Chapter 38
CHAPTER
I stare at the email for a long time—long enough that the screen goes dark and I have to swipe and let it recognize my face again to reread the message.
It’s dated almost a week ago—the day before my mother’s death.
And it’s just been sitting here, waiting for me this whole time.
My boss’s request forgotten, I jab at the attachment, opening it as the car’s air-conditioning hums away.
I take a deep breath when it flickers open, wishing I had a whiskey or two to fortify myself. I could run into the house, pour something, but my heart pounds, the anticipation too strong, and I can’t do anything but sit right here in the driver’s seat.
It’s another chapter. Of course it is. I knew it would be. I imagine Noah in his house, sitting on his bed wearing his glasses, smirking as he hits send from a fake email address. I exhale and start to read.
Chapter 6—Hannah’s Novel
Jocelyn didn’t hesitate this time as she drove up to the parking lot, parked the car, strolled into the motel office.
She paid with cash and gave her fake name, then went to the room to wait.
Mr. Sawyer wouldn’t arrive for some time.
That was how they stayed safe, how no one found out what they were doing.
And she didn’t want to give him any reason to put a stop to it.
She lived for these nights with him, the one person who noticed her, who took time to help her.
As she waited, she wandered the room, opening shelves and drawers.
Sometimes she found surprises—things people had left, the people who stayed here on the nights they didn’t have the room.
Once, she’d found a pack of gum, though she wasn’t about to chew some stranger’s gum.
This time, she found a Bible. A nice one.
Freshly placed there. The spine hadn’t even been cracked yet.
Jocelyn ran her fingers over the cloth exterior, but didn’t dare open it.
She’d gone to church, knew the scripture, and didn’t feel the need to read more about God or Jesus, especially not on the nights she was at the motel.
From behind her, the door creaked. Jocelyn whipped around and hurried over. Probably it was Mr. Sawyer, and he needed to be let in. Usually, she left the door unlocked, but maybe she forgot to this time. Maybe—
She swung the door open, but no one stood there. She stuck her head out, looked left and right, but there was only humid air and a cracked parking lot. Not even another car besides the guy’s who worked the front desk. Odd. She could’ve sworn someone had opened the door, or at least rustled it.
She blew out a breath, shut the door so she wouldn’t be seen, and went back inside to wait. Finally, twenty minutes later, the man she’d been waiting for burst through the door.
“Running late,” Mr. Sawyer muttered, though notably, there was no apology.
“On your knees.” He pointed to the spot where he always had her kneel, and she rushed to obey.
“Don’t have much time tonight. Have to get home to .
. .” The rest of his words were a mumble she couldn’t quite make out, but she knew better than to speak when she had not been asked a direct question.
Jocelyn knelt there for some time before he came over, running his fingers over the back of her neck, twisting them through her hair.
The rest of the evening went as it always did—he gave her commands, and she obeyed.
They undressed. They had sex with her up on all fours, facing the wall and not him.
But today it was faster than usual. Mr. Sawyer was brusque, ordering her around.
“Hurry up,” he said when they finished. “Get dressed.”
Jocelyn tried to, but one of her stockings snagged, making it impossible to pull up. She reached to fix it, but before she could, he was right there. Shoving her.
“I said hurry up .”
But Mr. Sawyer’s tone only made Jocelyn more nervous. One second she was standing on one foot, fixing her clothes, and the next she was on the ground, blinking.
“Shit,” he said.
“What happened?” She reached for her head. The spot where her hair met her forehead ached and felt hot and wet and—
“You hit your head. Why are you so clumsy? Here, let me look.” Mr. Sawyer crouched down, frowning in the dim motel light as he examined her.
Jocelyn was confused. She didn’t remember hitting her head, didn’t remember what happened.
Not exactly anyway. But when she looked up and around, she knew she’d hit the corner of the nightstand.
She’d fallen, and on the way down, bashed her head on it.
When she pulled her fingers away, they were covered in blood.
“You need stitches.”
Jocelyn’s mouth gaped open. That was a problem, wasn’t it? She couldn’t afford a visit to the doctor, much less stitches. Neither could her mother. And besides, if she went, they’d ask what happened. She couldn’t tell them. Yet she also couldn’t imagine lying to a doctor.
