Fractured Innocence (#2 IFICS) (21 page)

She nodded in agreement, but deep down she thought,
praying doesn’t work, Mamma.
But she had been rescued. Why wasn’t she grateful? Why did she feel so numb? And why was every ounce of her body aching to see Dasvoik? The man was a monster. She knew that, and yet a part of her still longed for his acceptance. What the hell was the matter with her?

The door opened again and the doctor came back carrying a tray of steaming hot soup and crusty bread. Her stomach rumbled at the site. When she placed the tray in front of her, Aaliyah greedily took a sip of the soup and burned her tongue. She was so hungry she didn’t care. She picked up the bread tore it apart and dunked it in the soup. Before she could even swallow it, she spit out the bread. Memories of the cage and struggling for a chunk of bread accosted her mind. 

“What’s wrong?” Dr. Chambers asked. 

Aaliyah pushed the bread aside. “I’m not hungry.”

“Does it taste bad? I can get you something else.” 

“I hate bread. I never want to see it again.”

Her mother looked confused. She used to love bread. 

“I see.” Dr. Chambers removed the tray from in front of the girl. 

“Let me get rid of this.” The doctor left the room and returned with a slice of pie and a tall glass of milk. 

Aaliyah looked at the pie, and her mouth watered. 

“Maybe this will be better,” the doctor said, as she set the apple pie down in front of her. 

Aaliyah eyed the dessert for a moment, before picking up the fork and taking a bite. It was amazing. It had been so long since she’d tasted anything so sweet and rich. She devoured the pie and then gulped down the glass of milk. 

“Did you eat bread while you were gone?” Dr. Chambers asked her voice was soft and soothing. 

Aaliyah turned her head, refusing to answer. 

“We’ll worry about that later. I’m glad you liked the pie. Would you like to be left alone to visit with your mother or do you want me to stay?”

“Alone.” 

The doctor picked up the plate and glass before leaving the room. 

Her mother reached for her hand. Aaliyah wanted to pull it away, but she knew it would upset her mother. 

“Noah has been calling and coming by every day.” 

Noah.
How had she forgotten about him? Once he found out what happened to her he wouldn’t want anything to do with her and she didn’t blame him. 

“What did you tell him?”

Her mom eyed her before speaking, “I told him the truth. That you were abducted and badly injured. That you needed time to heal. He insisted on coming to see you, but I told him I had to ask you first.” 

“No, I don’t want him to see me like this. I don’t ever want to see him again.” 

“He’s very worried about you.” 

“I don’t want to see him, Mamma.” 

“Then you won’t see him,” she said firmly. “It’s your choice.” 

Her choice? The words sounded foreign to her. 

CHAPTER 21

Kaitlyn had to see the girl. Dr. Chambers said she should not get involved—that it wasn’t part of her job. Which made no sense. They wanted her to be more human, but they didn’t want her to feel or be involved? Part of her saw the logic of not getting emotionally involved in the missions, but she just couldn’t seem to forget about the captive. 

Maybe if she talked to her she could put it behind her and move forward. It was not good for her attention to be unfocused. Dasvoik had managed to evade them for weeks, and they were no closer to catching him than they were on the day they boarded the ship. Kaitlyn was beyond frustrated. 

She paused in front of the door before entering. Kaitlyn wasn’t sure what she was going to say to the girl. She wasn’t very good at things like this. Maybe just seeing her would help and they wouldn’t need to talk. 

When she crossed through the door, Kaitlyn was surprised by what greeted her. The young girl sat in a chair, watching television. She clicked the TV off when she noticed Kaitlyn. 

Teal eyes and a mocha face stared back at her. Without all the bruising, the girl was truly striking. 

“You look well,” Kaitlyn said, crossing the room. 

“Do I know you?” The girl pushed herself back into the chair, wrapping her arms around her knees. Suddenly she looked like a fragile child. 

“We met on the boat.”

Aaliyah flinched. “I’m sorry. I don’t remember.” 

“That’s okay. I was once in an accident and I couldn’t recall anything for a very long time.” 

A long lapse of silence filled the room. Kaitlyn didn’t know what to say.  

Dr. Chambers warned her not to bring up Dasvoik, stating the situation was too delicate. It’s not like she had anything positive to tell her anyway. 

