Chapter Five #3
Both Jacque and Daniel stood as he approached them.
“She’s going to be okay,” Dr. Harmon said.
“Although in the next couple of days and weeks, she’s going to hurt.
” He looked from Jacque to Daniel. “She has two fractured ribs and various bruises. I had every intention of keeping her here for the rest of the night, but she insists she wants to go home. She should be out here in just a few minutes. I’ve given her a week’s worth of pain meds.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much that can be done for cracked ribs.
What she really needs is plenty of rest and to give herself time to heal”
“Thank you, Doctor,” Daniel said. As Dr. Harmon left them, he commented, “I was going to question Monique a little more, but it can wait until tomorrow.”
“You go ahead and take off and do whatever you need to do, I’ll take Monique home,” Jacque said.
“There’s really nothing left to do. We searched all around the porch area and where we believed the attack took place, but we didn’t find anything that might help identify the assailant. We’ll take up the investigation again tomorrow morning in the light of day.”
Minutes later Jacque was once again alone in the waiting room. He wasn’t sure how long it was before Monique walked out.
She was wearing a bright pink nightshirt with a blue-flowered hospital gown over the top. She walked gingerly, as if every step was sheer torture. She had a blossoming bruise on the side of her chin. The minute she saw him, she burst into tears.
If any woman ever needed to be held, it was her. He tentatively pulled her into his arms, not wanting to hurt her further.
She buried her face in the front of his shirt as she continued to cry.
“Hey, hey…crying is only going to make you hurt more,” he said softly.
She continued to weep for several more minutes, and then her sobs slowly subsided, but she continued to linger in his arms for a long moment. Finally, she raised her head and stepped back from him. “Oh, Jacque, it was so terrible. I thought I was going to be beaten to death.”
He hated to see her tearstained face and he wanted to grab her back into his arms and hold her tight. He needed to make sure that nobody would ever hurt her again. These thoughts stirred up old, raw memories inside him that made him unsettled, but he shoved them away.
“Can you take me home?” she asked.
“That’s what I intend to do,” he replied. “Are you ready to go now?”
“More than ready,” she said with a nod.
He grabbed one of her arms to steady her as they headed slowly to the exit. It didn’t take long to get her in his car and then he headed back to the swamp.
For several minutes she didn’t speak, and he remained silent, giving her space to remain quiet if that was what she needed.
“I was a fool,” she finally said, weariness heavy in her tone. “I should have never answered the knock on my door. Even worse, I stepped out on my porch.”
“Daniel told me the box that was on your porch contained a message,” he said.
“A message? What was it?”
“It was a note that said you were warned.”
She released a deep sigh. “If the beating had continued, I don’t think I would have been alive to read the note.”
“I hate to tell you this, but you’re probably going to hurt more tomorrow than you do tonight,” he said softly. He glanced over at her. She looked so small, so achingly vulnerable.
Two cracked ribs. He knew what kind of force was necessary to crack a rib. She must be in tremendous pain, but right now she was remarkably stoic. Even if the doctor had given her something at the hospital, a mere pill or shot couldn’t take away all the pain.
“I’ll get through it. Besides, I have some pain meds to take if I need them,” she replied. “Before I know it, I’ll be right as rain.”
He admired her optimism, but he knew it was going to take a while before she fully recovered and didn’t hurt anymore.
They arrived at the swamp parking area, where he hurried around to the passenger side to help her out.
Once again, they fell silent as they slowly walked in to her shanty. When they reached it, she paused for a moment at the foot of the bridge and looked up toward the porch.
It was dark, but lantern light came out of her windows, illuminating the porch area. After a moment’s hesitation, she walked up the bridge, and he followed close behind her.
It had been long enough since the attack that the police had cleared out and apparently it was no longer a crime scene.
The front door was locked but she had a key hidden under a rock next to the porch. She told him where it was and he retrieved it and opened the door.
When they were inside the shanty, she pulled a bottle of pills out of the hospital gown pocket and set them down on the coffee table. She then sat on the sofa and released a small sigh. “Jacque, thank you so much for bringing me home.”
“Don’t get comfortable,” he replied. “I want you to go pack a bag. You aren’t staying here.”
She looked at him in surprise. “Then where am I going to stay?”
He knew this was just another mistake in a trail of mistakes he’d already made with her, but as a man who cared for the safety of another human being, he had no choice.
“As long as your attacker is still out there, you’ll be staying with me,” he said.