Epilogue 2
Elizabeth
“Ms. Hall, you have been found guilty of . . .”
The words blurred together, muffled, like someone speaking above me while I floated underwater. The seal on the dark bench wavered, in and out of focus.
A man. Of course. Always a man.
In my belly, a soft wave of movement, bumping along the right side, but I didn’t move, didn’t press a hand on my skin. A girl, the last thing I wanted, innocent and powerless and vulnerable.
A cough behind me, well, behind the other lawyer’s table. Jase. Even drowning, water filling my ears, I recognized him. She’d be safe with him. She was his, and he’d be a good father, a good daddy. She’d be safe. He’d make sure.
My heart folded in, pressure and pain in my chest. I’d always been safe with him. Tate, too, probably the only two men I could say that about. Daddy, maybe. So three.
At the corner of my eye, movement flickered .
. . Tate folding an arm around Hannah’s shoulders.
I didn’t move, staring at the white and blue seal, the way it wobbled in a circle.
Of course she was here. And Tate was here.
And she was here, next to Jase, holding his hand, sitting beside him in the space that had always been mine.
I swallowed, muffled drone fading in and out of my ears.
I closed my eyes.
None of them mattered. Hannah had left me, so I was alone with Mama, alone with–
No. I wasn’t thinking about that. About him. Or the one after him.
I didn’t think about Jase if I could help it, either. He’d left me, after promising.
Men. Always men.
Mama, like always, had been right.
That movement again, and I ignored it.
The muffled voice, never stopping, and I ignored it.
“ . . . maximum sentence . . . five years . . .”
If you just squeezed your eyes shut and held your breath and listened to your heartbeat, it wasn’t real.
It wasn’t happening.
It wasn’t real.
And then I’d be with Jase and everything would be okay. I’d be safe.
“Open your eyes,” a male voice hissed, and a solid hand nudged my leg.
I recoiled.
Jase could touch me without permission. No one else. Only Jase.
I’d squeeze my eyes shut, think about how he smelled, about how his arms felt when he hugged me. And then it was over and he was there and I was safe.
Almost real.
“Open your eyes,” the voice hissed again. I blinked, bright lights hurting my eyes. The seal wavered. The lawyer, his cologne too heavy next to me.
The man on the bench scowling.
I sucked a breath through my nose and narrowed my eyes.
“Young lady, stand up, please.”
Young lady. Just like always. A man and young lady and–
Silence hovered, electric and charged and humming.
Something small and helpless brushed the side of my belly.
“ . . . one more chance . . .”
I didn’t move.
“ . . . contempt . . .”
Behind me – behind the other table – a familiar cough.
Hannah’s whisper. Hannah, who left me there with him.
“ . . . remand . . .”
More hissing, anger and frustration in the male voice, too much cologne so I couldn’t breathe.
“Bailiff.”
A large hand on my arm, lifting me, moving me where I didn’t want to go.
A man’s hand on my arm, always a man.
Rage surged up my spine, white light fuzzing out my vision.
I screamed.