Every Woman Needs a Wife (33 page)

“He showed me a two-dollar bill one day and pointed out that the only
Black man
sitting in the group was actually the first president on this continent. Calling you Black instead of African-American isn’t an insult. You all were everywhere, but history dictates most came from a place called Kemet the ‘Land of the Blacks’ which may have started in a place in Northern African—but extended the more everyone spread out. There was even a Moor among the knights at King Author’s Round Table—people didn’t know it because knights were knights, ranked by character, not color. Same with Hebrews and their twelve different tribes. People weren’t distinguished by color, that’s why anyone who accepts the faith is accepted wholeheartedly and also why so many people have a hard time trying to picture those tribes being made up of different cultures we know today.”

“Getting a history lesson from a white girl,” Brandi said, with a little laugh. “I’ll be damned.”

“No, be better than that. Just be
Black
,” Tanya said with a wink.

Brandi sighed deeply. “So, smart ass, why are you so upset about this new contact? Do you want to be stuck being a play toy for the next man that comes along?”

“I don’t want to be
stuck
doing anything,” she snapped back, shaking her hair away from her face.

“You will be if you don’t get an education or some type of vocational training. There’s a McDonald’s on every corner and you’ll be right there working fries until they get robots if you don’t do something right now.”

“Okay, I’ll register for college,” a reluctant Tanya said after a lengthy silence.

Brandi pushed the document out, Tanya scribbled her acceptance, and it was a done deal. “I’ll have this notarized and Avie will file this new one in court.”

Tanya huffed. “I know it might not be my place, but since we’re being so open and honest about everything…”

Brandi’s head whipped around. “The contract’s solid and it works both ways. I hope you’re not coming up with more excuses or more bullshit.”

Tanya inched back, bristling at Brandi’s caustic tone. “Maybe now isn’t a good time.”

“You brought it up, woman, speak your mind!”

“You’re working too much,” Tanya snapped back. “You’re working too hard.”

Brandi’s expression darkened. “I’m providing for my children, running a business, and paying your salary and benefits, so I know
you’re
not saying that to me.”

“Your
children
are saying it,” Tanya spat. “They’ve gotten so used to you not being here they don’t even ask when you’re coming home anymore!”

Brandi sighed, weariness filling every cell of her body. “If I don’t pull this together there won’t be a home to come home to.”

“I understand all that, but—”

“But what?”

Tanya lifted her chin, anger flashing in her eyes. “I don’t know what kind of day you’ve had, but I’d appreciate it if you didn’t take it out on me…or the children.”

Brandi took a slow, uneasy breath. “I apologize.”

Tanya nodded. “The money will always come, your career will always be there, but your children are getting away from you.”

“They’re not getting away. I love them.”

“Then stop putting them on the back burner,” she said softly patting Brandi’s hand gently. “It’s not how much time you spend with them. It’s the quality of that time. That means when you’re here, you’re here for them. No cell phone, no faxes, no www.com and no emails. It’s all about
them
. And why don’t you take them to church? You believe in God. What are they going to hold onto when they’re in trouble? At least let me take them with me to Power Circle Congregation on Sundays.”

Brandi leveled a stony gaze at Tanya. “You don’t have child one. So who are you to tell me how to raise my kids?”

Tanya gasped, reeling from that blow. “I’m the woman who’s here with them day in and day out. I’m the woman they tell their problems to. I dry their tears,” she snapped, unable to keep the anger from her voice. “While I know you didn’t want to have them, you don’t have to make it so obvious!

“This competition thing with Vernon is making you bitter and angry and they can feel it. And not that it makes a difference to you—but so can I.” Then she said, chest heaving a little as her voice broke, “And I may not have children…but I’m someone who knows what it’s like to have her mother put someone else or—or—or
something
else ahead of her child. I would never have thought you to be that type of woman. But every day you’re proving me wrong.”

Brandi opened her mouth to speak.

Tanya silenced her by raising a hand. “I don’t have to be a parent to understand that they love you and need you. I don’t have to be anything but a compassionate person.” A tear escaped her sad blue eyes as she said, “I’ll go check on the girls.”

