15. Aspen
Chapter 15
Aspen
“ Y ou are heavenly.” Harvey’s hand tangles in my hair, his fingers rubbing gently against my scalp as we stare up at the ceiling, the soft glow of the early evening light cascading across the bed and casting long shadows on the wall.
I sigh and roll into him, the warmth of his skin a welcome sensation. I smile against his chest as he pulls me into a warm embrace that feels so natural, so right.
For a brief second, I completely forget the reality of our situation. The fact that an untouchable asshole is blackmailing me and Harvey has been hired to protect him. My smile fades, a knot forming in my stomach.
“What’s wrong?” His brow furrows, my expression in direct contrast with what it was only seconds ago.
For the last several hours we’ve completely lost ourselves in each other. Neither of us bringing up the dark threat the looms. I stretch, my body aching in the most delicious way as I extract myself from his embrace. I try to smile but the weight of the secret I'm about to tell him weighs too heavily on me to even pretend.
“Harvey.” My chin quivers but I swallow down the tears. “I meant it earlier when I said there’s something I need to tell you, something nobody else knows.” I try to avoid his gaze, but he refuses, gently pulling my chin back toward him so that our eyes meet.
“It’s okay, whatever it is.” He looks at me intently, genuine concern in his eyes as he reaches out to grab my hand.
I close my eyes, taking in a deep breath as I attempt to brace myself for the storm of emotions I know I’m threatening to unleash with this confession. He squeezes my hand gently, silently reassuring me.
“I didn’t have the best home life growing up, not unlike a lot of people. I grew up struggling. We were not dirt poor; we always had food on the table and a roof over our head, but that’s where the good times ended. We only ever lived in one place, our two-bedroom trailer in the Magnolia Mobile Home Park. It was a small community, pretty tight-knit. Everyone knew my dad; he was kind of the mayor of the mobile home park—not really but that’s how everyone treated him. He always advocated for people when they needed help from the management office or he’d help them himself, especially the older single ladies when they needed repairs done or cars worked on. He always had the tools and answers for anyone’s problems.”
“Jack-of-all-trades,” Harvey says and I nod.
I take in another deep breath, my mind instantly transporting back to the turbulent and toxic years of my childhood. “But at home, behind closed doors”—I shake my head, his angry face flashing behind my eyelids—“he was a monster, a completely different person. It was like he’d shed his skin once he was alone with my mom and me.” Harvey’s hand squeezes mine tighter as he braces for what I’ll say next. “He was controlling, a religious zealot that pretended to be selfless and kind to everyone else but us. It was like when he looked at us…”
“Hey, it’s okay, you don’t have to go on.” I look over at Harvey, not realizing that I drifted off.
“He didn’t see humans; he didn’t see his wife and daughter. He saw—I don’t even know. We couldn’t do anything right. My mom was always cheating on him or stealing his money according to him and I was just like her… a whore, something he’d say to my face when I was barely big enough to remember.”
“Jesus.” Harvey sits up like he’s ready to go to war for me.
“All that translated into abuse. Physical, emotional, verbal… he would accuse us of things, conspiring against him, then lock us in one of the bedrooms together for hours or even days at a time. And when he’d hit us—” Harvey intakes a sharp breath. “It was like he knew exactly how to do it where nobody would see or if they did, it would be easily explained away.”
“Fucking coward.” It’s evident by the look in his eyes right now that this is difficult for him to hear as I imagine it would be for anyone, but it’s more than that; it’s a spark of white-hot rage.
“But one person noticed, my next-door neighbor, Jaxson Marquis.” I smile just saying his name. “I met him when we were both nine. He moved in with his dad who was just a different form of an abuser. He was an alcoholic, the spend his entire paycheck in one weekend type of alcoholic who made no effort to be a father and provide for his son. My father hated him and in turn, he hated that I was friends with his son. He’d say he’s going to grow up and be a no good degenerate just like his father.” It’s impossible to hold back a few stray tears that fall as I talk about Jaxson.
