Chapter 12
CHAPTER 12
Jazz
Tick tock, the time is ticking away, and her time will come to an end if she does not come clean soon. Jazzy girl, we will expose you and all your secrets, you can count on it!
The heat of the water mixed with the steam in the air was divine. Jazz stood under the large square rain shower head and let the water flow over her while her thoughts moved from what she and Michael had experienced in the Dungeon to what they needed to talk about.
She couldn’t tell him about what was happening now without sharing about her past, and she’d done her best to block that part of her life out of her mind, but since seeing her mother, everything was coming back like a kaleidoscope of memories.
She didn’t know how she was going to tell him all that she’d been hiding, not from him but from herself from the time she was too young to understand why it mattered.
After standing there long enough to see the skin on her fingertips start to resemble that of an old lady’s, she knew she could no longer put off the inevitable. Michael deserved to know the truth. He deserved to know what he was going to be expected to have to deal with should he decide to stay with her, because she wasn’t sure her mother and sister could be trusted whether she paid their price or not as they already proven by the slander campaign they’d been waging against her.
She stepped out of the stall and wrapped the most luxurious bath towel around her body before setting out to do the same with her hair. She rubbed the towel over her hair to get it as dry as possible as she didn’t want to waste time with the dryer at the moment.
When she made her way into the bedroom, Michael sat in the chair by the window looking out over the beautiful view of the surrounding mountains. They might be city people, but if they managed to fix this situation, then she could see them returning for fun, that was if they let her after what she had pulled this morning.
Michael turned to her while she was gazing out. He’d changed while she was in the shower, now sporting navy chinos and a gray Henley. He was sexy no matter what he was wearing, but that was as casual as he would get. “You know, you continue to take my breath away every time I see you. Nothing you have to say today is going to change the way I feel about you. I need you to know that.”
He was trying to reassure her, always taking her feelings into account. Had she done the same for him?
“The truth is I know you think that, but you can’t promise anything without knowing what it is that I’m going to say.” She shrugged.
“I know I love you. I know I plan to spend the rest of my life with you. I know you mean everything to me. I don’t think there is anything that is more important than the things that I already know. Now get dressed. Let’s get out of the room to talk. I know just the place.”
Of course, he did, she thought to herself. She grabbed a pair of leggings and an oversized sweater along with her underclothes and did as he asked. She paired them with a pair of ankle boots she hadn’t even known she owned, glad that Michael had packed for the cold weather that they were not used to in California.
He took her hand as they left the room and carried a bag in the other. “What do you have in there?” she asked her Boy Scout of a boyfriend.
“Just a couple of water bottles and some snacks along with a couple of blankets. It is a bit chilly out there today.” He winked at her. Yep, he was a Boy Scout in everything he did. #AlwaysPrepared.
They walked hand in hand out the door and followed the path that led to the stables. When they arrived, she couldn’t help the smile on her face, even through the stress she was feeling.
“Michael, it’s been so long since I’ve had the chance to ride. Jamie and I had a friend growing up who had horses we would ride, but that feels like a lifetime ago.” Unable to help herself, she moved forward, drawn to the small brown horse sticking its nose over its stall door.
“Oh, I see you met our Snickers. She adores being petted.”
An honest-to-god cowboy came from around the corner and offered his hand to Jazz.
“Welcome to Rawhide, I’m Travis, and this is my wife, Wren”
“Nice to meet you,” Jazz shook his hand and smiled to see Wren reach up to pet Snickers. “She is a beautiful girl, isn’t she?” Jazz reached up and did exactly as Travis had suggested and was rewarded as the horse nuzzled into her hand.
“She was so little when she was born, we wondered if she was even going to make it, but look at her now. It’s amazing what a little love and caring can do,” Wren said.
Jazz hoped that was true for humans as well as animals.
“I spoke with someone about taking a couple of the horses out for a leisurely ride around the lake. As my Pixie seems taken with Snickers, would it be possible for her to be one of them?” Michael asked always getting right down to the point.
“Absolutely. And are you an experienced rider yourself?” Travis asked. “So, I can help you choose one for yourself.”
“Absolutely. I grew up around them and have ridden since I was a child.”
How come this never came up? They were absolutely too busy in their lives if they didn’t have time to actually do things together like go riding.
“Then might I suggest Magic?” He indicated a horse that was a few stalls to the left. He was a beautiful black horse that seemed huge compared to the one she’d claimed, but then again, Michael was not a small man either.
“I trust your advice. I’ll say it has been too long since I’ve saddled a horse though.”
“Of course, no problem. We’ll take care of that for you. If you want to go, have a seat on the benches just outside the door, we’ll bring the pair out to you.” He turned and both he and Wren went about their work while Michael led her out the door with his hand on her lower back.
“Michael, you never cease to amaze me, you know that?” She shook her head. “A horse ride to the lake?”
“Well, there are some pretty secluded areas where we can talk without being disturbed, but it would make for a pretty long walk. I figured you might enjoy the ride and it might help calm your nerves a little along the way.”
“What if I didn’t know how to ride?” she asked, the thought suddenly occurring to her.
“Then you would’ve ridden with me. Seems like a win win to me.” He winked.
When Snickers was brought out to her, she felt as if she’d found a friend in this beautiful creature. “Do you by any chance have any carrots we can take with us as treats?”
“Of course, I’ll be right back.” Wren came back with a small bag with cut carrots in it but handed one to her seeming to know that she wanted to give Snickers one now. She reached up with the treat in her open hand and allowed the horse to take it before she nuzzled against Jazz’s face once more.