Tanya made a quick exit, sobbing deeply.

G
ripping the porcelain sink in the master bathroom, Tanya stilled herself, fighting the wave of nausea as she remembered her mother’s reaction when Mrs. Patton explained what had happened to her. The coiffed woman with strawberry-blonde hair, cagey blue eyes, aquiline nose, and petite frame lifted her chin proudly “She’s lying. Wilbur would never do that. He has me.”

“And it doesn’t matter if he’s hurting her like she says he is?” Mrs. Patton’s dark eyes leveled on Margaret. “Haven’t you noticed the change in her?”

“I thought those clothes were some new style. She never dresses the way she should, trying to be like that Michelle person.”

“Mrs. Jaunal, if you’re not going to act, I’ll be obligated to go to the authorities.”

“You stay out of this,” she hissed, momentarily losing her Southern Belle composure. “This is family business.”

Tanya’s teacher brushed her auburn hair back from her face. “Well, the only thing her family is doing is
hurting
her. Come on, Tanya.”

Tanya took Mrs. Patton’s extended hand.

Margaret Jaunal jumped to her feet, grabbing Tanya’s other arm. “You leave with her and you can’t come back. Ever. This teacher might buy into your lies, but no one else will.”

She was right. After that initial police report, which they only filed because Mrs. Patton said that she would call the state police, then the FBI if they didn’t do something—tongues wagged but soon hushed. Family members
who once thought the sun rose and set with Tanya’s smile became distant. The elite of Social Circle turned their noses up at her, the same ones who had practically begged Margaret Jaunal to match her up with their ugly but well-maintained sons. Now they wouldn’t even say hello. Tanya lost everything. But truthfully, she’d had nothing of importance to begin with.

Mrs. Patton lost her job but when people protested, the school board reinstated her within a week. For the time being Tanya was safe from her father at Mrs. Patton’s place.

Then one day she saw her sister at school. Limp blonde hair, pain in her blue eyes, and Tanya knew. Her father was hurting her baby sister. She had to get her out of that house.

She had Mrs. Patton bring her back to the mansion on the north end of Cherokee Road—on the pretense of needing some of her things—when she was certain her dad would be gone.

As she packed the last of her sister’s things and waited for Mindy to come home, her heart rammed against her chest, hoping that her father wouldn’t get there first.

Finally, Mindy inched into the room. Her golden hair had been pulled into a ponytail. Her Cupid’s bow lips formed a smile as she thrust herself across the room. “Tanya! Please take me with you.”

“That’s why I’m here.” She nodded to the door. “If there’s something I missed, get it quick! I want to be out of here by the time Daddy comes home.”

Then Mindy grabbed her hand and said something that confirmed what Tanya had suspected. “Daddy put his thing in me. My private hurts. I couldn’t walk today.”

Tanya froze, pain seared her heart as she hugged her little sister to her breasts and said, “I won’t let anything else happen to you. Come on, he’s supposed to be home in an hour…”

Tears blurred Tanya’s vision as she watched her sister struggle to maintain her balance. Didn’t anyone else notice? Any of her teachers?

All her life Tanya had been pampered and cared for—piano, tennis, ballet, and horseback riding lessons were things her mother insisted on for both girls. Her father had made sure she had the best of everything. Maybe he
thought he had the right to hurt her. Deep down Tanya knew that no one had the right to touch her that way. And he certainly had no right to hurt Mindy.

She snapped the bright pink case shut.

“You lying, ungrateful bitch,” her father spat from the doorway of the bedroom.

Fear stabbed her insides, churning them like a pot of stew as she suddenly found herself rooted to the floor. His wide frame blocked every inch of escape. Oh God!

He thrust Mindy out of the room and slammed the door behind him before crossing to Tanya, grabbing the case from her hands and tossing it on the floor. His sharp features twisted with anger as his fist slammed into her face. “Telling lies on me.”

“You did hurt me, Daddy,” she said, inching closer to the wall, holding a hand up to protect her face.

He reached down, grabbed her wrists, raised his hand in the air, and let it fly again. The pain that stung her face as her skull shifted from the blow was unlike any she had ever felt before.

