3. Bridget
3
brIDGET
I love you, darlin’. Don’t ever doubt it.
“If you’re not going to eat it, then I will. I’m starving,” Mel said from the chair beside my bed. The chair that Chase had previously occupied for Lord knows how long.
“Jase just went to get you food,” I said as I stared at the pink Post-it note.
She glanced up from her phone. “On second thought, I don’t want it. You eat it. You’re crabby when you’re hungry.”
“I’m crabby because I’m in the hospital,” I muttered as I gingerly peeled the note off and tried to open the little parfait cup.
Banana pudding had never sounded so good.
Mel took pity on me. She set her phone down on the tray table and popped the top off. As she was puncturing the plastic wrapper that covered the spoon, I glanced at the screen of her phone. Chase’s name topped the thread of text messages.
“Is he pissed?”
“You could say that,” Mel snickered as she wedged the cup into my right hand .
I couldn’t do much with that hand since it was in a sling, but I could hold a damn cup. I wasn’t about to let Mel feed me.
“He sent me enough F-bombs to last a lifetime,” she said giddily.
I looked at the note again. I love you, darlin’. Don’t ever doubt it.
“Here, I’ll throw that away for you,” Mel said as she reached for the sticky note.
“No!” I shrieked, leaning forward to grab it.
Ah, fuck. I whimpered, grimacing as splitting pain radiated from the back of my skull, down my spine.
Mel giggled. “Please, you think I’d actually throw that away? I’m just messing with you.”
“You’re an asshole.”
“And you know better than to move right now,” she said seriously. “Spoon to mouth is your range of motion at the moment, and you’re fucking lucky that you have that much.”
I guess a stay at the hospital was lucky compared to a stay at the morgue. Didn’t mean I had to like it, though.
Mel settled back in her chair and picked up her phone.
“You should go home,” I said. “You work here. If you stay any longer, it’ll be like you’re moving in here.”
She eyed me over the screen of her phone. “I’m not leaving.
“Mel—”
She slapped her phone down on the tray table. It startled me enough to send the plastic spoon flying, leaving a dollop of pudding and whipped cream on my blanket with an unceremonious plop.
“You should have died,” Mel snapped. “You fell down a twelve-foot staircase and smacked your head on a marble floor. I had to do CPR all while thinking you were dead.”
Tears filled her eyes. In all the years we had known each other, I rarely saw her cry .
“So,” she said as she let out a heavy breath and dabbed her eyes. “Forgive me for not leaving.”
What little appetite I had mustered had all but disappeared. “Are you and my brother…”
Mel’s demeanor softened. “We’re good. He and I talked through all of it. We’re gonna be okay. Don’t worry about us.”
“Did he tell you about?—”
“Yeah. About what Kyle threatened you with?” She looked down. “Bee. You should have told me. After everything else you let me in on… Do you really think I would have turned you away?” I could hear the hurt in her tone. The last few years had tested our friendship in ways I never imagined.
“I did what I thought was best for everyone.”
“Bee—” She reached over and squeezed my hand. “You’re not a sacrificial lamb. You’re a warrior.”
I blinked back tears.
“And whatever happens after this, you’re not going to go through it alone.”
There was a knock at the door. Ruthie, the nurse who had been popping in and out, walked in with another woman. She was tall and wore a dark blue pantsuit with a white dress shirt underneath. Her bouffant hairdo, hot roller bangs, teal eyeshadow, and coral lipstick were decades out of style.
“Bridget, honey, this is Detective Waller with the Havelock Police Department. Are you feeling up for a little chat?” Ruthie asked.
I appreciated Ruthie asking, but Detective Waller’s severe frown made it seem like more of a courtesy and less of an actual choice.
“Um, yeah,” I said. “I guess.”
“Do you want me to stay or go?” Mel whispered as Ruthie shuffled out .
“Do you have the file?” I asked softly.
She nodded.
“Stay.” I cut my eyes to the detective who was making her way across the room. “If you don’t mind.”
“Miss McGrath, I need to ask you some questions about your relationship with Mr. Kingsley.”
I knew what she was here about. Still, the sound of his name made me want to recoil as far away as possible.
