18. Chapter 15 | Elle #3
She opened her mouth to say yes. Nothing came out. She tried again, and what came out instead was smaller than she meant it to be.
"No. I can't." Her voice cracked. "I want to. God help me, I want to be the kind of person who could just do it. I can't."
"Damn right you can't." Dom's hand found hers, gripped hard, no accusation in it. Just fierce protection.
"A boy is about to go home with a man who beats him," Oretha said, quiet, not unkind.
"He's coming home with me." Dom was on her feet now, weight shifting into the stance Elle had watched her teach CJ a dozen times, fists loose and ready at her sides. "I don't care what the law's got to say about it. I got the law right here."
"Dom, no—" Elle was up too, hand out.
"You'll just get yourself arrested." Oretha's voice stayed level, but her gaze flicked, just once, to the three days Dom had already spent in a room like this one. She didn't need to say the word again out loud for everyone to hear it anyway.
Dom's face twisted, raw for just a second before she shut it back down, jaw locking hard enough to ache. "I have held myself back from that man for three years. I am done holding back."
Elle sat with the shame of her own 'no' sitting heavy in her chest, and underneath it, a surprise: Dom had not made her carry it alone.
They asked twice more to see him. Twice more the sergeant said the same thing without looking up from his clipboard: not allowed, not while charges were pending, family only, and they weren't listed as family.
The main door opened. Dom went rigid, already moving before her body had finished deciding to.
Lewis came in unsteady, shirt untucked on one side, a swollen lip he kept dabbing at with the back of his hand instead of a handkerchief. He didn't look respectable. He didn't need to. He walked up to that desk like a man who'd never once had to wonder whether he'd be believed.
"Evening, Sergeant. Sorry to trouble you with all this.
" He said it easy, deferential, a man who knew exactly which tone opened doors in a building like this one.
"I know my place, believe me. Not like some.
Some folks around here got a little too much freedom and forgot themselves.
Uppity. Unnatural, even, some of what I seen out there today.
" He shook his head, sorrowful, playing it exactly right for his audience.
"I'm not like that. Just want to take my daughter home. "
The sergeant barely glanced twice at the state of him before reaching for a pen.
Dom lunged before the sentence had even finished landing, every word of her own promise driving her forward now. Elle and Oretha both caught her, Elle's arms locking around her waist, and it took everything Elle had to hold on.
"Don't," Elle breathed against her ear. "He wants that. Don't hand it to him."
"I said I wouldn't let this happen," Dom said, low and wrecked, still straining against her. "I meant it."
Lewis leaned on the desk, papers half-crumpled, breath sour enough that the sergeant leaned back an inch without seeming to notice he'd done it. "I'm here for my daughter. Charlene Jordan. I understand she assaulted me this morning, unprovoked."
The sergeant set down his pen and nodded to an officer by the back hallway. "Bring the girl out."
His grin was triumphant.
Dom's whole body sagged in Elle's arms. Not giving up, but the weight of a promise finally admitting it hadn't been enough.
The metal door opened. Two officers walked CJ out between them, and he looked smaller than he had that morning, smaller than fifteen, his shirt still stained where that man on the courthouse steps had spat on him.
He met Dom's gaze, and his face crumbled.
"Dom—" His voice cracked, high and raw. "Dom, please—"
"That's enough," one of the officers said, hand landing on CJ's shoulder as if claiming ownership. "Your father's here."
"I'm not—my name is CJ—" He was shaking hard now, twisting against the grip. "Dom, don't let him—"
Dom moved without conscious thought. Elle and Oretha both caught her, Elle's body wedged between Dom and the desk.
"Don't," Elle said, low and fast, right against her ear. "They will put you in a cell and then you can't help him at all."
Lewis crossed to CJ and closed a hand around his arm. "Charlene. That's enough of this. Let's go."
"No—" CJ twisted, gaze fixed on Dom, on nothing but Dom. "Dom, don't let him take me—"
Dom's knees nearly buckled. Elle's grip was the only thing keeping her upright.
"I'm sorry," Dom said, her voice not sounding like her own. "Baby, I'm sorry."
Lewis steered him toward the door. CJ had stopped calling out. He was just crying now, looking back over his shoulder the whole way, until the door swung shut behind them both.
"I stood here," Dom said. Her voice had gone hollow. "I stood here and let that man walk him out."
"I know," Elle said quietly.
"Outside." Oretha's voice cut through, sharp. "Follow them where the desk can't see you do it. I'll bring the car around."
Elle's hand found Dom's. "Come on. Before they're too far gone."