“Tell me more about him,” Harvey urges softly, his expression serious but patient.
“He was so smart.” I laugh. “He taught me about computers and coding. Neither of us had one, of course, so we’d sneak up to the public library and he’d show me stuff. That went on for a few summers until we were about thirteen and we got kicked out because we hacked the library’s national database.” I giggle, swiping at a stray tear.
“Whoa.” Harvey laughs. “I can’t imagine you getting kicked out of anywhere.” He brushes my hair behind my ear and I take the opportunity to lean into his palm.
“He was a genius, truly. Knowing what I know now about computers and systems and coding… he was decades beyond his age. He taught me everything he knew and I ate it up. It was a welcome distraction from our reality but it also felt like a way out. Kids like us—we weren’t encouraged by anyone around us to go to college. The teachers just wanted to push us through, distracted by the overcrowded classrooms and the bad kids who caused disturbances. Everyone but my mom, that is.”
“She believed in you.” It’s not a question but I nod my head anyway.
“Always. She’d tell Jax and me, when my dad wasn’t around, that we were going to go to college together someday and when we’d tell her she was dreaming, she’d shut us down instantly. It was really the only time she was stern with us; she never allowed any self-sabotage or self-doubt talk in her presence.”
“Did she get to see you two go to college?”
“She did.” I smile through the tears. “But that’s when things went south. As the years went on, things only got worse and I knew that if I really wanted to pursue the dream of college, there was no way in hell I could leave my mom alone with my dad.”
I glance at Harvey, his eyes glistening with unshed tears as he stares at me.
“Nobody believed us,” I say as a fresh batch of hot tears tumble down my cheeks, Harvey’s hand squeezing mine so tight. “When we finally got the courage to go to the police and report my dad, they said there was nothing they could do. Unless they were called and witnessed the abuse themselves, there was nothing… He had managed to manipulate everyone around us for so long that it was hopeless… completely and utterly hopeless. And when he found out—” I tip my head back, trying to stop the deluge of tears but it’s no use.
“I’m so sorry, Aspen. I’m so sorry you had to go through that. I’d do anything to take it from you.” He brushes a tear from my face. I don’t try to go on. I sit for several minutes as Harvey tugs me against his body. I sob, allowing myself to relive the memories for the first time since it happened.
“When my mom and I went to the police, we told them everything. We had been diligent, documenting cuts and bruises and broken bones over the six months leading up to going to them. I even had audio recordings of my dad screaming, threatening to kill my mom in the other room. The abuse got worse and so did the threats until finally one day, she didn’t stand back up when he hit her. I had to wait until he left to help her, pulling her into her bedroom where I prayed she wouldn’t die. I was terrified so I called Jaxson and he rushed over. When he saw my mom, he dialed 9-1-1 before I could stop him.”
“It was a nightmare. The cops did finally arrest him and charged him with second-degree felony assault. I was so excited and relieved. I remember running to Jaxson’s trailer when I got the good news but it was short-lived.”
“What happened?”
“My dad happened,” I say, still in disbelief after all these years. “I have no idea why or what happened, but the judge decided he was going to throw out the case or at most, charge him with a misdemeanor which means he would be home in a matter of days and this time I knew… I knew he wouldn’t stop until he killed her.”
Harvey’s hand twitches in mine and I look back at him, only he’s not looking at me this time. His eyes are cast down, his jaw tense.
“I couldn’t abandon her to face him alone so I told Jaxson everything about what my dad had been doing to us all those years and he promised me that we would find a way to make it stop. So that’s when we came up with… the plan.”
“The plan?”
“Jaxson hacked into the judicial records to try and see why my dad’s charges had been downgraded but he couldn’t find anything obvious so we decided to do some digging. We found out through my dad’s criminal record—which I had no idea was as extensive as it was—that he had ties to some local organized crime. He had years and years of arrests and charges relating to low-level petty crimes but never seemed to actually get in trouble or do any time. That’s when we noticed the judge in charge of almost all of his cases was the same judge that was handling his case now. The honorable Dean Sarco,” I say his name with disgust. “It was clear he was involved with this organized crime ring somehow.”
