Thirty-Five
Trina
I couldn’t wait to get to the moment where life stopped throwing me curveball after curveball. Where it settled and I stopped being thrown for a loop every time someone from my past approached. Where I quit feeling regret bubble to the surface and when I was able to stop living in fear.
It’d take time, I knew that. I just wanted to be able to go about my day without waiting for the proverbial monster to jump out from around the corner.
I used the restroom, washed my hands, and then turned the faucet to ice cold. Shoving my hands and wrists under the water, I scrubbed them together until the icy chill distracted me from my spinning thoughts.
Done, I rested my back against the wall and closed my eyes. This would stop.
It would all stop soon.
I was doing the work to leave the past where it belonged. I was strong enough to leave Jonathan for good. I was healing. I was working on all of it, and maybe Ashley and Cole were right. The sooner I realized people loved me and didn’t hold the past against me, the sooner I’d start feeling the same. Maybe.
Time.
I just needed more time.
I opened my eyes. I might need more time, but tonight I had friends. I had people who were good to me. I had Cole, who kissed me like he truly did still love me, and not the girl I used to be. He kissed me like he saw the woman in front of him even if I wasn’t so sure who that woman was anymore, or who she was becoming.
What if…?
What if she could become whatever she wanted, craft a new dream, create a new life? One that wasn’t held back by all my regrets and fears, but focused on something different?
A soft smile curved my lips. I started at the reflection, at the face reflected. The smile, that maybe, for the first time since I left this town, contained hope, held true, real-life hope. “I can do this, and eventually, it will be okay.”
For the first time, the night didn’t feel so dark and the days ahead not so difficult.
I turned and opened the door. Stepping outside into the hall, I turned, intent on heading straight back to Cole when a hand wrapped around my arm.
I froze as the cloying, familiar scent I’d hoped to never smell again, hit me so hard my stomach churned. I opened my mouth to scream, and a hand wrapped over my mouth.
“You didn’t think you could actually hide in plain sight and get away with it, did you?”
Jonathan.
All that bubbling hope popped like a thousand bubbles. I kicked my legs, tried to break away but he only dragged me harder and soon, there was the metal bang of the door and the frigid cold air of the night air sending goose bumps peppering down my arms beneath my sweater.
“Those men Kip sent, might have been large, but they’re idiots. And Kip should have known better than to think he had a chance in hell at keeping me from what I want.”
I screamed against his hand, fear flashing straight in front of my eyes. Jonathan spun me around, making me lose my footing. The world spun, and my vision went hazy. It took me a moment to grasp what I was seeing, what Jonathan had spun me around to see. Jim Bower. Lying splayed out on the ground, face down, a dark pool of what had to be blood, but I refused to believe it was, pooled on the ground beneath him.
“No!”
I screamed against the hand still pressed to my mouth, and then felt the burning blast of pain and heat against my cheekbone.
“Shut up. You’re only making it worse for you. Should I tell you the things I’ll do to you once I get you back home? Should I tell you how much it’s going to hurt?”
“I think you should take your hands off the woman and let her go.”
Relief swelled inside of me at the new voice. Brock. Someone was here. Thank God. My shoulders fell as Jonathan jerked me around again, this time with something hard pressing into my back. He adjusted so quickly his other arm wrapped around the front of my throat, and he held me against him as Rocco came crashing through the back door a second before Cole followed. Rocco had his own gun drawn, pointed directly at me and Jonathan, Cole’s was loose at his side.
Adrenaline rushed through me, making me warm and possibly psychotic because I burst out in a laugh and looked directly at Cole. “Probably shouldn’t have gone alone, huh?”
“Shut up!”
Jonathan snapped and jerked me backward.
I cried out in surprise more than pain.
Cole showed no hint of humor and scowled instead. “You don’t think you’re getting out of here with her, do you?”
Jonathan chuckled, and the cold tone in his voice turned mocking. “You don’t think I’m leaving here without her, do you? It’s not like you’ve been that difficult to take down.”
With Jim still on the ground, unmoving, his point was clear.
“Takes a special kind of coward to shoot a man in the back,”
Rocco retorted. “Good news for you, when I shoot you, it’ll be straight to your chest, so you see it coming and I get to watch the life bleed out of you.”
“Nonsense,”
Jonathan clipped and stepped backward, away from the door to the tavern, away from the three men, all with their guns ready.
They wouldn’t shoot, though, and Jonathan knew it. Not with me as his shield. He could do whatever he wanted to me, and they wouldn’t do a thing to stop him.
His slow backward steps were mirrored by theirs. With very step he made away from them they made a small stride toward us.
“My wife and I will be headed home and trust me when I tell you I have plans to correct her behavior, so this doesn’t happen again. You won’t mind, will you, Mr. Paxton?”
“I think you’ll be the one who minds considering as soon as you cross state lines you’ll be arrested.”
“Lies. All lies,”
Jonathan snapped, but he stopped moving. With his arm around my throat, his other swung out from behind me and his gun was now pointed directly at Cole.
“Cole!”
I shouted and got jerked back against him with his hand tightening on my throat. I choked as he squeezed.
“Shut up.”
His hand loosened enough so I could suck in a breath.
Cole acted like he wasn’t watching Jonathan choke me.
