Silent Scream (16 page)

Sleep seemed to avoid him, but he forced himself to close his eyes. 
Don’t think about Jessie,
he commanded himself. 
Don’t even think about Maddie.  Leave the past in the past and let it go.
 Perhaps his body recognized fatigue well enough as he drifted away into a dreamless blackness.

Chapter Fifteen

Although the house was quiet, the scent of frying bacon and baking biscuits woke Gabriel.  Blinking, he sat up and swung his legs over the couch.  He ran his fingers through his hair, trying to comb back errant strands, but they refused to be tamed without a shower.  Peering at his wrist, he mentally noted the time: 8:30.  He shuffled into the kitchen, where he found Yolanda shuttling some eggs from a pan to a plate.  “Good morning,” she said, keeping her gaze on the eggs.

“Morning,” he replied.  “Have you seen Maddie yet?”

“She’s still sleeping.”  Yolanda grabbed a potholder and walked to the oven.  Opening the door, she reached inside and grabbed the pan of browned biscuits.   “I hope you’re hungry.”

“Always.”  He shuffled to the table and sat in a chair.  Leaning  back, he brushed his fingers across his eyes, trying to wipe away the residue of sleep.

“Good.  Enjoy it while it’s hot.”  Yolanda set a plate of eggs, bacon, and biscuits in front of him, along with a fork and napkin.

“Thanks.”  He set the napkin in his lap.

“You’re welcome.”  She scooped more egg onto another plate and added bacon and biscuits.  Plucking another fork from the drawer, she looked at Gabriel for a moment.  “I’m going to take this plate to Maddie.  I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.”  Gabriel watched her head down the hallway as he took a bite of his eggs.  Although he usually found people were far too liberal with salt, he quickly realized  Yolanda must share his minimalistic taste.  Although he wasn’t usually that hungry in the morning, he quickly discovered a hearty appetite and finished half his eggs even before Yolanda had reappeared, filled her own plate, and sat down at the table beside him.

“There’s juice in the fridge.  How’s the food?” she asked.

“It’s great.”  He walked to the cabinet and pulled out a glass, which he filled with juice.  “How’s Maddie?”  He peered out the window at the frosted landscape sparkling in the morning light.  As he stood there, the cold of the tiles penetrated his skin, chilling him.

“She’s okay.”  Yolanda paused to take a bite.  “I’m sure after she has a shower she’ll come out.”

“How is she holding up with the idea of giving a statement?”  Carrying his orange juice, he walked back to the table and sat in his chair.

Setting the fork atop her plate, Yolanda wiped the napkin across her mouth.  “I think she’s really nervous, but she hasn’t backed down,  at least not yet.”

“Think she will?”  He took a sip of the juice and set the glass on the table.

Yolanda rested the fork on her plate and peered ahead thoughtfully.  “I wish I knew.”  She turned her attention to Gabriel.  “I’d like to think she’ll be okay with it, but I don’t know.  I don’t even know that I would, considering all the awful things to come at the trial, all the terrible things lawyers say—the way they treat women who have been raped.  Maddie is strong, but that goes way beyond a need for strength.” 

“I know.”  He picked up his glass and took another drink.  “She shouldn’t have to go through this, and if there were any other way, we’d have done it.  But there isn’t.  We both know that.”  He tilted the glass to his lips and drained the remaining juice, then finished the rest of his breakfast.  The two sat in silence, each staring ahead into space instead of at each other, but both were dwelling on Maddie.

Gabriel’s thoughts flickered back to the previous night, when all hell had broken loose between him and his brother.  Then there had been that exchange with Tammy.  Although he knew water could never wash away the remains of each of those encounters, it couldn’t hurt to get a shower and at least try to start the day on a more positive footing.  “Would it be all right if I took a shower?” Gabriel asked.

Yolanda nodded.  “Yeah.  There’s two bathrooms, so even if Maddie is in one, you can have the other.  There are fresh towels in the cabinets.  Help yourself.  It’s just down the hall and to the left.”

“Thanks.”  Gabriel ducked into the living room and picked up the duffle bag his brother had dropped off the previous evening.  Bag in hand, he trudged down the hall until he found the bathroom and started the shower.  Before the steam fogged the mirror, he peered at his reflection, the haphazard way his dark hair poked outward, the shadows beneath his eyes, the thick stubble lining his jaw and cheeks.

