Chapter 60
SIXTY
Dana Jo wrung her hands together, tugging at the sleeves of her sweater.
Still self-conscious about the scars on her arms from the attack in the mountains, she always covered them, mostly because she didn’t want people in public or the street staring at her with curious, probing eyes and asking questions. Questions she had no answer to.
What happened to you? Who hurt you?
“Remember, this is a safe place,” Gil said in a comforting tone. “We’re glad to see you’re back, Dana Jo. You look upset tonight. Want to talk about it?”
She darted furtive glances around the circle then her eyes fell back on her jittery hands. She rarely talked about what happened, but when she’d passed the liquor store around the corner, she’d been tempted to go inside and buy a fifth of vodka.
Remembering her daughter, she’d ducked inside here instead.
She inhaled and spit it out. “I’ve been having a hard time, ever since that girl Minnie Benton was killed and her little girl went missing.”
“That’s understandable,” Gil said softly. “You have a daughter, too, don’t you?”
Dana Jo nodded, her breathing erratic. “I’m terrified something will happen to her. That I’ll lose her.” She hesitated, hoping someone else would speak up and save her from having to continue.
“Sometimes our fears are triggered by events in our lives and people around us,” Gil said. “But talking about them can be helpful.”
“I saw the news, too,” the woman named Lily said. “I’m sure you aren’t the only parent who feels that way right now.”
Dana Jo soaked in the woman’s kind voice. “It also brought back nightmares of what happened to me a while back.”
Silence stretched for a long minute, then Gil murmured for her to go on. For a moment, Dana Jo felt the faint beginnings of one of her migraines and massaged her temple. Maybe if she talked about it, her nightmares would stop.
“The problem is that I don’t remember exactly what happened to me,” she said.
“But over two years ago, almost three now, I was taken, assaulted, injured and left for dead near the ridge where Minnie died.” Her chest heaved with the strain of the memory.
She saw the shadow again. The man cloaked in all black.
She was fighting, clawing to escape even as the world spun in circles.
For a brief second, an image of a face appeared in those shadows, but… she couldn’t distinguish his features.
God help me. The image was so close she could almost touch it. She closed her eyes, trying to force it. It was on the tip of her mind, but she couldn’t quite grasp it.
“Dana Jo?” Gil said softly.
She opened her eyes, panic building. “I… was assaulted and… his face is on the edge of my memory. Part of me doesn’t want to remember.
” Her voice cracked. “But another part wants to see his face so I can make him pay for what he did to me. But then…” Then one day Lou Lou would know how she was conceived.
And she never wanted her daughter to find out the truth about that or feel like she wasn’t wanted or loved. In spite of how she’d been conceived, Lou Lou was the best thing that had ever happened to her.
She’d die if anything happened to her.