abusing you?”

“Yes.”

“Christ, Tara.”

“I ran after that.  When I knew the police couldn’t—wouldn’t—help me.  But he found me.  And every time the punishment got worse.”

Dominic pushed to his feet, started to pace.

“I know what it’s like to be found,” Tara said, watching him struggle to process the truth.  “I know what it’s like to be punished for running away.  But he won’t punish me this time.  He won’t drag me back to his house and remind me of my duties.  I’ve humiliated him, Dominic.  I’ve put a crack in that perfect, untarnishable image.  And there’s only one thing left for him to do.”

“But say that he doesn’t know where you are,” Dominic cut in, continuing to stalk back and forth across the long flat rock.  “Say that he thinks you
are
dead.”

“He knows, Dominic.  He killed the nurse who helped me escape and now he’s coming after me.”

“But what if this nurse was killed by someone else?” Dominic pressed, refusing to believe.  “Did you leave any other clues?  Any other possible trail?”

“I won’t stay here and wait for him to find me.”

Dominic stopped and stared at her.  “So that’s it, then?  You’re just going to run forever?”

“He’ll never stop searching for me, Dominic.  He’ll never give up.”

“But what about going to the Irish police?  What about getting a lawyer here, where your husband doesn’t have any connections?”

“I can’t risk losing.”

“But if you didn’t lose,” Dominic argued.  “You’d be free.”

“I can’t go back there.”  Tara shook her head.  “I won’t go back there.”

“Nobody’s asking you to go back there,” Dominic cut in, frustrated.  “I’m asking you to think about your options.  To think about the life that you’re choosing.”

“The life that I’m choosing doesn’t endanger anyone but myself.  Staying here on the island endangers you, Kelsey, and anyone else who’s connected to me.”

“But you’re only looking at this situation in black and white.  You’re not looking at your options.  If you stayed here, and fought this, you wouldn’t be alone.  You’d have me.”  He knelt down, took her hand, covering it with both of his own.  “You’d have every person on the island behind you, protecting you, fighting with you.”

“It’s not that simple, Dominic.  You don’t know who you’re dealing with.”

“I think I do.”

Tara looked up at him questioningly.

Dominic’s eyes drifted out to the water and, lowering himself back to the rock, he let out a long breath.  “Maybe not exactly what you’re dealing with, but I think I have a pretty good grasp on the general situation.”  Watching a lone fishing boat cut a slow path into the harbor, he shook his head slowly.  “Do you remember the night a few weeks ago when Liam told you we didn’t grow up on the island?”

Tara nodded.

“You asked me about it later that night and I told you that my parents died when we were kids and we moved to the island to live with our grandparents.”

“Yes, I remember.”

“I wasn’t exactly telling the truth.”

Tara waited for him to go on.

“I don’t talk about my parents, Tara.  Ever.”  Dominic watched the boat disappear around the bend leading out to the ocean.  “Because the truth is, I don’t know where my parents are.”

“They… left you?”

“Not exactly.  My mother—yes, she took off when I was seven.  She left Liam and I with our father in Dublin.”

“The same age Kelsey was when her mother left her,” Tara realized.

Dominic nodded.  “Believe me, the irony of that was not lost on me.  But the two women left for very different reasons.  Rachel, my wife, was escorted from the island by the Irish police last summer.  She was arrested for drug running.”

“Drugs?” Tara breathed, not willing to believe.

“Heroin, mostly,” Dominic continued, his voice flat.  “She was working with her brothers, disguised as a family of fisherman living in Galway.  They’d meet her at night, on the docks, after everyone had gone to bed.  They chose Seal Island as a hub.  And they needed someone on the inside, to hide the stash.  The police found most of it hidden in Brennan’s spare cottage—where one of her brothers was living.  The rest was buried in waterproof containers under the harbor.”

“The scary things in the water,” Tara realized, remembering back to their conversation in her cottage weeks ago.  “Those were the scary things in the water that Kelsey was afraid of.”

Dominic nodded.  “To Rachel’s credit—which I give her very little—I think she was only trying to protect Kelsey.  She thought if she could keep her out of the water and away from the docks it would prevent her from ever following her down there.”

“Was she… using?”

“No.”  Dominic shook his head.  “I would have known if she was.  Liam and I grew up in a rough section of Dublin.  We knew what users looked like, acted like.  Rachel was always very clearheaded, always on top of everything.  She was meticulous about details, schedules.  I should have known it was curious behavior for someone who just wanted to live a peaceful life on an island.”

“Is that what she said?” Tara asked, her heart sinking.  “When she first came to the island, is that what she said she was looking for?”

Dominic nodded.  “She never had any intention of falling for someone, let alone having his child.  But it provided a perfect cover, so she went along with it.”  Dominic’s gaze held Tara’s.  “She walked into the pub asking for a job as a waitress.  With nothing but the clothes on her back, wanting only a quiet place to live for the summer.”

Tara squeezed her eyes shut.

“Now do you understand why I didn’t want to hire you?”

Tara nodded, still trying to process it all.  “Where is she now?”

“In jail.”

“Does Kelsey ever visit her?”

“No.”

“Does she want to?”

“No.”

“Are you sure—?”

“She’s her mother, Tara.  I will always leave that door open for her to decide.  If she changes her mind when she gets older, we’ll have a discussion and reassess.”

Tara watched a group of teenagers pile into a rowboat, laughing as they set out for a day on the water, as carefree as the wind.  “Are you… divorced?”

“Yes.  The papers came about two weeks before you arrived on the island.”

“No wonder you wanted me gone the moment you saw me.”

“The memory was still fresh.  There were too many similarities.”

“And I wouldn’t talk about my past,” Tara finished for him.

Dominic nodded.

And still.  Still he had found it in his heart to trust her.  To think he might even
love
her. 
Tara let out a long breath.  “Tell me about your mother.”

“My father was a drunk.  He used her as a punching bag.  She put up with it for a few years, and then left.”

Slowly, Tara lifted her eyes to his.  “Your father hit your mother?”

Dominic nodded.

“But… what happened when she left?  Didn’t she try to take you with her?”

“No.”

“Did your father go after her?”

“No.”

“But… wasn’t he angry?”

“Yes.”

“Then who did he…?”  Tara lifted her eyes to Dominic’s face.  “No,” she breathed, but when he continued to hold her searching gaze, she flashed back to her argument with Glenna, the day the other woman confronted her about her past. 
‘You know
nothing
of what I’ve been through!’  ‘You’re right, I don’t.  There’s only one person on this island who could understand what you’ve been through.  But you’re too blind to see it.’
  “Oh my god,” she breathed.  “How could you not have told me…?  How could I not have known?”

“Do you believe me now?” he asked softly, threading his fingers through hers.  “When I say I understand what you’re up against?”

Tara nodded, letting out a long breath.  “But how did you do it?  How did you get away?”

“I used to make a point of getting home before Liam, of making sure that I was the first one my father saw when he stumbled home drunk.  It didn’t matter which one of us was there.  He’d go after whoever he could get his hands on.  But one night, Liam was supposed to be at our neighbor’s house, but he’d come home for something and ran into our father.  He’d been drinking all day on the couch.  Liam said something to him about it, and he lost it.  When I got home that night my father was gone and Liam was unconscious on the kitchen floor.”

“How old was he?” Tara whispered.

“He was nine,” Dominic answered, after all these years, the memory still fresh in mind.  “I carried him to the nearest hospital and the doctor said he’d broken his shoulder.  The police came, started asking questions.  But I’d heard stories of what happened to kids who were taken in by the police and put in new homes.  The siblings were always separated.”