“You look like hell,” he told himself and turned away, adjusted the water temperature, and ducked under the warm spray.

* * *

“You can’t hide in here forever,” Maddie murmured under her breath as she sat on the bed, her hand pressed in her lap.  Long strands of her hair had slipped into her face, helping to distract her from her reflection, something she didn’t want to see, not with the scar lining the side of her face, reminding her of what she wanted so desperately to forget.

She huddled in the depth of her sweater, clinging to its fuzzy warmth.  Peering through the hair in her face, she read the clock on the wall: 10:30.  Sam would be here soon to talk  about...it. 

Her heart rate sped up, and she could feel the panic catching inside.  She couldn’t escape.  Yanking the hair from in front of her eyes, she pulled it back and merged it with the length at her backside.  She gathered it into a pony and twisted it, slowly drawing it up into a bun  she secured with a pencil from the dresser top.

As she started to stand, she put weight on the weak ankle and fell against the dresser, banging her outer thigh.  “Damn!” she whispered and half fell across the top of it, forcing her to pay attention to her reflection.  She drew back sharply, shocked at the pallor of her skin and the way the scar seemed so obvious in the harsh brilliance of morning.  Without realizing it, she had raised her hand and traced the uneven length of it, feeling remembered pain.

Gasping, she pulled her fingers away.   Stumbling back to the bed, she slumped upon it, still staring at the wide-eyed woman peering back at her, a woman so haunted she appeared unrecognizable, and looking at that reflection, she couldn’t find the doctor who had been so self-assured once, so poised and ready for anything.

Anything.

Her eyes widened even more and glistened with the tears pooling there.  She tried to blink them back, but the glistening grew and overflowed, streaming down her face in large streaks. 
How do I do this?
she wondered, quickly brushing her hands across her face, soaking her fingers in tears she couldn’t contain.  For a moment, she released herself to the pain, and quietly sobbed as her shoulders curved into a brokenness she couldn’t fight any longer.  Slowly, she rocked back and forth, waiting until she’d emptied herself of the grief, but her body was full of it—too full for words.

“Maddie?”  Yolanda lightly rapped on the door.  “You all right?”

“I’m fine.”  Maddie forced a calm to in her voice as she  inhaled sharply and straightened.  She frantically rubbed her face, trying to erase the flush left behind.

“Do you need anything?”

“No.  I’ll be out in a minute.”  She turned to the door, half-expecting it to open, but instead she heard Yolanda slowly depart, leaving her to try to find a way to conceal her rising panic.

Trying to force her heart to slow, she looked one last time at her reflection, trying to find the person she’d once been, the one she wanted to be yet again. 
I know you’re in
there somewhere,
she thought.
You have to be.

Before Yolanda returned or, worse yet, sent Gabriel to check on her, Maddie forced herself to leave the sanctuary of the room and hobble into the living room on an ankle still telling her off. As she stepped across the threshold, found the fireman sitting on the couch, reading the TV Guide.  Although she was used to seeing him in tee-shirts, this morning he wore a navy cable sweater that buttoned at the neck and black jeans.  She spotted the black shoulder holster and gun l in place.  His dark hair, still wet, she assumed from a shower, glistened in the morning light.  Although he’d brushed most of it away from his face, a few strands fell toward his eyes.  He noticed her enter, lightly tossed the magazine to the coffee table, and looked at her.

“How are you feeling?”  He stood and studied her ankle and bare foot.   “You look like you’re limping less.”  He pushed the sleeves of the sweater higher on his forearms.

Maddie’s gaze joined his as she, too, scrutinized her ankle.  “I guess it’s better, even though it still hurts like hell.  It is a little easier to walk.”  She took a step and winced.  “Or limp, I should say.”

“Come sit.”  He pointed to the couch.  “The last thing you need to do is keep weight on it.” 

Although she wanted to argue, she shuffled through the room and finally sat on the couch, not far from where he had been sitting.

“Did you sleep okay?”  His dark  midnight eyes, peered at her, searching the depths of her face for...something, though what she didn’t have a clue; still, she found herself returning the stare, focusing on the line of his jaw.