Tanya opened her mouth. At first no sound came. Then an ear-piercing scream let loose.

“Scream all you want, missy. Your mama’s entertaining your teacher friend in the library. She doesn’t know I’m here—”

That meant that Mrs. Patton would never hear a thing. The library was in the west wing on the first floor. Her bedroom was on the second floor in the east wing. Miles apart. Worlds apart.

He pinned her to the bed with his full weight, but she finally freed her fist and connected with his head. He pressed her face down hard nearly cutting off her breath. She tasted the saltiness of her tears as he roughly shoved down her pants.

“You’re going to pay for humiliating me in this town. Since I may have to serve time for this shit, I think I should make it worth my while.”

This time his fist caused blood to pour from her nose and mouth.

“Daddy, please,”
she shrieked, struggling to free herself.

He covered her mouth, leaning forward as he whispered, “Wouldn’t want your little sister to come in and watch now, would you?”

Tanya felt the sudden painful pressure at the entrance of her vagina. Then he moved forward, crushing her face to the white lace pillows and the wooden canopy. The room swam out of focus as pain exploded in her pelvis—a familiar pain, but no less sharp and searing.

She thrashed beneath him, but that didn’t stop him. Then her gaze fell to the table beside her bed. She reached, trying to ignore the overwhelming pain down below. Her father grunted like an animal with each move.

She lunged out, hand wrapping around the lamp. She swung it hard connecting with his head forcing him out of her body.

The lamp fell from her sweaty grasp as he lunged for her again. Tanya went for his eyes, trying to apply pressure to the bright blue pupils that were so much like her own.

Lifting his head, he bit down on her fingers, instantly drawing blood. This time he slammed her against the wall. The shock made her go weak with terror. Suddenly, he was inside her again, from behind. “If your mother won’t take care of her wifely duties, you will. Hanging out with that bitch teacher of yours has given you some bad habits. And it won’t make a difference. I can get to you anytime I want.” His hands applied a painful pressure to her neck, cutting off all air. “I have my rights and I own you. I could kill you and no one would say a word to me.”

With every word he lunged forward, pressing her further against the wall. He had never hurt her this badly. And it had never happened with the sun still shining. Always in the cover of darkness. Always with her mother out at one charity event or another—or even when she was home. Was that why Mindy and Tanya had been put in the east wing, so far away from their parents’ room?

She gasped for air. Sobs wracked her body as blood continued to flow from her lips and nose.

“Wilbur!”

He froze mid-stroke. Tanya slumped forward as her mother’s voice echoed in the bedroom. Lifting her head caused pain to shoot through her body.

Slowly, reluctantly, he pulled away. She welcomed his exit, but her body now throbbed with an unnaturally intense pain. Blood dripped from the end of his wrinkled pink penis. That, too, caused an alarm to go off for Tanya. She wasn’t on her cycle. And he had taken her virginity over a year ago, just after her twelfth birthday. What more had he done to her?

Mindy ran into the room, a little pink suitcase clutched in her tiny hands, toys poking out of the sides. She looked from Tanya to her father to her mother. Distant blue eyes filled to the brim with tears as her gaze landed on her older sister.

Wilbur had all but pulled himself together. Tanya waited with anxious breaths for her mother, finally confronted with the truth, to do something,
anything
this time.

“I’m going with Tanya. I don’t want Daddy to hurt me anymore.” Mindy grimaced as she crossed the room to take her older sister’s hand. She gripped the hand so hard it hurt—but Tanya didn’t mind. This would be the last time either one of them would feel pain from their parents.

“Now you’ve got her lying, too,” Margaret said.

Tanya gaped, not sure she heard correctly. Her father’s sly grin infuriated her. Didn’t the woman see his ugly penis hanging out? Hadn’t she seen him raping her? Didn’t she see the blood? What did she think he was doing—helping her pack?

Her mother stared absently ahead as Wilbur Jaunal zipped up his slacks. “Now you just go get cleaned up and everything will be just fine, dear,” she continued.

Finally, Tanya found the strength to move. “Just fine?” The sudden reality made her want to die. “You’ve known all this time. You’ve
known!”