Chapter 34
Raya
I duck my head as I walk away, sobs racking my body. There are no raindrops falling from the sky to blame. I used the excuse numerous times as a teenager before I was able to get my emotions under control. How I feel right now is real and raw, less like the robot I had become before meeting Liam.
My chest aches with heartbreak, my heart broken from the words he said to me. I couldn't take it any longer. I had to walk away. I needed just a few minutes before going back and telling him that he's a coward for purposely trying to shove me away.
The tactic doesn't surprise me. Liam isn't exactly the type of man who’s going to admit that he's scared.
He won't tell me that involving me in his life is too dangerous for me, because he should know by now that I'm willing to take the risk.
I'm willing to run to the ends of the earth for the man and I'll explain all of that to him.
But the words he said, the truth in all of them, were like slashes to my skin. I don't think he believes them, but if there's even a chance that he feels the way he just said he does, then he may be right. There may be no hope for us.
“Excuse me,” I say mechanically when I bump into someone on the sidewalk.
“Miss, are you okay?” the woman asks but I don't acknowledge her.
I keep walking. I keep my head down. So people don't see how upset I am. This devastation isn't meant to be witnessed. My world falling apart, my heart utterly broken, should be done in private.
The sun gets lower in the sky as I continue to walk but I keep a pattern of left and right, left and right at the end of each block, so I'm able to zigzag my way back to Liam.
“Ma'am,” another female voice calls out, but I ignore her too. “Ma'am.”
I hurry my steps, turning right at the next block.
“Raya Reed.”
My feet stutter to a stop at the sound of my name, fear making my heart pound.
My first instinct is to run but after taking a quick glance over my shoulder to assess the situation, I know I can't. A uniformed police officer approaches slowly, her hands facing me palms open, in a way you would expect someone approaching a dangerous animal would act.
“Miss Reed,” she asks, her voice questioning as if she can't believe I'm standing right in front of her.
I know I can't get away from her. With all of the running I've done on Liam's treadmill, I might be able to lose her but I'd never be able to outrun her reports back to dispatch. It will only be a matter of time before every cop in the small towns descends on this area.
Liam's voice rings in my ear of the options he gave me. Tell them I took you or tell them the truth. I still haven't decided which way I'm going to go as she ushers me to her car.
“I'm sorry about this,” she says as she opens the back door. “The computer takes up more than half of the front seat. You’re not under arrest.”
I feel very much detained, not free to walk away, as she closes me in the back.
Her radio comes to life after reporting that she just found me wandering the streets of Mission, Texas, incoherent and completely distraught.
I imagine she'd be just as upset if the man she loved said the things to her that Liam said to me, but I don't open my mouth to tell her so.
My tears are renewed as she drives past the motel I left not long ago. Liam's car is already gone. Even if I managed to find my way back to him, he couldn't be bothered to stick around. Maybe the things I tried to assure myself weren't true, he actually meant.
The cop car rolls to a stop outside of a small regional hospital and you’d think that there was an assassination attempt on my father’s life with how many people rush out to greet us.
I'm not given the option to walk inside, as a burly orderly lifts me under my arms and places me on a gurney.
Numerous members of the hospital staff descend on me, taking my temperature, my blood pressure, asking a slew of questions and not waiting for any form of response.
I wince at a pinch in my arm, wondering if they're just taking liberties, as a nurse fills a vial of my blood, or if I'm as incoherent as I heard the policewoman mention on her radio on the drive in.
Nothing seems real and I think that has more to do with the fact that I don't want this to be real.
I don't need the hospital. I need Liam, but Liam isn't an option.
He made that blatantly clear saying the things he did, and then leaving.
He proved that I don't matter to him. That I was a game. That I was a toy he broke for fun.
I'm not transported into a trauma bay. I'm instantly put into a quiet room. I don't speak to them, but I do acknowledge that I am in fact Raya Reed when they ask.
The next several hours are a mad rush of tests and questions that I can't answer.
Questions that I won't answer, like where have you been?
Who took you? Did they hurt you? I ignore all of them until a doctor steps into the room.
She shuffles everyone out and I know what's coming before she even speaks.
“We have one more test, Raya. I need to perform an exam on you.”
“No,” I say.
“There's a chance that—”
“No,” I snap. “I wasn't raped.”
She gives me a small smile as if she doesn't believe me, but instead of forcing the issue, she hands me a clipboard and a pen. “I'll need you to sign this, stating that you refuse to give consent for the exam.”
I quickly do what she says because I know what she'll find. Liam may hate me. He may not see me the way I see him but hurting him isn't the reason for my refusal. I don't want the exam because I know what they will find. They'll determine that I hadn't had sex, nor was I assaulted.
I base a lot of what I know on real-life experiences and I know those types of exams reveal consensual sex and rape. I know I’m protecting myself more than I’m protecting him with my refusal.
It doesn't take long before several men in dark suits arrive to escort me away from the hospital after the doctor leaves with my signed consent form.
They don't look happy or pleased to see me.
They don't offer any condolences and I get the feeling that it's more because they're just a couple of men doing the job they're paid to do rather than actually caring where their paycheck comes from.
I'm of no more importance to them than I am to Liam.
That knowledge sits like a weight on my chest as I ride away in the backseat of a darkly tinted SUV.
I couldn't sleep if I wanted to, but that doesn't stop me from closing my eyes in an effort not to speak to them.
They don't try to engage me in conversation or questions.
The police detective that arrived at the hospital shortly after I did thinks I'm in shock, assures me that I'll be willing to talk to him, eventually.
I heard chatter from the nursing staff. Words like in shock, and won't speak without her father present, thrown around.
I let them make their assumptions. People have been doing it about me my entire life.
Why try to change things now? They have no idea that I'm no longer the woman I was a month ago, and I don't know that it's in my best interest to disclose that information.
Somehow, but not surprisingly, the media has already been tipped off. We pass several news vans rushing in the direction of the hospital as we leave town.
The drive is long, taking what seems like forever to get back to my parents’ home. No one but house staff greets me when I step inside the house. My parents aren't there, but I don't know why I would expect them to be. I haven't turned my reality into a fantasy during the time I was gone.
Maybe I would have if things would have been bad. Maybe I would have longed for this house, for Roxanne who's always quick with a warm smile but never really engages in meaningful conversation with me. She's too busy. The expectation my parents have for her is high, just like they have for me.
Oddly Roxanne pats my hand when she approaches. “I'm glad you're home, miss,” she says. “Is there anything I can get you?”
“Where are my mom and dad?” I ask.
“They're on their way back. They had a meeting in Dallas.”
I nod before walking away.
“I put clean sheets on your bed and fresh towels in the bathroom,” she says as I ascend the stairs toward my room.
When I walk into my bedroom for the first time in a month, I notice the only thing that has changed is me.