“I didn’t dream, if that’s what you mean.”  She forced her voice to an emotionless tone, and she toyed with the edge of the cast, her forefinger tracing its roughened edge.

He shrugged and joined her on the couch.  “Maybe it was that god-awful coffee I made last night.  Sam used to tell me I couldn’t make a pot worth drinking to save my soul.  Maybe it was enough to scare away your nightmares.”  He lightly patted her shoulder. 

“Maybe,” she finally agreed.  The doorbell chimed, and Maddie jumped. 

“Relax.”  Gabriel lightly squeezed her shoulder.  He started to reassure her she was safe by telling her it was probably Sam and then realized that wouldn’t exactly ease her tension, either,  not with the statement she was about to give.   Instead, he said, “I’ll be right back.”  He gave her shoulder one last squeeze and walked to the front door to find his brother had arrived.

“You’re early,” he said, opening the door.

“Better than late,” Sam ansered, stepping into the foyer and unzipping his coat.  He pulled it off and hung it on the coat rack.

“Still ticked off about last night, I see,” Gabriel said.

“There’s nothing to be mad about,” he retorted, jerking off his hat and hanging it on the rack as well. “Do me a favor.  Let’s just leave the past where it belongs, little brother.”

“Sure, Sam,” he said sarcastically. 

Sam leveled a baleful stare at Gabriel and shook his head.  “How’s Maddie this morning?”

“Nervous as hell, I expect.”  He headed toward the living room, leading his brother to where Maddie sat.  Yolanda had joined her, and the two women were whispering.

“Good morning, Maddie,” Sam said, nodding toward her.

The color drained from her face.  “Morning,” she finally responded, then turned her attention to the hand that rested in her lap.  “You’re early.”

He looked from Maddie to his brother.  “So Gabriel told me.  It’s kind of a nasty habit I have.”  He stepped into the room and sat in a chair across from the sofa.  “I guess you know why I’m here.”

 Maddie nodded as she stiffened and squinted her eyes closed, wishing she could erase everything around her.     

Clenching his teeth, Gabriel crossed the room and sat beside Maddie on the couch.  Although he wanted to touch her shoulder to reassure her, he forced his hands to rest idly in his lap, unsure whether  she would react positively to his touch.

“I know this won’t be easy for you, but I’ll try to make it as smooth and quick as I can.”  Sam pulled out a palm-sized tape recorder from his pocket and showed it to her.  “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to record your statement as another form of evidence.”

She looked at the tape recorder with dull eyes and slowly nodded.  “All right.”  Her deadened gaze traveled the room and ended up focusing on Yolanda, who mouthed the words, “It’s going to be okay.”  Leaning against the couch, Maddie closed her eyes and began to relay the story one more time, amazed at how clear the details seemed even weeks after the assault.  She forced herself to reduce the events to words given in a monotone voice, even as images from the assault flashed into her mind, refusing to release her.

She would never be free.

The rapist’s blond hair flashed in the moonlight.  The blade he held cut her face.  Drops of his spittle sprayed her cheeks as he yelled at her.  There came the sound of fabric tearing in a single, savage rip.

Her eyelids snapped open.

“It’s okay.”  Gabriel frowned and leaned toward her.  “You don’t have to keep blurting things out.  Take your time.  Whatever you need.”

“No.”  Maddie shook her head.  “You don’t understand.  I want it out.  I want it to be gone.  I want a hole in my memory as big as Texas so I won’t have to think about this anymore.”  She started rocking back and forth, her good arm folded across her chest.  She exhaled each breath in a light, frantic burst, suggesting she was about to become hysterical at any moment.

“Take it easy,” Gabriel said.  “Just focus on your breathing.”

Sam and his brother watched Maddie, waiting until her breathing slowed before Sam began to question her.  “When you went to the station to give your statement just after the break-in, did you recognize anyone as the man who raped you?” Sam asked softly.

“Yes.”

“Was it one of the teenagers?”

Shaking her head, Maddie replied, “No.  It was a cop.”

Sam exchanged relieved glances with his brother.  “Can you be more specific?”

The rocking motion sped up, and her fingers toyed with the outer edge of the cast.  “The blond cop who brought in the second boy.  He was the rapist.”  Her voice cracked, threatening to snap beneath the weight of emotion bearing down on her.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”