4. Chapter 3
Chapter 3
Savannah
As I think back to over a year ago, and as frustratingly slow as things seemed to go, I try to keep in mind the progress I have made. The day Derek came home and raped and beat me, while Kenzi cried in the other room, was the last straw. Knowing I had to get her out of that house, I started forming a plan. My injuries had to heal first because I struggled to move for several days after. There were things that had to be done first, I couldn’t just pick up and leave right away. Everything had to be planned methodically to ensure Derek didn’t catch us before we put some distance between us. My priority was getting Kenzi away from him, so even if he killed me, I needed to find somewhere safe to stash her, keeping her out of his grasp.
He had isolated me slowly over the years as the abuse escalated, until I had no one to turn to. Knowing and accepting that I may never live to see my daughter grow up makes my heart break. I am under no preconceived notion he won't find me. The day will come when I have to say goodbye to Kenzi and accept my fate—death. Derek not killing me and keeping me prisoner would be worse, so, instead, I welcome the day he strangles the life from my body. It is almost soothing to imagine going to sleep and being at peace. The weight of despair is exhausting.
Suicide has been something I have pondered, imagined, even dreamt of, but I couldn’t abandon my daughter to the devil that was her father. Saving money to make our escape was imperative. When I bought groceries or paid a bill, I embezzled small amounts of money, hoping it would go unnoticed. If my husband had found out I was squirreling away cash, he would have known I was up to something, and the consequences would have been my death warrant. Derek had warned me many times that if I tried to leave him, he would never stop coming for me. That meant I had one chance, and I needed to make it count.
Every time he hurt me, I longed to escape, but I hadn't found a safe way out. Initially, I had to stay out of necessity, because leaving was more dangerous, but then the risk of staying and dying became much greater. His violence continued to escalate, and suddenly, we were out of time. That’s what made it imperative that we went as soon as possible.
Often, I embellished the amount that things cost, and I pulled the extra cash out of our account. The shoe boxes in the bottom of my closet had small amounts hidden in them. I folded the bills as small as I could and hid them in the toes of my shoes. Derek required me to have nice ones to wear to work functions. There was more under a loose floorboard. I’d even taken to hiding small wads of cash in the pockets of coats hanging in the back of the closet. Derek would assume I’d forgotten about the money if he found anything. Adding to our stockpile involved saving diligently and occasionally taking money from Derek's wallet while he was passed out from drinking. All this relied on him not noticing it was missing. I had been lucky so far, but one mistake could quite easily have been my last. Derek often went to strip clubs, paid prostitutes and strippers for sex, and spent large amounts of money on drugs and alcohol. When he was inebriated, he couldn't remember what he had wasted money on, so it worked to my advantage. His drug use had progressively gotten worse over the last few months. Having been a dirty cop, he had large amounts of money at his disposal, and it ran through his fingers like water. I was betting on him not being aware of the exact amounts that he spent. If he had just overdosed on drugs and alcohol or gotten himself killed by the criminals he associated with, Kenzi and I would have been safe and free. Dreaming and praying for my husband to die made me a shit person, but I was grasping at straws to survive. I was willing to cross any line necessary to keep my little girl safe. I knew that if he’d caught me, he would have killed me. Failure wasn't an option, and because I had our daughter to think about, I kept pressing forward. Derek had become unhinged. He was escalating in his violence, and I could deal with it even if I ended up dead, but he started to be verbally abusive to Kenzi. Mentally and emotionally torturing her, and I was afraid he was going to break her little mind. The psychological damage he was causing her was clear in the way she trembled and clung to me whenever he walked into the house.
I was riddled with guilt and hopelessness about allowing my child to stay in that situation, but the opportunity to get away didn’t present itself often. Once we were gone, I needed to be able to feed and shelter Kenzi. If it were just me, I would have slept on the streets, but that couldn’t happen with a three-year-old in tow.