Detective Waller flipped open a notepad and clicked her pen. “How long have you and Mr. Kingsley been involved?”
The harsh stench of her atrocious perfume made my nostrils burn. It was like she bathed in patchouli and rotten roses.
“We’re no longer together,” I said softly. “But we started dating about three years ago.”
“Was this the first instance of abuse?” she clipped without skipping a beat.
“No.”
Detective Waller raised an over-plucked eyebrow. She let out an annoyed huff. “Care to elaborate? I need as many details as you can remember.”
I swear I heard Mel growl. “If this is an inconvenience for you,” she hissed. “You can come back another time.”
Waller glared at her. “And you are?”
“Her advocate,” Mel snapped back before typing something out on her phone.
Waller gave pause, then turned her attention back to me, muttering something about circling back to the prior question. “As you are probably aware, we have been unable to locate Mr. Kingsley.”
“Why would I be aware of that?” I asked. “He attacked me, threw me down a flight of stairs, and left me for dead.”
“Often, victims try to protect their abusers out of a misguided sense of loyalty,” she said. “Do you have an idea of where he may have gone or who he might have gone to?”
“No,” I said through gritted teeth.
I was getting a headache, and it wasn’t from the head trauma.
“Now isn’t the time to protect him, Bridget,” she clipped. “If you know something, you have to tell me.”
“She doesn’t have to tell you shit,” a menacing voice rumbled from the other side of the room. Steve’s broad shoulders filled the doorway. He looked pissed.
Detective Waller looked over her shoulder. “This case isn’t in your jurisdiction, Pelham.”
“It is now,” he said as he stomped inside. “So, you can either sit in the corner—silently—and take notes, or you can leave. I’ll take it from here.”
“This is my case,” she argued.
Steve carried a chair from the other side of the room and set it beside Mel’s. “Not anymore, Karen. A victim advocate filed a complaint with proof that you were badgering a victim.”
“This is ridiculous. You think you can go over my head? Just wait until I file a complaint with Chief Byrne about you.”
I snorted, earning a sharp glare from Detective Waller.
Lori Byrne—Beaufort’s police chief—was no-nonsense and kick ass. If Waller thought she would intimidate Steve by going to his boss, she was sorely mistaken. Chief Lori would chew Waller up and spit her out.
“I’ll give you a head start. It’s Pelham. P-E-L-H-A-M.” He rattled off his badge number as she stormed out the door.
“I wish I had caught that on video,” Mel said under her breath as she tucked her phone away. “How’d you get here so fast, anyway?”
He eyed me sheepishly. “I dropped by to have a talk with Chase. ”
“Why is Chase back?” It had been hours since I asked the nurses to keep him out of my room.
“He never left,” Mel said softly. “He’s been sitting out there in the lounge.”
A sense of longing radiated from my gut. I stifled the urge to cry.
Steve hunched forward and put his hand over mine. “I can take your statement,” he began. “Or if you want someone you don’t know, I can find a detective who’s not a raging cunt.” His thumb stroked the back of my hand. His tone was calming. “Either way, I need you to hear me when I tell you that I’m here for you. Whatever you need.”
“You hate hospitals,” I whispered. “And you’re here voluntarily?”
He cracked a smile. “Yeah.”
Steve smiling in a hospital was something I never in a million years thought I would see.
Beneath the beard and stacks on stacks of muscles, Steve had slowly returned to who he was before Heather passed away. The way he was supposed to be.
If he could come that far, maybe there was still hope for me.
A heady mix of gratitude and sadness rose in my throat. I forced a tiny smile. “Thanks.”
“The doctors and nurses already recorded all of your injuries in your chart, and they have photos to go along with it. The court will subpoena the records, or you can sign a release. Either way, we don’t have to talk about them right now.”
I nodded, thankful for his patience.
“If it’s okay with you, I’m gonna ask you some questions about Kyle. If you don’t wanna answer, or you can’t remember, it’s okay. Just tell me to move on.”
I eyed Mel. “You can give it to him. ”
She and I had decided on giving the file of evidence to the Havelock Police Department when we filed charges. I didn’t want Steve or Chase to see the photos inside.
