6. Beatrix
6
BEATRIX
“ B eatrix!”
A hard flinch follows the sound of my name spoken with undeserved relief. I glance up as I enter the office where Thatcher and Pastor Michaels are waiting. Both men rise to their feet, Thatcher slower than Trevor’s father, who comes barreling toward me.
He’s not well. That much is clear. The dark rings under eyes are a stark comparison to his pale complexion. His mouse-brown hair is in disarray, and his clothes look wrinkled as if he’s slept in them. The way his brows pull together and then upward, and the sheer relief mixed with his devastation when he sees me, tugs at my heart.
What have I done to this man?
As the pastor wraps his arms around my shoulders, I look behind him to catch Thatcher’s gaze. While he holds a polite, appropriately professional look of sympathy, his eyes flash in warning. Does he think I’ll blurt out what happened? I’m not sure if I can utter what I’ve done out loud, even if I wanted to. It’s too horrific. My eyes slam shut as Pastor Michaels squeezes me, seeking comfort in who he believes is someone he can trust.
“Oh god, Beatrix! I’m so glad you’re here,” Pastor Michaels says, his voice cracking.
My hands come up as best they can since he’s pinning my arms down, and I try to return the hug.
“I'm so sorry for your loss.” What a lie. Can his god hear my dishonesty? “I wish I could've been here when you stopped by yesterday.”
Pastor Michaels grabs hold of my shoulders as he steps back and looks down at me. I risk a glance up at his face to find concern etched into his expression.
“We need to talk. It’s urgent. I know you’re busy but?—”
“We can take care of anything that Beatrix was doing,” Thatcher interrupts pleasantly as he comes up beside us. “Here, why not sit and talk in here? We can reconvene when you two are through. Take your time.”
I can’t look at either of them in the face as Pastor Michaels thanks Thatcher before my stepbrother slips out of the room. The minute the door shuts behind me, Pastor Michaels grabs my wrist and leads me away from the door.
“What happened to your hands?” he demands, glancing down at the bandages.
Quickly, I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind. “I was being careless around the furnace.”
He nods, satisfied with my response.
“Thatcher just told me he and his brother obtained ownership of Bright Starr, thanks to their father’s will. How is that even possible?” he asks as we lower ourselves to the old couch. “This place belongs to you and the Starr family.”
My heart races as I try to compartmentalize everything that’s happening in my life. Bright Starr’s change in management, Trevor’s death and his eyes arriving in our mailbox, being buried alive… There’s a ton that’s happened, and because it all intertwines, I have to tread carefully during this conversation. I can’t let anything slip. Maybe this was the warning Thatcher was trying to convey when I entered the room. This could get complicated if I don’t watch every word that comes out of my mouth.
“It was a surprise for me too, but I guess Mom thought it best to give everything to her husband in case of her death,” I mutter, staring down at my hands. “But they’re letting me live in the house with them, and I still get to work here and help run the place, so not all is lost. Honestly, it’s kind of nice having the help.”
“I guess if they’re actually pulling their weight…” Pastor Michaels’s voice trails off as he nods, deep in thought. “Look, I want to hear all about your new situation, but we don’t have a lot of time, and I need to say something to you before you get wind of what everyone is talking about in town.”
I bite my bottom lip and force myself to look up into his face. To my surprise, his face is even paler and his eyes slide away from mine with a look I can only decipher as guilt.
“Uh-oh,” I groan. “What’s happened? What are people saying?”
Pastor Michael sighs, sagging as he does. “I don't know if you know, but the Haggardy’s were the ones to find Trevor hanging off the old Hogton Bridge.”
Guilt builds in my chest, causing it to constrict tighter than ever, as the pastor’s bottom lip trembles and tears mist in his eyes as he looks back at me. Crap, I need to say something. Anything .
“Pastor Michaels, I’m so sorry?—”
“No, Beatrix, no.” He shakes his head. Reaching forward, he takes my hands, cupping them between his. “I’m here because I’m sorry.”
I blink rapidly, trying to search my brain for an answer to this type of response. It’s not the first time someone’s said something strange in their grief. Maybe he's just flustered. I’ve never seen him so upset. The fact that I’m partially—ok wholly —responsible for his current state makes this situation so many times worse. Thankfully, I don’t need to find something to say because Pastor Michaels continues.
“Trevor left a note. Sheriff Heins called me to the scene and showed me it. Trevor said—” he swallows and takes a steadying breath before he continues, “—he said he couldn’t live with what he did and hopefully he’d be forgiven for his sins.”
It takes everything in me to keep the derision off my face. There wouldn’t be enough time in the world, even if Trevor had been immortal, to atone for his sins. I don’t say that, though.
