10. Chapter 10
Nine Years Later ~ February 2023
Carefully, I tiptoe down the hallway toward Stephan’s office. I peek out around a corner and when I notice the coast is clear; I round the corner before pausing and covering my side as I swallow my hiss of pain.
Three days ago, on Valentine’s Day, I received my usual ‘present’ from Stephan, which entailed him drunk off his ass and beating me until I was black and blue. I could have sworn he broke my wrist, but it was only badly sprained per the ER nurse. My wrist, a swollen right eye, which thankfully didn’t swell shut, and a couple of bruised ribs were the worst of my injuries. Compared to my holiday ‘presents’ in the past, I got off easy this time.
However, this time, something different had happened.
As I was laying in the hospital bed in the ER, resting, Stephan answered his work phone and had a conversation right there in the room. In the past, he’s always been so careful not to take phone calls around me. He would usually take it to his office or step outside.
The only thing I can think of for why he took the call this time, was that he thought I was asleep.
Whatever the reason, I heard the entire conversation. At first as I heard his Chief swearing him out, I thought I might finally be getting some help. That someone finally noticed.
But that hope was immediately dashed when he started calling my beating an ‘incident’. That he should have been more careful.
Half of the police force here in Credence, Wisconsin are dirty and are on some crime lord’s payroll. However, it seems that even the criminals get tired of the heat and inquiries from the hospital staff. Not to mention the few good cops when I heard that they were starting to suspect that Stephan was beating me rather than me being insanely clumsy.
I mean seriously. Who falls down the stairs almost every month and ends up in the ER? I’m surprised we haven’t lost our health insurance by now. Our rates must be astronomical. Not that I’ve been allowed to see a bill since everything went to automatic withdrawal from Stephan’s checking account. I haven’t seen the bank statements either.
My mind wanders back to his Chief’s words. In the past, whenever people at the station or around town start questioning things too much, it means change. That Stephan’s mafia boss, who unfortunately is my very own grandfather, Antonio, orders him to move to whatever town he needs Stephan’s help on the police force. For the past nine years, we’ve lived in five different towns in Wisconsin, including Credence, where we are now.
Based on that phone call and some things Stephan has said in drunken rants this past year, I think he’s getting on Grandfather’s last nerve. Ever since around a year ago, Stephan’s beatings have been more violent and for trivial offences, like not doing something fast enough or the meat I cooked was too dry. I had to bite my lip hard that time. I know how to cook and there was never a time that the meat was too dry. Obviously not all of his beatings lead to ER visits, but like I said, I’m probably in there at least once a month or so.
However, all of those beatings that lead to ER visits meant that Uncle Diego and Grandfather have had to cover things up more than they’ve had to in the past when it would just be four or five times a year.
Taking a deep breath, or as deep as I can with these fucking bruised ribs, I push those thoughts out of my mind, and continue to quietly creep down the hallway until I’m just outside Stephan’s office. Thankfully, he kept the door slightly ajar tonight, which will make it easier to hear him. It’s almost midnight, so the kids are safely tucked away in their beds. I would have been too if I hadn’t seen the text message on Stephan’s phone earlier saying that one of my uncles was going to be calling at midnight for his next assignment.
His phone rings, and like the lazy asshole he is, he puts it on speaker. Internally though, I’m doing a fist bump in support of his laziness. I’ll be able to hear the entire conversation now.
Stephan thinks he’s cowed me into obedience and that I’d never consider eavesdropping on him. So much so, that over the past three years, he’s gradually become more and more lax in how he handles his ‘side businesses’ for lack of a better term. Except for that night in the ER, he still takes calls away from me, but it’s no longer behind closed doors with his phone pressed tightly to his ear. Like tonight, he leaves the door open slightly and has been using speakerphone during his meetings. Which has made things easier for me.
Little does he know that for the past few years, I’ve been eavesdropping a lot on him so that I can learn their operations better. I knew from the get-go it wouldn’t be a simple escape. Stephan has eyes and ears everywhere it seems because of the things he says when he beats me. If it was just me, I’d take the risk, but it’s not just me anymore. I’d never chance my babies being hurt because I didn’t find out as much information as I could about the situation.
As the years went on from Stephan buying me, the more I played along, the more he allowed me freedoms to go places without him, like to the grocery store, to one of the kids’ doctor visits, or taking the kids to a park. Though, I think he has someone shadowing me because he knows if I speak more than the usual ‘hello’, ‘thank you’, or normal polite conversation that happens when someone sits down next to you. Or answering ‘yes’ to the usual ‘did you find everything you’re looking for’ kind of questions cashiers always ask you. If I do speak more than that to someone, I end up in a crumpled heap on the floor that night after he’s done ‘administering my punishments’. Uncle Diego’s voice coming through the line brings me back to the present.
“This is your last chance, Hayes. Your next assignment is in Forest Creek. The cops are getting a little too bold in their efforts to bring us down.”