Aaliyah looked up, her arms were now wrapped around her chest and she rocked slightly back and forth. “Were you a prisoner on the boat? I think I would have remembered you.” 

“No, I was not. I helped rescue you.” 

The girl looked down at the ground and shifted in her seat. Her eyes lifted and met Kaitlyn's. “You were too late.” 

The words stung. “I’m sorry.”

“Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be trying to find my brother? And all the others?”

“That’s not my job.”

“Not your job?” The girl’s voice shook. Kaitlyn registered her rise in pulse rate and blood pressure. Physical and emotional signs of distress. 

“Federal agencies are searching for the prisoners.” Kaitlyn was searching for Dasvoik, but she wasn’t allowed to talk about that.

“It’s been weeks. Wherever they were headed, they have reached by now. My brother could be dead for all I know.” 

“That’s a possibility,” Kaitlyn agreed. “But, chances are, he is alive.”

“If he’s alive, he probably wishes he were dead,” the girl said looking off in the distance, her eyes glazed over. 

“Can I sit down?”

The girl didn’t respond, so Kaitlyn sat in a chair next to her. 

“I can’t claim to know what you are going through.” Kaitlyn said looking at the girl. “I do know you must miss your brother.” 

Aaliyah turned in her direction, but did not speak. 

“You want him returned.”

“Yes.”

“You might be able to help us.”

Aaliyah sat up straighter and for the first time, Kaitlyn saw a hint of interest in her clear blue-green eyes. “How?”

“You spent more time than anyone with Dasvoik. You might know something about his whereabouts.”

She shook her head. “He never talked to me like that. I don’t know anything.” 

“You might have heard or seen something and not realized it was important at the time. The mind captures things we are not aware of.” 

“I’m sorry. I cannot help you. Most of my time was spent tied up.” The girl recoiled at a memory. 

Kaitlyn was not a psychologist, but she deduced it was a good sign that the girl was remembering the horrors she went through. To get over this odd obsession she had with Dasvoik. 

“Dasvoik is the one that hurt your brother.”

“No!” 

“If it were not for him, your brother would be home with his family.” 

The girl glared at Kaitlyn. Her chest heaved up and down, and like a crumbling pile of cards, she collapsed. Sobs racked her body. 

The door flung open and Dr. Chambers looked at Kaitlyn in disbelief. “I told you not to talk about him.”

“She needs to talk about him.”

“On her own time.” 

“She might be able to help us.” 

“I can’t,” the girl wailed. 

Kaitlyn tapped the side of her own head. “It’s in there I know it is. She knows something she is not aware of. A conversation heard when she was unconscious, a map, a childhood memory from Dasvoik, something. I’m telling you, it’s in there.” 

Dr. Chambers got on her knees in front of the girl and took her hands in hers. “She might be right, Aaliyah.” 

“She’s not,” the girl spit out. “Don’t you think if I knew where my brother was I would tell you?”

“You might unconsciously be protecting Dasvoik. We need to find him to find your brother. Without him, it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack.” 

“I don’t know anything!” 

“Would you be willing to let me put you under and see if I can pull the information from your mind with hypnosis?”

The girl’s breathing became shallow and her head lifted. “Could you do that?”

“I can try. If you are open to the idea.”

Kaitlyn interjected. “Dasvoik needs to be stopped. More than likely he has a new girl tied to his bed as we speak.”

“Kaitlyn!” Dr. Chamber’s eyes were wide. 

Aaliyah pulled her hands away and rocked back and forth in the chair. 

“He hurt you, Aaliyah. He took something from you that cannot be returned. But you can come out of this stronger.” 

“I’m too weak.” The girl sobbed. “I’m afraid. I’m disgusting. I can’t even look at myself in the mirror. No one but Dasvoik is ever going to want me again.”

 Kaitlyn leaned forward in her chair. “Not long ago I was attacked. And I woke up afraid. Changed forever, just like you. I thought I was a freak. That no one could ever love me again, but I was wrong. I’m stronger than ever and have people in my life that believe in me. Love me even.”

“You’re just saying that to make me feel better.” 

“Why would I do that?” Kaitlyn asked, puzzled.