“That’s awful. I hope he’s found—” I start, but the pastor cuts me off.
“Trevor was a good kid. Did he have his faults? Sure, we all have some. But I thought… Well, I thought he and I had found a way for him to get over what he’d done.”
My friend must see the confusion on my face because he shakes his head, his expression melting into regret.
“There’s only one thing I can think of that would haunt him to the point of taking his own life.” He scoots closer, his grip around my hands tightening. “I know what he did to you back in high school and before you left for college, Beatrix.”
My spine goes completely straight and stiff as shock leaves me momentarily speechless. I let out a strangled noise as mortification and disgust, phantom pain and helplessness, all combine to create a painful knot in my throat.
“The first I learned of what he did, I heard him talking to Sebastian about the, ah, incident after a service. When I approached him about it, he immediately told me how bad he felt. He thought you two were on the same page, and when you ran away crying, he didn’t know what to do. I had him pray about it and when nothing came of it legally… Well, I thought that maybe it hadn’t been so bad. You know how things go. Kids getting carried away and all…”
My lips part but close as I stare at the knowing look he gives me. As if I had seduced his son and then got too swept away and possibly overreacted. The feeling in my hands begins to fade, leaving them tingly. Does he think what happened was my fault in some capacity? While the rest of the girls in school vied for his attention, I never wanted anything to do with Trevor. I can still hear Trevor and Sebastian’s laughter that first time as they chased me down the alley before they?—
“The second time, I only found out because the cop you gave your statement to came and told me about it,” Pastor Michaels says, clearly on a roll now. “He’d been a diligent student in Bible study when he was younger, and I really thought he might follow in my footsteps before he lost his faith. I suppose he felt he had some loyalty to me.” Pastor Michael shrugs. “This time when I confronted Trevor, he told me how you two had gotten a little drunk at a party and he may have taken it too far.”
He laughs nervously. The sound is so startling and inappropriate, I recoil slightly. Seeing my reaction, he stops. Reaching up, my friend smooths back his mousy brown hair as he attempts to gather up the courage to continue whatever else he’s been bottling up.
As he struggles with his words, I struggle not to fall apart. But it’s hard. My insides fracture; the frisson forming across my heart as it begins to crumble makes it nearly impossible to breathe. I try to swallow down that knot that’s formed in my throat, but it only grows bigger as the seconds pass us by.
“Beatrix, I…” The pastor, my friend , looks back at me. The corners of his mouth hang down as he licks his lips. “I couldn’t let a mistake ruin him. He can’t have that on his record, and he’d implored me to help him. So I… I had the cop destroy your statement. But to make up for that, I forced Trevor to go to a divinity school and really immerse himself into learning God’s scripture. He came back a year later as a better man, Beatrix. When he told me he apologized to you when you came home from college a few months back and you had accepted it—I was thrilled. Then, a few weeks later, he told me he wanted to do right by you and date you properly. That God showed him you were special. I thought everything had turned around, that what I did was right.”
Every word out of Pastor’s Michaels’s mouth is a stab to my breaking heart.
I trusted this man with my life. For all the time I’ve known him, he’s always been one of the only people who would walk around town by my side without being ashamed. He stood up for me when people were cruel, and he always had something nice to say. But his kindness has been a facade. A lie. Pastor Michaels never cared about me. This man of God has gone out of his way to diminish what his son did to me. Tried to downplay the assaults as if they were nothing. He even went as far as to hide the legal trail I created in order to stop Trevor. It’s clear his son lied to him—there was never any apology made and there certainly had been no drinking or party where he claimed the second assault took place—and it was obvious Pastor Michaels didn’t care much about the details. He heard his son’s version of the story and decided Trevor was too precious to let get into trouble. That my suffering wasn’t as important as his son’s future.
This is the man who claimed he only wanted the best for me.
Tears sting my eyes. I look down at where Pastor Michaels holds my hand. How could he do this to me?
“All this to say, Beatrix, when Sheriff Heins asked me about the note and what it meant, I told him the truth. I wasn’t thinking clearly when I did. If I had, maybe I would’ve remembered that the Haggardy’s were standing just a few feet away, listening. You know how they are when it comes to gossip.” He grimaces.
I do know how fast gossip flies here. Nausea rocks my stomach as I think about how everyone will know what Trevor did to me.
“Knowing that, I’m here asking, no, imploring you, to reassure people that Trevor did right by you and that you two were on good terms,” Pastor Michaels continues, his words coming out faster as he speaks in earnest. “I can’t let Trevor’s reputation get sullied. If the people in Chasm believe that he was capable of something that hideous, it’ll destroy his memory here. It doesn’t help that Officer Hein’s kid, Sebastian, has been MIA. He thinks Sebastian took off because he was afraid Trevor was going to say something, and he’d have to deal with the backlash from everyone in town. The guilt my son must’ve been feeling… Of course, he would confide in his friend that he might confess what they’d done to you! But for Sebastian to leave Trevor to face their crimes alone? Disgusting… Anyway, Officer Heins thinks his son isn’t coming back. Honestly, Chasm can think what they want of him, but Trevor? I just… I just can’t let his name become tarnished in such a way.”