Stephan sputters at Uncle Diego’s words, but I’m frozen to the spot. We’re going back to Forest Creek? Hope starts to build in my chest at the thought.
“Boss, wouldn’t it be a little suspicious for us to move there? That case is still open.”
“Then you better make sure that insolent wench knows her place and will only answer in favor of the family. She needs to make everyone believe that she left willingly and married you by choice. That’s the only way this will work. If it doesn’t, you’re done, Stephan. You’ve been getting on the Don’s nerves the past year with your inability to keep that wench and those little leeches in line. I don’t need to remind you what happens when the Don decides that you are of no use to him.”
Stephan clears his throat and I can imagine him paling at Uncle Diego’s threat. “No, no, you don’t.”
“Good. Boss has some jobs you’ll need to do to make up for your fuck-ups. We’ll be in touch.”
The call ends and I start to make my retreat back to our bedroom. As I crawl under the sheets, my mind goes to Luke and my heart clenches.
Over the years, Stephan has taken great joy in constantly showing me pictures of Luke being intimate with other women. He knows how much it hurts me to see the love of my life not caring about me and not looking for me.
However, the worst are the stretches of time where he’d show me those pictures daily if not multiple times of day. That, in and of itself, is torture. That I have proof of what he’s done, or supposedly done, on my phone. After showing them to me, he texts me the images and I’m not allowed to delete them. I know because I tried in the beginning. I’m not sure how he knew that I deleted them, but he did and the punishment that night actually ended up earning me a hospital stay. Not in the ER, in the actual hospital.
I’ve long given up hope that Luke waited for me, and I know it’s going to be painful if I see him on the streets or in the stores when we move back to Forest Creek. To know he’s close, but to never be able to reach out to him. I still love him and in all honesty, I don’t think I could ever stop loving him. Though if he’s moved on with someone else, I think that would be the worst. It might kill me seeing him in love with someone else and possibly with kids of his own.
My mind wanders to Brady’s dad, Sam. If he’s still on the police force, he might help me, but then I shake my head. If anything were to happen to Sam because of me, I’m almost positive Brady would kill me for sure this time. I haven’t forgotten what he’d said to me when the others weren’t around back in high school after the accident my mom caused. The harsh words of hate and bullying that he’d spewed were almost as bad as Isaac’s version of bullying.
Shaking my head, I sigh, knowing there’s only one place I can go if the kids and I manage to escape.
My παππο?? και γιαγι?’ (grandparents’) house.
I’m hoping that παππο?? (grandpa) is still alive and that his lawyer’s license is still active. He’d help us get free from Stephan. I wish I’d been able to check on social media or the internet about my family over the years to see how they were doing, but there’s no way Stephan would allow me to do that. I know our laptop has tons of tracking software on it. Looking them up would just be inviting more pain and I try to not do that as much as possible. It’s bad enough that he beats me for no reason at all anymore.
My mind goes to that fateful night where my life no longer became my own. That night, I was cut off from my entire family and friends, except for my cousin, Isaac, Isaac’s dad, my Uncle Carlos, and Uncle Diego. I’ve seen the three of them many times since then and they always rub it in my face that I’m the black sheep of the family. That I was sold off like cattle to further the Don’s goals like the worthless reject that I am.
Sighing, I shake my head. I should stop referring to them as my family because of what they’ve done. True family would never have done that. I should have stopped considering them family years ago, but even though they’re all assholes, I hadn’t wanted to cut that last tie to my family at the time. I wasn’t ready to. Now though, I’m done. I’ll figure out some way to escape and get παππο?? (grandpa) the evidence I’ve collected so far.
With that thought, I close my eyes and try to get some sleep.
A soft finger pokes my cheek and I groan, not wanting to wake up yet. My body still aches from Stephan’s beatings, and I pray I’ll be able to do everything around the house I need to today. At least it’s Friday and a no school day for the kids.
That means I don’t have to go anywhere.
A finger pokes my cheek again and I crack my eyes open to see my little cutie, my youngest and only daughter, Cassie peering up at me. She bounces on her toes, which causes her little blond curls to bounce along with her. Her hazel eyes sparkle as she smiles up at me, showing off the gap in between her teeth that she lost two days ago.
“Mama!” she cries out, her smile widening when she realizes I’m awake, but then it melts into a frown as she scrambles up into bed with me.
Carefully extending my arm, she takes the cue and gently lays her head on my arm, snuggling into me. They’ve seen me hurt multiple times over the years, even though I try to not let them see.
However, my oldest son, Asher or Ash as I like to call him, has unfortunately seen me at my worst too many times to count. It’s him that helps doctor me up when I’m not able to reach my wounds. Well, for the ones that aren’t severe enough to warrant an ER visit, that is, which is most of the time. He’s also taken on a protector role with Isaiah and Cassie to get them quickly out of the room, especially if I redirect Stephan’s rage away from any of them and onto me.