“Yeah, see, I got a text a minute ago. Apparently, an APB in Georgia has gone out on you. How many women have you assaulted in the last several years? I mean, other than your wife?”
“What?”
I rasped, and my jaw fell open. I blinked at Cole, trying to make sense of his words, but it was Brock who filled in the gap.
“Eight women so far have come forward, thanks to the help of some of our team.”
He turned to me. “Board meeting was called this afternoon, and all the evidence was laid in front of Mr. Wolf here. He’s been asked to resign immediately. Seems Kip and Valerie have been working hard on your behalf, Miss Mills.”
My head spun with the news. The reminder of my conversation with Valerie. I knew they’d been working on something, but this?
“Mrs. Wolf,”
Jonathan clipped and yanked me even closer to him until my entire body was pressed against his. “And they’re lies. Aren’t they, Katrina. You know I wouldn’t do that.”
I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe. We’d been married for almost nine years in all those years there’d been women? He’d cheated on me. The entire time. It was a punch I hadn’t seen coming. I’d truly meant nothing to him. And how messed up was it that that hurt? After all the other things he’d done…he still had the power to hurt me.
“I hate you,”
I seethed, unable to stop the bile rising in my throat. Assaulting women… the fact he could say he’d never do that…
What was wrong with him? He was so much worse than I already believed him to be.
“I hate you with every fiber of my being.”
I twisted, because screw him. Screw being trapped by him again. It would never happen. Not again. I was done living in fear.
Cole’s voice rang out as I struggled, and I froze as something round and cold pressed to my temple.
“Keep moving and you’ll end with your brains splattered on the pavement.”
“Doubtful,”
I snapped back. “You need me to portray your perfect little image, don’t you? You’re sick.”
“And you were the broken and used and desperate little girl that fell for me, weren’t you?”
His words hurt, but the impact was dulled as he grabbed me tighter around the throat with his gun to my head.
“Now, if none of you want to see her brains on the ground, I suggest you all stop moving.”
He swung out his gun and then brought it back to my temple.
None of the men stopped, but their movements slowed.
We were almost to the end of the parking lot. At some point, he’d have to let me go. I’d move then. Or the men would. I just had to stay calm.
There was no way he was going to get away with this.
I shoved what Brock said out of my mind. I’d have time to deal with it later.
“Freeze! Police! Hands up!”
A cacophony of voices erupted, and lights exploded behind us.
Jonathan froze and then swung us around. Our backs were now to Cole and Brock and Rocco and I wasn’t thinking that was such a great thing, but I wasn’t sure that mattered anymore either, because in front of us, was what had to be the entire Deer Creek police department. Fully decked out in gear, guns drawn. How they’d arrived without anyone hearing them was a miracle.
But they were here.
Jonathan swung again, and this time didn’t get far.
“I wouldn’t move,”
Rocco said. Based on his tone, there had to be a smile on his face even though I couldn’t see him, but he was sounding like he was enjoying this.
Somehow, the lightness in his tone helped me relax.
He did something, and Jonathan jerked as he barked out a cuss word, and then his arm from my throat was gone. The gun at my temple gone with him.
I collapsed onto the pavement and gasped for breath, and then two strong arms I’d recognize anywhere were wrapping around me.
“It’s okay,”
Cole said. “It’s okay. We’ll get you out of here, and I’ll explain everything, okay?”
“He hurt other women,”
I rasped. My throat burned, and the bile that had seared my throat earlier returned except this time there wasn’t any forcing it down.
I threw up all over gravel and pavement, on my hands and knees, and while I was certain there was still shouting, still noise and mayhem and madness all around me, all I heard was the ringing in my ears and the softly spoken words from Cole while he gathered my hair.
“It’s okay, Trina. Get it all out.”
One of his hands rubbed up and down on my back. “It’s okay. You’re safe now, Trina. And that monster is going to go to jail for a very long time.”
“I wish you would have shot him,”
I admitted.
He huffed and ran his hand up and down my back again in large, swooping gestures. “Me too, honey. Me too. But you’re safe, and that’s all that matters in the end.”
I gathered myself, spit, and then pushed off my hands so I was still on my knees. “He was arrested.”
Jonathan was currently in the back of a police car, smirking at me. He’d been evil and an idiot, and now he’d get what was coming to him. Whatever happened to those women, whatever he’d done to anyone other than me, I’d be joining their fight to ensure what Cole said was correct. That Jonathan went away for a very, very long time and could never hurt anyone ever again.
For the first time since he’d revealed his true colors to me, I met Jonathan’s smile and gave him one of my own. Hopefully, he read into it what I intended. A smile of vengeance, a smile prepared to fight tooth and nail, and a smile that said he would get what was coming to him.
He caught my smile and looked away.
I grinned up at Cole and held out my hand.
Like I knew he would, he took it and guided me to my feet. I was barely on both before his arms were around me, holding me tightly to him. “I love you, Trina. I love you so much.”
This time, I hugged him back. It came as naturally as breathing. Which was probably why I opened my mouth and found myself saying, “For the first time in a long time, I love myself too.”
He pulled back and grinned down at me. I reached up and cupped his cheek, which meant I was close to see the ways his eyes softened as I smiled back. “And I’m pretty sure I love you, too.”