When I found out I was pregnant, I foolishly thought Derek would change. Against all reason, I clung to the hope that he would be overjoyed. He pointed his finger at me, accusing me of being responsible for the brat. Derek never referred to Kenzi by her name or in the way a loving father should. Not caring if she existed or not, he only liked her being alive because he knew it was the easiest way to control me and bring me to my knees. I gave him her first year to adjust and start acting like a father, but when that didn't happen, I started making a plan.
At first, he just acted indifferent to her and ignored her as long as I kept her quiet and made myself available to him when he wanted. If I was busy taking care of her, then he became angry and resentful, even violent. When she was sick, he expected me to ignore her and give him all of my attention, but yet she wasn't allowed to cry or disturb him in any way. He was cruel, and as my attachment and love for our baby grew, his hatred of me grew faster. Even though he despised me, told me how fat and ugly I was, how I’d let myself go because I had stretch marks from giving birth to our daughter, he wouldn’t let me leave. He told me that if I ever tried to leave him, he would kill me and spend the rest of his life inflicting as much pain and torture on Kenzi as he could. He had known that the very thought of harm befalling her would make me submit to anything he wanted.
Knowing I couldn’t have gotten away on my own, I reached out to my best friend from high school. Olivia was sarcastic, and she didn’t take anyone’s shit. If you gave her any lip, she came back at you tenfold. Because of that, Derek didn’t like her and told me not to see or speak to her anymore. He said she had too much mouth for a woman, and she was a bad influence on me. To keep the peace, I pulled away from Liv for a couple of years. Keeping in touch with her put her in danger. Derek used his badge and position in the police department to inflict trauma on anyone who tried to help me or he felt threatened by. Knowing I had to make an escape sooner rather than later, I reached out to her. She helped me by giving me the spare money she had saved up. I had planned on paying her back every penny, but I couldn’t allow my pride to impede Kenzi’s safety.
Olivia found me a car. I couldn’t take Derek’s. He would have used his police resources to find me since it was registered to him. He could have easily reported the car stolen. Instead, Olivia purchased an old Honda Accord to get me and Kenzi to where we were going. It wasn’t new by any means, but it was clean, and we didn’t have the luxury of spending money frivolously. I needed every penny I could scrimp and save. It was registered to Liv’s dad. She had enlisted him to sign the title to help a friend who was in trouble, and he had agreed. Hopefully, Derek wouldn’t have thought to look into it once I went missing and with it being in the name of a man he didn’t know, it would have gone unnoticed. Having had no contact with her for years, I was betting on him forgetting her or assuming we still weren’t in contact. It was a risk, and I hated putting Olivia in the line of fire, but she knew the stakes and was willing to risk her own safety to ensure Kenzi was protected from her father. There was no way I could take the car that I drove to run errands. Not only had he installed a GPS tracker on it, but it was also in his name. Just reporting the car stolen once we disappeared would get me arrested and Kenzi would be handed over to him while I languished in jail.
Most of the police were part of the good ole boys club. His coworkers had seen me with black eyes, busted lips, and broken bones over the years. The men looked the other way as if they didn’t notice, and the women looked at me with pity. The police department in our town was corrupt, and women were nowhere near being treated as equals to their male counterparts. They all remained silent and helped facilitate the abuse, either out of loyalty to my husband or fear of him.
Olivia had bought me a burner phone because I knew Derek was tracking my iPhone and again, it was on his account. He monitored my calls and text messages, which is why I had to cut Liv off when he demanded it. If I hadn’t, he would have known. The burner phone was cheap, but it served its purpose, and he couldn't trace it. No one had the number except Olivia, so I knew if it rang, it was her. It was our only means of communication. She had a burner phone of her own, one she had purchased from a gas station. She would call me and immediately dispose of the phone, so even if Derek searched her or her home, he wouldn't find any connection between us.
Liv will call if she hears anything about Derek’s whereabouts or what he is doing. Deep down, I know it’s only a matter of time before that call comes.