Stephan tries to limit where he hits me so that my clothes can cover my bruises. On the rare times that he hits my face, I try not to go out until they are healed. However, I can’t do that anymore since Cassie’s in pre-school. Whereas Ash and Isaiah take the bus, I have to drop off and pick Cassie up each day. Those days, the only way to hide the bruises is to cake make-up on and style my hair just so to help hide them.
“Is it still bad, Mama?” she asks me in a quiet whisper.
I don’t sense Stephan in our room. Glancing up at the clock, I realize it’s seven o’clock, and internally I groan. Stephan’s going to be mad when he gets home tonight since I didn’t have breakfast and coffee ready for him before he left. Honestly, I’m surprised he didn’t beat me and wake me up to make it for him. Normally, he would have.
Pushing those thoughts away, I lean down and kiss Cassie’s forehead. “A little, but it’ll heal.”
She twirls my long black curls around her fingers, her little forehead wrinkling as she thinks.
“What are you thinking about, Angel?”
Her little face falls even more, and she sniffles. “Why does Daddy hurt you? Hurt us? Doesn’t he love us? I’ve seen the other dads at pre-school, and the other kids are always happy to see their daddies. The daddies hug and kiss their kids. Our daddy doesn’t do any of that unless he’s apologizing after he hurts us or if he wants something from us.”
My heart breaks as a little tear falls down her cheek. She’s way too young to be this observant, but then again, living in this type of environment changes you. Taking a shaky breath, I wipe away her tears. “I don’t know, Angel. I don’t know.”
Personally, I think he gets off on what he does to us, not that I can tell Cassie that. More than once, I’ve washed shirts that have smelled heavily of perfume and had tacky pink lipstick stains on them. Neither the perfume or the shade of lipstick were ones I wear. Though, if I do wear anything, it’s usually lip gloss rather than lipstick. Not to mention that I never would have done said gesture to Stephan to begin with.
Even though I don’t love Stephan and didn’t want to be his wife in the first place, it still hurts that he isn’t faithful to me. That I’m not even allowed to speak to other men, but he’s allowed to go off and sink his pathetically small dick into other women. Or maybe it’s average and I’m just comparing him to the other dick I’ve seen, which is Luke’s. Thinking about the other women, I pray that whoever he’s seeing is willing and that he isn’t raping her. His escapades are also why I regularly get tested to make sure he doesn’t give me some sort of disease.
Shaking off those dark thoughts, I kiss her forehead again. “Let’s get up, Angel. After I get ready, I’ll make breakfast. You can go ahead and put your cartoons on in the meantime.”
Cassie nods, gets up, and kisses my cheek. “Love you, Mama.”
“Love you too, Angel.”
Cassie bounds out of the room, hollering to her brothers that they can watch cartoons. Smiling, I gingerly sit up when my phone rings. Reaching over to the nightstand, I unplug my phone and my body sags as I groan loudly in the now empty room.
It’s Stephan.
Swallowing another groan, I answer the call.
“Hello, Stephan.”
“About time you woke up.”
My cheeks heat, but then I stamp down my nerves at his arrogant tone. “I’m sorry about that. I must have forgotten to set my alarm before going to bed last night.”
He grunts and fear coils in my stomach. Does he know that I eavesdropped on him last night? Regardless, I don’t speak as the silence stretches. I learned that lesson early on.
Finally, Stephan clears his throat. “Chief notified me this morning that I’m being transferred, so we need to get things packed up and get ready to sell the house. I’m also picking up some extra shifts to help with the costs. You’ll have to be the one to research and work with the real estate agent this time. I’ve already called them, so they know what I want our house to go for. The agent will be calling and emailing you information later today.”
Shock courses through me. He’s never let me handle anything with the selling and buying of our previous houses. Why is he doing it this time? Is this one of his tests? “O-Of course. I’ll look online to get a head start. Where are you being transferred to? Is there anything specific you want me to look for?” I gnaw on my lip as I wait for him to answer.
“No more than $300k, and make sure there’s an office for me. I’d like to be out in the country, but we might not be able to do that this time with the short notice.”
“Okay.” I wince internally at his preferences. If we’re out in the country, he can get away with more because there’d be no neighbors to hear my cries of pain.
He pauses and, even though I already know where we’re going, I wonder if he’s going to tell me himself or if I’ll have to wait for the real estate agent to say something.
“Forest Creek. Tonight, after I get home, you and I are going to have a little talk about the move. Things need to be different there, and there will be a few more rules that you’ll need to obey.”
Ice slides down my spine and I wonder what exactly he’s going to demand. I have a rough idea from what Un… I mean, Diego said, but who knows if Stephan will use the opportunity to make my life even more miserable than it already is with him?
“Okay, Stephan.”
He grunts in response and then the line goes dead.
Well, guess I better get ready.
Still, a thrill goes through me that I’ll able to pick our house this time around. Well, mostly. I know Stephan will ultimately get the final say since he’s never allowed me to get a job, so I have no money of my own.
Smiling, I gingerly slide out of bed. I’ll take this little freedom because I know it’ll be a long time before I’m ever allowed another one.