But I also knew that I needed to widen my circle of trust. Steve had always been a steady presence. Given the way the other detective had come at me, I didn’t want to talk to a stranger about this.
Mel raised her eyebrows. “You sure?”
I nodded.
She reached into her purse and produced the thick, manila folder. “This goes back about two years,” she said, handing it to Steve.
He flipped it open, hands shaking as he thumbed through the pages. He shut his eyes, scrubbing his palm down the front of his beard as he closed the file and set it aside.
“It started about six months before all that,” I said. “I just didn’t tell anyone.”
“I’ll go through it and follow up with you if I have questions,” he said in a rasp. “That way, you don’t have to talk about it today.”
“Can you—” I glanced at the door. “Can you make sure Chase doesn’t see it?” I asked. “Please. I… I don’t want him to.”
Steve sighed. “I’ll be logging it as evidence with the Havelock PD since I’m working in conjunction with them on this. He might be able to pull it, but I’ll talk to him.”
I nodded. It was the best either of us could do. Chase had a habit of going balls to the wall when he wanted something. Hence why he was still sitting in the hallway.
I wasn’t sure if it was patience or him just being stubborn.
“Most of this will be admissible, and it’s gonna help us build an ironclad case against him. But what happened last night is going to be the nail in the coffin. We’ve got BOLOs and APBs out from Maryland down to Florida, and every cop in the state is looking for him.” He let out a heavy sigh. “Given the circumstances, we’re gonna file charges for attempted murder. Even if the defense gets the charges reduced, he will go away for the rest of his life.”
The idea that Kyle would kill me someday was nothing new. Even Mel had said it to me before. But hearing it from Steve shook me to the core. All I could do was nod.
“Do you think you can tell me a little about what happened last night?” he asked.
I let out a shaky breath. My memory had been returning in bits and pieces. The doctors were shocked that I didn’t have much memory loss, given the severity of the head trauma I was recovering from.
“I had been planning to leave him for a while,” I began. “He was supposed to be away at a conference in Charlotte this weekend. Yesterday morning he…” I swallowed. “Well… I think Mel put what he did yesterday morning in the file.”
Steve nodded thoughtfully as he scribbled something down. “Like I said. If you don’t wanna talk about it, we don’t have to.”
I picked at a thread hanging from the corner of the thin blanket. “He, um… He left after, so I went to Mel’s. We went through our routine, but Jason dropped by to get something and caught us.” I looked at the other side of the room, unwilling to subject myself to Steve and Mel’s gaze. “I hadn’t told him about any of it yet. He was upset with me. Mad at Mel. I probably would have been, too. Jason and I talked it out.”
Mel squeezed my hand.
I took a deep breath. “Kyle had threatened me with photos of Mel and Kristin. He threatened to hurt them… Or kill them. Probably both. He said he didn’t take the photos, so I think he hired someone to do it. At the time, they both lived alone. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if I let something happen to them, so I stayed.
“Jason went back to Kyle’s house with me, and I told him everything. I told him that Mel was going to come back last night and pick me up. Kyle tracked my phone and my car, so I couldn’t take them with me. She had gotten me a prepaid phone to use, but I guess it’s still at the house.”
Steve set his pen down. “Kyle was already supposed to be in Charlotte when you planned on leaving?”
I nodded. “He did stuff like that all the time, though. He would tell me he was going somewhere and then would come back home a little while later just to see if I was still there. If I told him I was going to work or to the store, he’d let me go by myself, then show up without warning. He called me last night and told me he had gotten to his hotel. That was a lie, obviously. I had called Mel to tell her I was ready to go. She and Jason were on their way over when he came up the stairs and cornered me in the bedroom.”
“What did he do when he went into the bedroom?”
I closed my eyes as the nightmare played out like a horror film. “He backhanded me across the face and called me a stupid bitch. And… And he said he knew what I had been up to. What I was planning. He pushed me into the footboard of the bed. I fell, and he kicked me in the ribs. He grabbed my hair and dragged me back up and threw me into the wall. I tried to fight him, but he’d already hurt me that morning. There was a vase on the dresser, so I grabbed it and hit him. It shattered, but he knocked me back into the hallway before I could?—”
I had tried to kill him.