“Taking bribes, looking the other way, reducing charges…” Harvey lists off several correct assumptions. “Not the first time I’ve seen high-level officials involved in shit like this.”
“We found so much evidence, pictures of him at parties with escorts and drugs, associations and affiliations with the kind of criminals that end up in federal prison doing life sentences. So we blackmailed him.”
“Holy shit, what? How?” Harvey sits up straighter, a look of shock on his face.
“It was easier than I expected. We sent all of our evidence to the judge anonymously so he knew it was a legitimate threat. Once he saw the damming evidence, he brought the charges back up to first-degree felony assault and convicted him.”
“Holy shit.” Harvey starts to laugh. “Holy shit, I am pleasantly impressed.”
“That’s not the end.” My voice stays steady. “It was really only the beginning. The maximum sentence for a second-degree felony assault charge in New York is three to seven years and he got five. It wasn’t enough. I knew that he’d come after my mom and me once he got released. I tried to convince myself that we’d have a new life and a new identity by then, but I couldn’t take the risk that he’d find us.”
Harvey tangles his fingers deeper with mine, his anxious concern almost palpable. “What happened after he was locked up?”
“We went on with our lives, or at least tried to. But the ever-present questions continued to linger… What if he gets out on good behavior? What if he bribes a guard to let him escape? What if he appeals and his case is overturned? It was like we were living in a different prison now. A prison of uncertainty, never really feeling safe… It was just an illusion, you know?”
He nods and I’m sure he does know. As a man who spent years in the Special Forces, I can only imagine the demons that haunt him.
“But all of that fear and uncertainty came to an abrupt halt one day about six months after he was sentenced. We received notice he would be transferred to a different prison upstate and he was but about a month after his transfer, we got a call. He’d been found dead, murdered by his cellmate.”
“Good.” Harvey’s voice conveys zero hesitation or remorse. “I hope it was slow and painful.”
“I don’t know the details about how he died, but one thing I did find out about the man who killed him, he was also involved in that same gang my dad was caught up in and about four years earlier, he’d been sentenced to fifty years by Judge Sarco. The crazy coincidence…” I say sarcastically, “is my dad was the one who testified against him and he’s the reason that man got a life sentence. He was already forty-one when he went in so he knew when the judge handed down fifty years he’d never see the light of day again.”
“Ah, one of those kind of coincidences.” He smirks. “Do you think the judge had your dad taken out before he could start talking in prison since he was tied up with him in these bribes and kickbacks?”
“I did—at first. But something in my gut wouldn’t accept it. I knew there was more to it but Jax and I promised each other we wouldn’t bring up the case ever again.”
Harvey’s eyes widen. “Meaning?”
“A few years later, during our college graduation weekend, we were just chilling in his apartment that we’d spent all day packing up, talking about what our next steps were, how our lives were about to change.” I smile, thinking back on that night. I can still feel the excitement that vibrated between us. The excitement of the unknown mixed with the realization that we were finally college grads. “We’d been drinking, not too much but for me, two Mike’s Hard Lemonades at the time got me loose enough to let my guard down so, I asked him the one question I’d been harboring all those years. Did you have anything to do with my dad’s death?”
Harvey’s eyes widen in shock. “You think Jaxson had him killed?”
I shrug. “I never got a straight answer from him. He just smiled at me with this lazy grin he’d always give me when I knew he wasn’t telling the truth and said, ‘Isn’t it funny how karma always finds a way, huh?’ And that was it, we never talked about it again.”
“Do you think he’s capable of something like that?”
“I don’t know,” I admit, “but I do know that Jax would have done anything to protect me and my mom.”