“Let’s go,” Mr. Sawyer said. “There’s a clinic in the next town over. No one will recognize you.” It was as if he could hear her concerns.
He helped her pull on the rest of her clothes, then gathered his own belongings, shoving his keys and wallet back into his pocket.
Jocelyn watched him, dazed, processing. She was about to say something—she already couldn’t recall what—when out of the corner of her eye, she caught a flash of motion in the window. A face, eyes peering through—
Grabbing the dresser to steady herself, she took two steps and opened the gaping curtains wider. But there was no one. Again.
“What?” Mr. Sawyer asked.
“I thought I saw someone.”
“You hit your head. You probably have a concussion and are seeing things.”
Jocelyn nodded without replying. She always agreed with him. That’s what he expected of her, how he taught her discipline—but she was sure someone had been looking in.
Out in the parking lot, Jocelyn walked toward her mother’s car.
“You can’t drive right now,” Mr. Sawyer barked. “Get in my car. In the back. Lie down so no one sees you.”
But she couldn’t help wonder if someone already had seen them.
The clinic was quiet, clean. Much nicer than the last time she’d gone to the doctor her state-funded insurance covered. The nurse did all the normal doctor’s office things—checked her pulse and her blood pressure, took her temperature, handed her a specimen cup to give a urine sample.
“You’re here alone?” the nurse asked, taking notes on a clipboard.
“My . . .” She almost called him her boyfriend. But he wasn’t that. He was more than that, in a way. “My dad dropped me off,” she managed. “He had to get to work.” Jocelyn felt proud of the quick lie. It worked, too, just in case someone had seen Mr. Sawyer leaving her at the curb.
“I see.” The nurse peered at her once more, then nodded. “Okay, the doctor will be in shortly.”
Jocelyn sat on the exam table, swinging her feet, the paper crinkling beneath her. She grew dizzy, gripped the sides with her hands, felt it bunch, then relaxed.
He’d pushed her.
She remembered now. She’d been trying to hurry and get dressed, do as he asked, but he pushed her.
Jocelyn pressed her lips together, tried not to think too hard about what that meant.
She let him do a lot of things that caused her pain—but those usually caused a good pain.
This was different. And now she needed stitches.
She knew what Mr. Sawyer had done to her was wrong, knew she should probably not go to that motel to meet him anymore.
Not just her mind knew it, either. Her palms were sweating, and her throat felt tight—like the inside was swollen.
The same thing had happened before, when she’d done things with Mr. Sawyer that made her uneasy.
Yet she kept going back. This time, though, she would be stronger.
Fleetingly, she thought of her mother—what she’d tell her happened. She could simply say she fell. It was true, after all. Hell, her mother might not even notice a head wound with stitches.
“Jocelyn?” A woman tapped at the door. She was tall, young, and wore a white coat. “I’m Dr. Nye. I understand you have a cut that needs tending to.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The doctor was quick and thorough. The most painful part was when she injected something she called lidocaine to numb the area.
But after that, Jocelyn didn’t feel anything other than a little pressure.
“It’ll wear off,” Dr. Nye said. “But you can take some Tylenol or ibuprofen, and that should help. You’ll have a scar, but since it’s at the beginning of your hairline, it won’t likely be noticeable, unless you’re looking for it.
” She snapped off her rubber gloves and tossed them into the garbage can. “Can you wait here just a moment?”
Jocelyn nodded, and the doctor left. She stood up and peered at herself in the mirror behind the sink.
A gauzy bandage had been placed over the stitches.
This was going to be hard for anyone to miss, even her mother.
And why did her damn palms kept sweating?
She twisted the knob on the faucet and ran cold water over them, blotting them dry with a paper towel.
“Jocelyn?” Dr. Nye came back into the room and beckoned for her to take a seat. “We took a urine sample when you came in. Standard procedure.”
“Okay.” She nodded.
“For female patients, part of that screening is a pregnancy test.”
Jocelyn tilted her head, waiting for more. Perhaps the doctor was going to tell her all the different tests they’d run.
“Jocelyn, your pregnancy test . . . It came back positive.”