Finding Pride (Pride Series) (16 page)

He liked the way the sun was shinning in her hair. She had changed into gray dress slacks and a blouse the color of her eyes. She had left her hair down; he noticed it was longer than he had first thought. He remembered how soft it felt and fought the urge to reach over and play with it now. Then reaching over he decided why fight the urge.

“
You don’t find it a little crowded? Living with your sister and brother?” Megan asked looking over at him.

“No, it’s nice being close; it really helped after the accident. Adjusting and all, we hired a tutor to teach us sign language together. I’ve noticed that you’re picking it up fast, if you want to learn more, I can help.”

“Oh, that would be great, I feel so left out some times. You guys seem so close, has it always been that way?”

“No, Lacey and I’ve always been close, but a few years back Iian and I had a large falling out right before Sara died. He was young, I was arrogant. You know.”

“Matt and I had a large fight the last time he came out.” Megan said looking down at her arm, she had grown accustom to fidgeting with the ends of the cast, to the point it was flaking apart. “I feel really bad, we did set things right over the phone, but the last time I saw him…” Tears were coming back to her eyes.

“Don’t do that, you know your brother loved you, he would have forgiven you anything. I’m sure he had long forgotten about what ever it was, you should do the same. Here now, tell me about these paintings. How did you get little Allison Adams to sell you these?” He had changed the subject so quickly Megan had to stifle a laugh. Obviously Todd didn’t handle weeping women well.

“Well, I went in to her store a couple of weeks back and bought some items and noticed them in the back room, I guess I just kind of barged in and started buying the ones I liked. I had done some marketing work for Mr. Derby, that’s the owner of The Blue Spot Gallery, he was very kind over the phone. I haven’t met him personally, but last week when I called, he was excited that I was near by. He said he was going to be in Portland for the next month and to bring some of Allison’s work up if I got the chance.”

“That’s very nice of you to help her out. I’m pretty impressed by what you have planned for the Bed and Breakfast. You have some talent pulling a business together. We could use your help with the restaurant, that is, if you want to. Your brother helped me out a lot with my company, since then it has moved to a whole different level.”

“I never thought he would settle down in a place like Pride.”

“Why not?” Todd asked looking over at her.

“Matt was – well, to put it bluntly, a wanderer. He never stayed in one place long enough to grow roots. Every since I could remember he was uprooting me from schools. We mostly stayed in the Boston area during school seasons. I remember one year he got it in his mind that he would home school me so we could travel year round.” Megan giggled.

“Then he took one look at my Algebra book. The next day, I was enrolled in school and he had signed a lease on an apartment down the street.”

Todd smiled back at her. “Well, he settled pretty well here. He did travel a lot the first year, but the main house wasn’t quite done being remodeled. He was really concerned about you near the end. He wanted to start the Bed and Breakfast with you. He said that if you had a goal you could fix your mind to, he would be able to persuade you to move here.”

“I would have eventually, but I really needed to find myself first.” Megan looked out the window.

“Is that what you’re doing now, finding yourself?” He wanted to know more, but was afraid to push.

She could see the question he wanted to ask her. It was written on his face.

“No,” she said softly. “I’m reinventing myself.”

“Had you become so bad then, that you would have to reinvent yourself?”

“I had let things in my life control me. I want to know that I can do this, that I’m still alive. I know your family has been patiently walking around the fact that I’ve been hurt,” she said looking to her hurt arm. “I know I should talk about it, and I really want to, but there is so much that I am ashamed of,” she said looking back into her lap.

“You’ve nothing to be ashamed of.” Todd snapped out. Megan sat up trying to mask the hurt in her face. “Damn it.” Todd yanked the car to the shoulder. He was staring down at his knuckles that were turning white on the steering wheel. To be victimized so long to feel ashamed, what must she be going through?

He wanted to get his hands on her ex-husband. “I know what you’ve been through; I can see it all over your face. I know who did it to you too, that’s clear as well. I can’t begin to comprehend why he did it, and I in no way condone his actions. I can’t even fathom what you went through, but I am here to listen.” He looked over at her. “I can’t promise not to show emotion, to be honest, it just pisses me off, seeing the aftermath.” He turned his body toward her, she had her eyes fixed on her fingers. She had messed with the end of the cast so much there was a fine white powder all over her slacks. He reached over and put her hand in his. “Let’s get some lunch. I want to hear your story, if you’ll tell it.” When Megan nodded, he pulled the jeep back on the road.

They found a small sandwich shop ten minutes later. It was warm out, so they sat outside on the covered table and ate in silence. When she had eaten her turkey sandwich, she took a sip of the iced tea and took a deep breath.

“
I
meet Derek in college. I was a freshman trying to major in marketing and business, and he was a senior about to graduate with a degree in law. I thought I’d found the man with whom I wanted to grow old. We married less than a year later. The wedding was nice. I had thought it would be the start of a really great life.”