“Where is Jaxson now?” Harvey’s eyes are staring down where his hand still clutches mine.
“I don’t know.” The tears come back, fat and hot, tumbling down my cheeks faster than I can wipe them away. “The day after we graduated, I went by his old apartment to say goodbye. He had accepted a job in LA and we had plans to grab lunch but when I got there, it was empty. I pounded on the door but he didn’t answer so I used my spare key he’d given me and let myself in. All of his belongings and car were gone but he’d left me a note sitting on the kitchen counter along with instructions to give my spare key to his landlord.”
“What did it say?”
“He told me that he wasn’t really taking a job in LA. He had taken a job with an international group of high-end hackers that had been around forever. He couldn’t involve me; he knew my plans to move to Manhattan and pursue a fun, fast-paced job would be destroyed if he and I were still friends and he ever got caught. Jax always had big dreams of being an altruistic hacker ever since we were kids so it didn’t really come as a surprise. It was just hard to lose that person, to close that chapter of my life that had been a constant for so long.”
Silence settles between us as I stare off into nothing. Finally, I look back at Harvey to gauge his mood after hearing all of this. It’s clear his mind is racing with questions, some I know I probably am not ready to answer. He must feel the toll this conversation has taken on me because he changes the subject slightly.
“What about your mom? What happened to her?” My face falls and fresh tears well up. “Shit, I’m sorry,” he says, trying to fix it. “We don’t have to talk anymore, baby.”
“It’s okay. A year after I graduated college she was diagnosed with a rare form of sarcoma. It was in her stomach and there was nothing they could do. She died within eight months of her diagnosis.”
“Fuck.” My stomach drops. “What was her name?”
“Margaret.” I smile, wiping my nose. “But she went by Maggie. I had a small funeral back in my hometown and she was buried in the same cemetery as her mom, something she always wanted.” I blow out a slow breath. “After dealing with her estate, which was nothing but medical bills at that point, I went to visit her grave one last time before heading back to the city. That’s when I saw it, a single flower with a burner phone.”
“Jaxson?” Harvey asks. “Was he at the funeral?”
“No, he wasn’t but I knew the phone and flower were from him. There was no note and only a single number programmed into the phone listed as JustInCase.”
“Did you call it?”
I shake my head. “No, I never have. But I kept the phone and put it in a lockbox at my bank.”
“It’s still there?” I nod. “What about the judge in the case? Any chance he could still be a threat?”
“No, he was actually disbarred a few years later in a huge sting that took down a few other officials. He never served time, but rumor is he ran off to Mexico and nobody has seen him since.”
Harvey releases my hand, sitting up to pull me fully into an embrace, holding me tightly as the sobs come back. “I’m so sorry, Aspen,” he repeats as my tears run down his bare chest. “You’ve been through so much.” His hands rub my back gently before pulling me back slightly so we’re eye to eye. “But those days are over for you. You don’t have to carry this burden alone anymore. I’m here for you, every step of the way, and I’m not going anywhere.”
He plants a kiss against my forehead, the pain of heartache evident in his eyes. “Thank you.” It comes out in a rush. “I’ve kept this inside for so long… It feels so good to share it with someone I can trust.”
For the first time in forever, it feels like I can actually take a deep breath, a sense of relief washing over me as I let it out. For the first time since Jaxson left, it feels like I can finally face my past with Harvey at my side.
“You’re incredibly brave, you know that?”
“I don’t feel very brave. I just did what I had to do to survive.”
He pulls my gaze back toward his. “That’s exactly what makes you brave,” he insists. “You faced unimaginable horrors and didn’t let them destroy you.”
I stare at this man, knowing full well that I’m in love with him. I want to tell him, to scream it from the rooftops, but I know that I’m not ready. I’m overwhelmed with emotion in the moment. I want to tell him when I haven’t just confessed my most hideous secrets.
“I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“You’ll never have to find out,” he promises, burying his face in my neck. “I’m never letting you go.”