Oh… This is why he hurried to Bright Starr to speak with me. It’s not because he cares that the horrible things his son did to me are now public knowledge. Oh no, that would be just too kind and my world isn’t filled with kindness.
A full-body flinch rushes through me. Pastor Michaels wants me to lie about Trevor. To let the world know that he couldn’t possibly be a rapist. That what he’d done was nothing. The tears that have welled up spill over. They fall, landing on my arms and wrists.
“I know, I know, this is hard. His loss will be felt by everyone,” Pastor Michaels says, taking my tears for grief. “I know you’ll do right by him. He adored you, he just had a funny way of showing it. I thought that one day you two might marry, you know?”
The tears come to a halt. Anger, so bright and scalding that it steals my breath away, barrels through my veins, scorching away the hurt. Marry Trevor? The thought is so revolting that another flinch rushes through me. How dare he bring this up after confessing to gaslighting me for years?
“I’ll need to figure out his service arrangements. There's already a funeral taking place this Sunday. I suppose I could do it afterward, but … I don't know, I'll figure it out. Either way, I'll have his ashes buried next to his mother and the rest of the family. Have you already... have you cremated my son yet?” he asks, his voice breaking as he looks up at me.
I shake my head, unable to speak. Rage wipes away my guilt for this man's suffering and leaves me tongue tied as I fight the urge to scream at him. To call him out on his hypocrisy to the god he serves and to the people he leads. Pastor Michaels's confession hurts more than anything his son has ever done to me.
“Ok,” he nods. “Can you be the one to do it? I need it to be you that oversees the care of his body, not one of these new owners. The connection you had with Trevor… knowing you’re looking after him will make all of this a little easier to swallow.”
Internally, I scream. Although the sound is contained, it still rattles through me. It’s enough to cause my vision to blur and my heart to stutter. I lose more feeling as the numbness creeps up my wrists and into my arms. Before I can muster up a response, the gentle recorded bell tolls throughout the funeral home.
I cringe at the sound, as does the pastor. The door to the office opens and Thatcher walks in. I look away from the Hunt twin as his gaze lands on my face. I can’t face him right now. Too much has happened between us for me to trust him with this new betrayal I’m facing. It’s too raw and painful to entrust a man like Thatcher—whose words are both beautiful and terrifying, whose touch can unravel my sanity and leave me breathless. Somehow, Thatcher is both talented and dangerous enough to strip away everything from me and still make me feel like I’m being given something in return. I just need to process this on my own.
“I'm sorry to interrupt, but?—”
“No, no! You’re not interrupting. We were just finishing up.” Pastor Michaels squeezes my hands before he lets them go and stands. “I’m so glad I have you to lean on for this, Beatrix.”
I can’t look up at him or speak. Instead, I simply stare where he had been sitting. My mind tries, and fails, to wrap around what I’ve heard and to make sense of what I know of the pastor.
Pastor Michaels pats my shoulder as he moves around me and heads for the door.
“Here, I'll walk you out,” Thatcher offers.
The door barely closes before I'm on my feet. My internal scream wells up in my throat, and for a second, I consider letting it out. Maybe I'll feel better? Or maybe I'll feel worse since it will get me nowhere. Without thinking, I reach down to grab for the decorative star sculpture sitting on the coffee table. Maybe throwing it might help. But as I wrap my bandaged fingers around it, the pain from them causes me to stop.
I can't even throw something to relieve the pent-up energy.
The thought only pisses me off further.
What am I doing here in Chasm? In a town full of horrible people? Living with Patrick's kids who allowed their boyfriend to nearly kill me? What. Am. I. Doing ? How do I escape this fucking hell?
The door opens and the absolute last person I want to see steps inside. Knox freezes when our eyes meet.
“Oh, hey. I thought the room was empty now. Is, ah, everything ok?—?”
All the hatred and hurt churning around inside of me can’t be contained any longer. Like a fuse being lit, I can feel everything inside me ready to blow. Trembling with unbridled fury, I yell at him.
“GET OUT! GET OUT! GET OUT!”
His eyes widen with surprise, and he lifts his hands in surrender. “Shit, alright already!”
I choke on an angry sob and glare at Knox’s retreating form. When the door shuts behind him, I collapse back onto the couch.
Unable to hold it back, I let out a wretched scream.