“That night, our wedding night, I learned it was not to be a dream but a nightmare. Derek was very upset about some of my college friends I’d invited to the wedding. That was the first time he hit me. Things progressed from there, he was not only controlling, he was extremely jealous. When I started my job at Martin and Marcus Marketing, the marketing firm I worked for, things should have been going fine. But, they weren’t; I learned his moods, learned when to keep my mouth shut and when to apologize for everything, whether I’d done anything wrong or not. One night, my boss Jose Martin needed me to stay late on a campaign that was due to go to print the next day. Actually it was Ric Derby’s Gallery campaign I was working on. You have to understand, Jose was a sixty-five year old grandfather of six. He was like a father figure to me.”

“When I got home late that night, Derek started accusing me of having an affair. Things escalated from there, I woke up in the hospital with him standing over me, telling an officer how I had been mugged in the parking lot of our complex. I had sixteen stitches to my head, three broken ribs and two broken fingers.” Megan looked down now at her hand. Her fingers were healed, but they still ached when it got really cold.

“When I was released, he brought me diamond earrings and apologized. He told me he was under a lot of stress from work and he just couldn’t bare it if I left him. It became regular that I would get slapped, or pushed. He started throwing things at me as well; he had a really good aim. He started with small items, shoes, books, and then he started in on lamps, or furniture. After the third time of ending up in the hospital, someone called the police. His excuses weren’t believable anymore. They couldn’t charge him, unless I pressed charges. I did take their advice and moved into a shelter, I was there for two weeks when Derek found me and dragged me back. He kept me locked up in a motel room, a prisoner.” She took another breath and looked up at Todd.

He was sitting patiently listening, his knuckles where white but his face showed little emotion. She could tell he was struggling to keep in check. Taking another deep breath she continued.

“I’d been locked in the motel room for three weeks, no phone, no going out, little to no food as he was at work all day and all I could eat is what he gave me. The only door with a lock on the outside was the bathroom, so I had spent most of my time locked in there, it was a six by seven room with no windows. I was going crazy, no way out.”

“And then, one day, the bathroom door just pushed open, maybe he’d forgotten to lock it. I don’t know, but I ran. I didn’t even grab clothes. I ran to the corner, and then I ran to the next and then the next. I ended up about six miles away at a quick-n-stop. I called my boss and asked if he could come take me to the police station. Mr. Martin helped me file for divorce and put a restraining order out against Derek. I finally pressed charges. They charged him and he was sentenced to two years in prison. He only served six months; part of the bargain was based on him signing the divorce papers. After I recovered, I’d started back at work, Mr. Martin hired me back, no questions asked. I sold the townhouse, and signed a lease on a new apartment on the other side of town; I bought new furniture I thought I had started my new life.”

Todd reached over and held her left hand; she’d been peeling the cast away again. Her eyes had clouded over in the memories, she’d been talking without really seeing him and he could tell she was trying to show no emotions.

“The restraining order was still valid, he couldn’t get within two hundred feet of me, and he stayed away for a while, until a week before Matt died. I’d been putting in some extra hours, trying to save up for a trip back here to visit Matt. When I got home that night, I remember turning around to lock the door, and he was just… there. I guess my neighbor had called the police when she saw him push his way in. It took the police ten minutes to get there, if they hadn’t arrived so quickly, I would be dead. Derek had changed, he told me that I had ruined his life. He said he knew I’d been sleeping around and I deserved everything I’d gotten and more. That if he couldn’t have me, then no one would. That I needed to pay for all the damage I did to his career.”

She held up her right arm.

“This happened in the first minutes when I tried to push him out the door. He just – snapped it. He had pushed me in and locked the door so we wouldn’t be “Interrupted.” Within five minutes he’d broken almost all of the items in my living room, claiming that someone must have bought everything for me, since I was too stupid to survive without him. Then he started in on me. I had edged my way towards the kitchen phone, when he looked up after smashing my new television and noticed me. The bruises on my back are from one of my oak kitchen chairs.”

Todd’s hand tightened around hers, not painfully, but enough that it snapped Megan from her trance.

“Todd, I’m sorry.” She blinked again.

“Don’t!” he said harshly. “You’ve nothing to be sorry for. Tell me the bastard is locked up for good.”

“Yes, for now. The trial is set for sometime late next month; my lawyer says I won’t have to testify. I try to imagine that it was someone else’s life, like watching a movie. It really didn’t happen to me, then I move the wrong way, and the pain comes back. I tried going to a counselor right after he was sentenced the first time. She really helped me deal with a lot of the hurt. I felt as if it was my entire fault. I would look around and see happy couples, holding hands, kissing, and here I was, abused and torn down. What did I do wrong? Why did these other women get happy ever after, and I got – well, not. It must be me, right? Derek would constantly tell me what was wrong with me. I didn’t think before I said something, I didn’t say it nice enough, or in the right tone. I had no sense of style, I didn’t walk feminine enough, or put on enough make-up, and then I put too much on and looked like a tramp and so on.”