Dr. Chambers smiled sadly. “She’s telling the truth. I have helped her recover. Just like I intend to help you recover. I don’t agree with the way Kaitlyn has handled this, but I believe she has made more progress in the last fifteen minutes then I have made in weeks.”

“Please, Aaliyah. Help us,” Kaitlyn whispered. “Take back your life. Do something good. Help us save any other girls and boys from the hands of the maniac that did this to you.”

Aaliyah wiped her nose with the back of her sleeve and nodded. “Okay. I don’t think it will work, but I will try it. But, you have to promise me you will look for my brother.” 

Kaitlyn nodded. “I promise, but first I have to find the mastermind behind all of this. You also have to make me a promise.”

“What?” Aaliyah asked wearily. 

“You have to remember. You can’t move forward until you face the past. Once you remember what that man put you through, you will see that was not love.” Kaitlyn reached forward and extended her pinky. The young girl stared at Kaitlyn’s hand and back at her face as if she was trying to figure out if Kaitlyn was serious or not. Kaitlyn nodded her head and the girl hesitantly extended her hand, linking her pinky with Kaitlyn’s. 

“I’ll find your brother,” Kaitlyn vowed. “I want to show you something. I will be right back.” She jumped up and walked down the hallway until she reached the lab. “Lucas, can you print an image from my memory?”

“Of course. Anything in particular?”

“Aaliyah lying in Erik’s arms after we found her.”

Lucas looked at her for a moment, rolled his chair over to his computer, then rapidly pounded away at the keyboard. Within seconds, the printer kicked on and an image formed on the paper. Kaitlyn smiled. She might not be fully human, but her mind was pretty damn impressive if she did say so herself. 

“Thank you.” She grabbed the photo and hurried back down to the girl’s room. 

She looked down at the image, and her smile disappeared. It was horrible the way she’d been beaten within an inch of her life.

Dr. Chambers and Aaliyah looked up when she entered. 

The doctor saw the photograph in her hands. “Kaitlyn, no! This is not the way to handle this situation.” 

Kaitlyn ignored the doctor. “I want you to look at this.” She held the photo out, and the girl reached for it with shaking hands. 

With one hand, she covered her mouth. The image shook violently, before it floated to the ground. Kaitlyn wondered if the doctor was correct, and she had made a horrible mistake. 

The girl pulled her legs up on the chair and wrapped her arms around them, resting her head on her knees as she sobbed. 

The doctor tried to speak to her, but the girl ignored her and continued to cry. 

“He did this to you. The man you think you need to please. He tortured you. Did unspeakable things to your body and mind. Please tell me you see that when you look at the image,” Kaitlyn said softly. 

The girl’s tears subsided. “Why? Why did he hurt me? I really tried. I tried so hard.”

“I know you did, but someone like him is never happy. They get off on the pain and the humiliation. No matter how hard you tried, nothing would have been good enough. He is the one who is wrong. Not you. You did absolutely nothing to deserve what happened to you. Do you understand that? None of this was your fault.” Kaitlyn ripped the photograph to shreds, letting it fall to the ground. “You’re stronger than you think. You will get through this.”

Aaliyah stared at what was left of the photograph on the floor. Tears spilled silently and flowed down her face. “I’m so ashamed.” 

CHAPTER 22

 A few days later, Aaliyah looked up as someone entered her room. The book she was holding slipped from her fingers and fell to the floor. 

 
Noah.
Despite what she had been through, the sight of him still made her heart catch. 

Feeling very self-conscious, she tugged at her shirt and smoothed out her pants with her hands. The look on his face made her want to get up and run. His usual friendly features were contorted in pain.  

He couldn’t even stand the sight of her. She knew it! Why was he here? She told both her parents and the doctor not to allow him to see her. Her hands clenched in her lap.

“Aaliyah.” He took a couple of hesitant steps towards her. Her heart flipped, and her pulse accelerated. The walls felt as if they were rapidly closing in on her. 

“Please, go.” Aaliyah looked down at her hands. She could see the scars on her wrist, the ever-present reminder of the restraints that bound her. Even though her hands had been freed, she was still mentally stuck in that cage. Therapy was helping, but she knew she would never be whole again. She was physically ready to leave the facility, but she couldn’t. The idea of going back home and acting like life was normal was impossible for her to grasp. The mere mental image of walking down the road made her shake like a leaf in a storm.