Chapter 39 #2
“Where are your kids currently, Ms. Blake?” The female agent asked, raising one unimpressed eyebrow at me.
“At home. Sleeping.” I answered.
“And who’s watching them?” She fired back instantly, “While you’re here—” She eyed up the massive crowd.
“Working.” I clapped back in anger. “While I’m working, they are at home, in bed, with my mother watching them until we get home.”
“We.” The man said, flipping through his file. “Would that include a Mr. Travis Hayes and a Mr. Elliot Torres?” He looked up at the two men flanking my shoulders with open disdain, like he was counting the marks against me and just found two more.
“Yes.” I ground out through my clenched teeth. “Is that against the law?”
The man tsked, and Eli’s hand settled on my back, like he was trying to offer some sort of comfort under the man’s blatant judgement. “It is if you’re subjecting your children to depravity and indecent behavior.”
“Oh my God,” I whispered in horror. “It’s Danny.
” Trav looked at me with murder in his eyes as Eli’s hand tightened around my back.
“We should have—” I felt despair trying to pull me under into hysterics as I realized just how fucked I was.
“He went to them first, which means they’ll never believe me. ”
“Shh,” Eli pressed his lips to my temple as I fell into his support. “He’s not going to win this.”
“So, help me God, if you believe the blatant lies of Danny Masters over this whole situation, you’re as dumb as you fucking look walking in here and throwing this bullshit at Frankie.
She’s an incredible mother, and you don’t even know the half of the shit that piece of trash has done to her!
” Trav roared, losing his normal grip on his control and dissolving.
“Ma’am,” Agent Andrews ignored Trav’s outburst and glared at me, “As part of our investigation, we’ll be placing the children,” He opened his file again, “Emmaline and Toby Blake into protective custody.”
“No!” I broke, falling completely into Eli’s arms. “You can’t take my kids! That’s insane, you can’t take them! Based on one person’s claims? That’s absurd! They need me!”
“Then why aren’t they with you?” The woman scorned me, and I felt every shred of humanity slip from my body as I realized I was already guilty in their eyes.
“Ma’am,” Andrews interrupted again. “We’re going to let you go with us to collect the kids, but we’re placing them in the care of their father under an emergency custody ruling until this investigation is complete.”
“Please!” I sobbed, “No, you can’t! Please don’t give them to him! Please!”
“Over my dead body are you placing those kids in the care of the man who beat and abused Frankie for years.” Eli pulled my face into his neck and held me tight as he yelled at the agents, ripping open my secrets for the entire bar to hear, hoping to save my kids.
“You say that the allegations against Frankie are too severe to leave anything to chance, then those are my allegations against him. He beat her. He abused her. And when she finally got away and ran home to be safe here in Cedar Bluff,” He sneered, like he was speaking to the Chief himself, “Where outsiders don’t get to come into our community and fuck with our people, he followed her!
He has been stalking her, breaking into her home, stealing items from her belongings, and terrorizing her children.
He cut the brakes on her car trying to hurt her for fucks sake!
” He roared, “And if you don’t believe me then ask Lenny,” He waved his hand out to where the mechanic sat, drinking a beer with his wife and his friends.
Then he looked at one cop standing behind the agents, “And don’t fucking just stand there silently while this shit all goes down, Johnny Hallstead, because you were at the crash that night.
Time to talk! These aren’t just my allegations; there are others who have seen the shit that Danny’s been doing to Frankie and her children.
He’s terrorizing them! You can’t honestly think for one second that they’re better off with him! ”
“He’s right,” Lenny stepped forward instantly, “A few weeks ago, Frankie’s car was towed to my shop, with front end damage after Travis lost control while driving it.
There was suspicion behind the crash because of the way the car responded during the incident, and when I looked into it, the brake lines had been cut.
Not all the way through so the line would bleed instantly, but in a way that would let them bleed with each press of the brake until suddenly there would just be no resistance at all. Travis sustained injuries in the crash.
“We responded to that crash,” Officer Hallstead piped up, giving the Chief a pointed look. “There were no skid marks, backing the claim.”
“Did you report any of this?” The Chief asked, looking at me directly.
Shrinking, I grimaced as I shook my head, “We were coming to the station to file a report in the morning.”
Instantly, all the credibility Eli had built for me disappeared just as fast. “Please, you have to believe me. I don’t neglect my kids.
They’re my whole life. Every single thing I’ve ever done has been for them.
I work for them. I go to school for them.
I have provided for them 100% on my own and have every single second since we moved back here four years ago.
Toby has never even met Danny! You can’t put them in his care; he doesn’t know anything about them! ”
The Chief watched the agents share a glance and then stepped in. Maybe it was the long-standing reputation of Travis’s family, or Eli’s respectable character as a first responder, or maybe even his friendship with my mom, but he stuck his neck out.
“They’re right though, report or not, those allegations are too serious to place the kids in his care. There has to be another solution.”