Once they were ready, the two of them mounted the horses and started a slow pace toward the large lake. Even with the cooler temps in the fifties, there were still people bundled up and milling around as they passed. After they arrived at what Michael thought was a great location, Michael tied the horses off to a tree and poured them some water while Jazz placed a blanket on the ground facing the lake.
“Pixie, who were those women you were meeting with at the diner?” Michael asked once they were seated.
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes in an effort to calm her racing heart before beginning. This was Michael, the love of her life. He wouldn’t look at her any differently when she told him about her past. He’d promised that nothing would change, and she needed to hold on to that promise now more than ever.
“Before I talk about what happened this morning, I think I need to tell you about my childhood. I know I told you I never wanted to talk about it, but I think you deserve to know everything because I’m pretty sure it’s not going to stay in the past.”
He took her by the hand and rested their joined hands on his leg, but otherwise remained silent and waited for her to continue, letting her do this at her own pace.
“You know I left home at eighteen because I got the record contract, and the studio hooked me up with the guys and we became The Scarlet Letter. That is the story that everyone knows, and though I did leave at eighteen, the entire backstory is missing.”
“I snuck out on my eighteenth birthday with all the money I’d been saving since I was ten years old. Jamie wasn’t going to let me leave alone, and his home life was pretty terrible as his family was totally homophobic, so he followed me to the bus station realizing I was up to something. I bought a one-way ticket to the first bus going out of town. I don’t even remember where that bus stopped.” She stopped, looking into the distance, lost in the past.
“Once I was seated, I looked up and there was Jamie walking up the aisle. Of course, he wasn’t going to let me leave without him. I don’t think he would have ever forgiven me.” She shrugged. “Anyway, when that bus stopped, we got on another, then another all headed west and kept going until we hit the Pacific Ocean. I’d always wanted to see the ocean and figured this might be my only chance.”
He squeezed her hand. “It sounds like you were trying to escape. What was going on in your life that you needed to get so far away from?” he asked, his voice gentler than she’d ever heard.
Jazz looked to the ground, unable to stop the tears that had started to fall. “You have to understand, my family was all about appearances. Everything was about what it looked like in the community, or to the church ladies. Things can be squeaky clean and pretty on the outside, but dark and dirty on the inside.”
She knew she was talking in circles, but she was trying to figure out the words to tell him things she hadn’t spoken aloud since she was very young.
“So, my father died when I was ten, but honestly, I don’t remember too much about him. My mother was actually pregnant with my little sister when he was in a car accident that he didn’t survive, or at least that is the story. I’ve always wondered though.”
“Why did you wonder if it was true? I’m just curious.” Michael asked.
“I don’t remember much, but they were always fighting, and after he was gone, my mother quit her job and seemed to have a lot of money. When I got older, I thought he must have had a large life insurance policy.” She shrugged.
“Anyway, that is when I remember everything in our lives changed. Not long after Dad passed was when Uncle David moved into the house.” She shivered even speaking his name out loud. To her he was like that famous character in the Harry Potter books; the name that shall not be spoken.
“So, your uncle moved in with you guys, to help out?” Michael prompted, bringing her back from her thoughts.
“That was the story, except neither my mother nor my father had any siblings. I was always told to refer to him as ‘Uncle David’ but I learned later that he’d paid my mother to let him live in the house.”
She stood and walked over to the horses, taking a moment to breathe from the onslaught of memories that she’d been dealing with since this morning which were even worse now that she was starting to talk about it. She’d spent so many years pretending that her life began at eighteen that this was like waking up to find the bad dream was real after all.
After calming her breathing down, she nuzzled Snickers’ muzzle one more time before returning to Michael on the blanket. “I’m sorry, I just needed a minute.”
“My Pixie, take all the time you need.” He reached up and stroked her cheek.
“My mother wanted David I think from the first time she saw him, but what she didn’t know was he had a thing for young girls, and he wanted me.”
“It’s okay. You were a child and did nothing wrong. Do you hear me?” She looked up and saw the seriousness in his eyes. “I mean it, Jessica. Whatever happened was not your fault.”
“The first time I was ten and didn’t understand what was happening. It wasn’t all that bad. He started with a slight touch here, a little kiss there. Nothing that would make a little girl think anything was wrong. I was eleven the first time he…” She couldn’t finish the statement.
“I’m so sorry you went through that. You don’t have to say anything else if you don’t want to, at least not right now.”
“No, I need to finish. I need to tell you everything.” She took another deep breath and continued. “I actually reported it when I was twelve. I told my doctor, but he didn’t believe me. He didn’t even do an examination. He just took me back to my mother and told her what I’d said. She punished me by locking me in my room for a week. No food, though she said I should be grateful she left some water bottles in there to drink. She didn’t even let me out to use the bathroom.”
Of course, though she was locked in, it didn’t mean he was locked out, and he’d spent the week doling out his own terrible kind of punishment. “Like I said, my mother is all about appearances and I’d embarrassed her by talking to the doctor. Let’s just say I never made that mistake again.”
“How long did it go on?” Michael asked, his hand resting on her knee, keeping physical contact with her the entire time she spoke.
“The morning I left, I hit him over the head with a lamp as he was coming to give me his special kind of birthday present. Mother liked to pretend like she didn’t know what was happening, but there was no way she didn’t hear my cries. She just didn’t care.” Jazz broke down and sobbed with those words.