Bile rocketed up my throat. I was no better than he was. He had turned me into a monster just like him. He had destroyed everything good in me and pumped my veins full of tar.
“Bee.” Mel’s hand was on my knee. “It would have been self-defense.”
“She’s right,” Steve said as he set his pen and notebook aside. “ But the important thing is that you’re safe now. You hear me? You’re safe.”
I nodded, though I wasn’t quite sure I believed him. “He pushed me against the wall in the hallway and started choking me.” Instinctively, I moved my hand to my neck. I hadn’t looked in a mirror since I had been admitted to the hospital, but I knew from previous experience how bad it probably looked. “I couldn’t breathe, and I was about to black out, but I managed to kick him in the nuts. He dropped me from the wall. I tried to run for the stairs, but he pulled me back and hit me again.”
I tried to blink away the tears, but they wouldn’t stop building. “I don’t remember much after that,” I admitted. “We struggled, and he said it was the last time I’d get away with something like that. Then he pushed me down the stairs. I hit the middle of the staircase. I think that’s how I dislocated my shoulder, but I’m not sure. I don’t remember hitting the floor.”
“Kyle left after that,” Mel said. “Jase and I were pulling into the neighborhood and passed him on the way out. He almost hit us. When we got to the house, the front door was open, and Bee was lying at the bottom of the stairs.”
Steve nodded. “I listened to the 911 call.” He touched her arm. “You did real good.” He scribbled a few things down, then closed his notebook. “Can you tell me what you guys kept in the garage?”
It took all of my brain cells to remember. I didn’t go in the garage often. Parking in there was annoying as hell. “Um, just the trash cans, some camping stuff, and Christmas decorations.”
Steve raised an eyebrow. “Y’all had camping gear?”
I shrugged. “I’m not much for camping, but Kyle loved it. We went a few times together, but he’d go camping by himself sometimes. He was really into it, but he hadn’t gone in a while. After Jason retired from the Navy and came back to town, Kyle started getting really antsy and rarely left me alone. ”
Steve sat back in his chair. “I’ve got good news and bad news. Which do you want first.”
“Give me the bad news.” Carefully, I pointed to my face. “It can’t get much worse than this.”
“The bad news is that his SUV was found abandoned at his dealership. We think he stole a car, but the security cameras in the lot were wiped. Probably by him. When the police went through the house, they found dust voids in the garage. With the camping gear missing, I’m gonna take a stab in the dark and say that he’s going off the grid for a bit. You said that Mel got you a phone? Do you remember where you left it in the house?”
“On the bed. I kept it hidden in a box of pads under the bathroom sink. Right before Kyle came back in, I pulled it out along with the cash?—”
“Cash?”
I nodded. “I saved up about two grand so I could get an apartment.”
Steve sighed. “There was no phone or cash found in the house. We put a freeze on his bank accounts, but he had already drained them.”
Mel muttered a colorful string of profanities.
“I think I could use some good news,” I said quietly. Something better than the revelation that I had no money, no place to live, and that my dirty laundry had been very publicly aired.
Steve squeezed my hand. “The good news is that you’re safe, and you have us. Whatever you need, whatever you want—consider it done. Nothing that’s happened in the past or present changes how much we love you.”
There was a knock at the door. Ruthie popped her head in. “Sorry to interrupt.” She looked at me and smiled. “Time for a CT scan. We’ll take you down in the bed so you don’t have to get up.”
“Can I use a wheelchair?” I asked .
I honestly didn’t know what I could do. I hadn’t actually gotten out of bed since I woke up here. Yay, catheters.
Everything hurt, so it wasn’t even worth trying. Even though it felt like I’d been sucked into a wood chipper and spit back out, I had asked the doctor to lower the pain medication so I wasn’t as groggy.
I didn’t like how out of control it made me feel. If I wasn’t awake and aware, I was vulnerable. And that was something I’d never allow myself to be again.
Ruthie pursed her lips. “Well, you don’t have any injuries that would make it unsafe, but it’ll be really uncomfortable.”
“I’d like to use a wheelchair, please.”
The sooner I got some independence, the better.