“Foster care.” The woman agent, who never even introduced herself, said, “We will place them in a temporary housing facility until we can run our—”
“No!” I cried again, banging my hands on the bar as I lost my grip on my control.
“You’ll traumatize them! You’re standing there, judging me for being a working mom, who escaped an impossible situation and has fought for every single thing I have given them, calling me an unfit mother, but you’re willing to just throw them in foster care when there are dozens of other solutions! ”
“What would you recommend we do then?” She pursed her lips with her hand on her lips, and I wanted to reach across the bar and slap the attitude off her fucking face more than anything else in the world.
“If I’m the problem, then I’ll leave. Let them stay in their home, with Travis and Eli, who are good men, loving men who care for them and protect them every single day alongside me, and I’ll leave while you do your investigation.
Or let them stay at my mom's! Anything but the two pathetic, heartless solutions you’ve thrown like they don’t fucking matter to you!
They matter to me! Let me keep them safe! ”
She sighed as if the mere mention of my recommendations annoyed her, but the other agent looked more reasonable.
“Please,” I implored, “It’s late. Let them stay in their beds and in their home.”
The Chief stepped forward again and spoke to the agents, “Mrs. Blake, Frankie’s mother, is a good woman, the kids would be safe with her if that’s what route you want to take, but I think they’d be better staying at home with Trav and Eli. Both are stand-up men, who have never been in trouble.”
The woman scoffed, “You have to hear the absurdity of that statement as plainly as I do.” She put her hands on her hips, “How long have you three been in a relationship?”
“Months.” Travis snapped irritability. “And the kids have lived with us for almost as long thanks to Danny’s tormenting. They moved in with us to be safe.”
“Fine,” Andrews sighed as he closed up his folder. “But we’ll be conducting a formal search of the home, and we’ll need you to come down to the office for questioning.”
The words sounded so far away as I blinked in disbelief. I tried to find relief that the kids could stay with Trav and Eli, but I couldn’t get past the part where I wasn’t free of the whole situation.
“You are not to return to the home until you’ve been cleared, if you’re cleared.
You’re also not permitted to have any contact with the children.
No phone calls, no visits, no bumping into them at school pickup.
Nothing.” The woman stated firmly and then laid a card down on the bar top.
“You can follow us to the office now to begin your interview.”
“Yes, Ma’am.” I whispered, haunted inside and shamed.
I couldn’t go home.
The agents turned and walked away, as if they hadn’t walked in ten minutes ago, destroyed my entire sense of security and happiness, before leaving for the night.
The Chief and his officers lingered longer, coming up to the bar. “Frankie, I’d like you to come down to the station tomorrow to start the paperwork on these other incidents.”
“I—” I stammered, blinking away the tears. “How—” I suddenly felt like I was going to collapse.
“Shh,” Trav kissed the back of my head as Eli pulled me into his chest again.
“Eli will go with you, and I’ll go home to the kids.
” I turned and looked at him, shaking my head in absolute defeat.
“We’re going to clear this all up, I promise you, Shade.
No one will take those kids from us. No one will touch them, I promise you. ”
“Go on,” Eli said, squeezing Trav’s arm as he turned us to all walk out. “Rick, close up.”
“On it.” Rick said, patting me on the shoulder as Eli pulled me from the bar, taking the back door to his truck with Trav following us.
“I’ll pack you some things and send them home with your mom.” Trav said, pulling me into his arms and squeezing me so tight my bones creaked under pressure. But I never wanted him to let go. “I love you, Frankie. I promise you I won’t let anyone take them from us. Those damn kids are ours.”
I cried again, melting into his strength and crumbling under the fear of Danny getting his claws into my kids because of me. He’d destroy every good part of them, every inch of innocence inside of them that believed in right and wrong. They’d never heal from the venom they found in him.
When Travis turned the wheel of his truck toward the opposite side of the rink, taillights glowing red against the dark on his way home, to be with the kids, to a place where I wasn’t allowed, something inside of me broke.
It didn’t matter that he was going to the kids. It didn’t matter that he was protecting them, the only thing that was important right now.
All I saw was distance. Him driving away from me.
I felt it.
The familiar ache in my chest as I realized what Danny was doing to me all over again. The alienation. The isolation. The distance he forced between me and everyone that mattered in my life.
He was doing it again. And he was going to get away with it if I didn’t find some way to prove something I didn’t believe most days myself.
I was a good mom.
But there was a hollow ache of knowing I couldn’t be their mother and a partner to anyone but Danny.
He’d never allow it.
Eli touched my hand on the console, murmured something steady, but it barely cut through the roar in my head. Because in that instant, I realized DCFS didn’t need to prove I was unfit. I already felt like I was.
I had to walk away from Travis and Eli if I ever wanted this to end.
I had to choose my children over myself if I had even the barest chance of keeping them safe from the monster that fathered them.