Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
HIM
“Don’t!” she screeched more than screamed. The sound so piercing—I hated to admit it—but I jumped back a little. Shocked, not scared. I didn’t scare that easy. She stifled a sob and added, “Please don’t.”
“You have exactly two seconds to tell me what I wanna know, Jules, before I’m serving up minced sausages for dinner. And unlike the eggs you wasted, you will eat ?em.”
“I’m telling the truth,” she whispered. “He didn’t touch me! My father didn’t touch me…”
I believed her. Couldn’t explain what it was about the woman. Could have been the fact I’d spent my entire life around liars so I recognized she wasn’t one of them. At least she didn’t want to be. We all had to lie when it was us versus them. When our survival was at stake.
“What he do then?” I pressed her as I switched the garbage disposal off and took a step closer.
And another as I slowly guided her back down into her chair.
She looked like she might faint if I didn’t.
Her own damn fault for washing half a body’s worth of blood down the tub drain and refusing to eat.
I didn’t feel sorry for her. I was annoyed at how fucking stubborn she was being.
She chewed on a nail, her other hand aimlessly tugging at the fishing line in her arm.
If she was in pain, it didn’t show. I flicked her fingers away from her mouth and her hand away from her stitches.
Setting the knife down between us as I held her wrists in place.
Not forcefully. I didn’t have to be forceful when she was letting me do it.
She swallowed down the lump I could hear bubbling in her throat and plastered on a tight smile.
“It was me. I did it. I didn’t want to. I swear I didn’t want to.
But if I didn’t… well, it was my responsibility.
To take care of him. So I didn’t argue. I didn’t say no, and I don’t understand why.
I knew it wasn’t right. It didn’t feel right.
I swear I didn’t like it!” The words came pouring out of her, almost as if once she let one go, the rest rushed forward to follow until she was tossing a nonsensical confession at my feet.
Literally. The only thing keeping this ghost of a girl upright was my arms digging into her wrists.
I yanked her up off the floor and onto the table. I was afraid she would curl into a ball if I didn’t, and then there’d be no getting nothing from her. “Him touching you, him making you touch your brother. There ain’t no difference, Jules. You get that, right?” I grunted.
She was being ridiculous. Sure, I was as fucked up as they came. But even I knew when shit was wrong. I just didn’t care to be any different.
She shook her head. “He was my brother. My baby brother.” She hid her face in her hands but I could still hear her rambling.
“I touched my brother. Did things… And Robbie… he never got over it. The disgust I felt every time he looked at me… The disgust he showed me. Because we both knew I could have stopped it. I could have tried harder. He didn’t make it to seventeen before he…
He hung himself in our living room. He wanted us to find him.
He wanted me to find him. To know why he did it. ”
“Makes sense.” I shrugged, and her head shot up to look at me.
“Why you became a nurse, not why he offed himself, Jules.” I rolled my eyes.
“You couldn’t fix ?em. You couldn’t save him.
So you made it your mission to save others.
Really ain’t as deep as you made it out to be. Like Psychology 101 shit.”
“I… that’s…” She stared at me, shocked, for a moment.
“Just ?cause I’m crazy, doesn’t mean I’m stupid, Nurse Keller.”
“I never said you were—” she tried again.
“Didn’t have to. Ya’ll just assume. You’d be right too. About the crazy part anyway. But have to be plenty smart to trick ya’ll into thinking I’m one of ya every few months. Fooled a few patients into thinking they were hallucinating while I was at it, and they weren’t stupid either.”
“So you’re a…”
I grinned. “I’d give ya my chart number but they got rid of those when they moved us all downstairs, sweetheart. Almost like they didn’t want anyone to know we existed anymore. Makes it difficult to ever get released but far easier to sneak out when no one is doing nightly bed checks.”
I watched her jaw drop, her eyes blink a few times, her breathing change.
Leaned in and shut it the only way I knew how without a pair of underwear to stuff down her throat.
I used my tongue instead. Kissing her stupider than she already looked.
Pulling back and rising to my full height as soon as I felt her relax into my mouth.
She liked kissing me, and I guess I didn’t hate it. Her lips tasted almost as good as her pussy.
“You were about to say it and I didn’t want to hear it again,” I explained with an irritated groan.
But she was still just staring at me. “Say what again?”
“Sorry. I told ya I’m tired of all the fucking sorrys. Next time I hear ya say it will be the last time I hear ya say anything, Nurse Keller.” I made a slashing gesture across her throat, tapped her nose with the tip of my index finger, and turned my back on her.
She wasn’t going anywhere looking the way she did. I glanced down at myself. At the pink robe. The raging hard-on. And I guess I wasn’t going anywhere either. Except maybe to take a shower and calm myself down a bit.