Chapter Twenty-three – Where Have You Been
Chapter Twenty-three
Andie
WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN
Performed by Kelly Clarkson
It had been a long time since I’d spoken any of these names to anyone. Even when Dawson and I talked, we were careful to say the minimum. It was like tearing open an old scar. One that was healed, but the skin would always be thin and easily broken.
I’d already drunk the first finger of tawny port I’d poured and half of the next glass, but I’d need more than that to get through the rest of this story.
I’d need more than the disassociation I’d tried to tug around myself in order to get through it.
The truth was, I’d only shared the easy part so far.
The part that made me look like a victim instead of a criminal.
“Looking back, I can see how easy I made it for Eddie. I was hungry for love. For attention. For someone to tell me I was far from a disappointment. That I was actually everything he’d hoped for.” I paused, trying to keep my voice from shaking, but my body was already trembling.
“I fell. Hard. Eddie treated me like a queen, showering me with expensive dinners, nice presents, and the attention I truly craved. When we gambled together, he told me I was a mad genius. He was ecstatic that I always seemed to double our money. But even with how much we were earning, I realized Eddie always seemed to have more than he should for someone who didn’t seem to have a day job.
When I asked where he got it, he told me not to worry about it, that he could take care of me, and I just let it slide.
I realize now, I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want my bubble to burst. I just wanted to feel loved and needed. Appreciated.
“Three months later, we went to Vegas, and he convinced me to marry him.”
I scoffed even as I said it. Truth was, I hadn’t needed convincing. I’d wanted to be his.
“The next day, we got kicked out of one of the casinos. I guess Eddie had already earned a reputation there, and he wasn’t supposed to be gambling at any of the casinos on The Strip.
” I was still shaking when I took the next sip.
“Eddie was furious when he dragged me out. An ugly, contorted version of the man I knew. We went back to the hotel we were staying at, and when I continued to ask him what had happened and why he was banned, he backhanded me.”
I remembered the stunned feeling I’d had. The pain in my cheek. The fear in my heart.
“He walked out afterward and didn’t come back until morning.
When he did, he had a suitcase full of cash with him.
We loaded up the car and drove home. The whole way, I kept expecting him to apologize.
To say he was sorry. But he didn’t. And I was too afraid to push it.
Too afraid to ask about the cash. So, I said nothing.
And once we got home, he was the Eddie I’d fallen for again.
Charming. Smooth. Bragging about how I was his genius wife. Beautiful. Intelligent.”
The pleasure I felt at those words could still undo me. I’d wanted so badly to feel like I was good and brave and smart after two decades of feeling like I was lower than dirt.
“After about a week, he told me the cash he’d brought home was a loan from a friend.
That he’d promised this friend we could double the money with my card skills.
And once we did, we’d use our cut of the profit to leave Clover Lake for good.
That we’d start over in Atlantic City or New Orleans or even overseas. ”
The memory of how excited I’d felt at the idea of traveling the world with my handsome husband, living a better life, filled me once more. I’d finally had something of my own to look forward to. Something that wasn’t Dad’s or Belinda’s idea.
“I couldn’t gamble at the casino I worked at, but there were plenty nearby where I could.
The problem was that we didn’t win. We were losing routinely.
Eddie freaked. Looking back, I know he was scared.
Scared of whoever he’d borrowed the money from.
He insisted I learn how to count cards. When I hesitated, he got angry…
and I was afraid he’d hit me again, so I just did what he said.
” I swallowed, guilt swarming through me.
“I justified it because it isn’t technically illegal, even if it could get us banned.
But even counting cards wasn’t winning us enough money fast enough.
So, he began switching face cards with marked ones.
“When I found out, I told him he had to stop. That I wouldn’t be part of something illegal.”
I had to stop and inhale, fear ratcheting through me before I drew back enough of the numbness I needed to continue. “He broke my nose and three ribs.”
Cooper scooted his barstool back with a loud screech. I’d almost forgotten he was here again. Almost forgotten he was the reason I was telling this story to begin with. He crossed his arms and paced the kitchen.
“I went to my dad…” The look of disgust on my father’s face was scored into my memory. “I didn’t tell him about the cards… I just… I was a mess, you know. Bruised. Battered.”
I closed my eyes, but it didn’t help. I could still see Dad’s face.
“Dad told me I’d made my bed by marrying scum and that I had to live with it. But that I better not fuck up his election by dragging our name through the mud.”
“Fucking hell,” Cooper swore, pounding his fist on the counter.
“When I went home, Eddie somehow knew I’d gone to Dad. He told me I was his. That I wasn’t ever going to leave him unless it was in a coffin…and then, he broke my arm.”
“I need a moment,” Cooper said, storming out into the backyard.
I finished my glass of port, but it didn’t calm the trembling inside me.
All of the worst moments of my life were pouring out of me, and talking about it never helped.
All talking did was make me relive it. I didn’t want to relive it.
I wanted to bury it and never think about it again, regardless of what my therapist in Idaho had told me.
Except, I was never allowed to forget for too long, and now my home here in Swift Rivers had been violated because my past had found me again.
It took a long time for Cooper to come back in. So long that I wasn’t sure he actually would. But he did, face grimmer than I’d ever seen it. He walked right up to me, wrapped me in his arms, and held me tight. He kissed the top of my head and said, “None of this is your fault. None of it.”
A sob escaped my chest. But he hadn’t heard the worst. He hadn’t heard the ending.
I inhaled the scent of him, the deep scent of wood and musk. Like an elixir, it calmed me. How long would I get to experience it? How long did I have before he walked out of my life, disgusted by the truth, and didn’t come back?
“How bad does it get before you leave?” he asked gently.
It physically hurt, but I pulled away from his embrace. “Bad.”
He dragged his stool up close to me again, grabbed my hand once more, and rubbed his fingers along the palm.
“With my cast, I couldn’t deal cards for a while, but I could still play.
Eddie loved the cast. It was the perfect hiding spot for his marked cards.
And when I did eventually return to work, he made me take the cards with me.
I was responsible for switching out entire decks.
Brand-new ones that still had the protection stripe on them.
I don’t know where he got them or how they fit in so perfectly with the casinos’, but they were exact replicas.
It was my job to ensure the decks were placed at any table he was going to sit at.
And if, for some reason, one of the decks wasn’t swapped out when he played, I paid the price that night.
“He won thousands of dollars. Hundreds of thousands of dollars because we played at other casinos too, swapping cards from the player side. We had more money running through our hands than I’d ever imagined.
But Eddie was spending it wildly too. A new car.
An expensive watch. Thousands of dollars in suits.
I was too afraid to ask him whether he’d paid back the money he owed.
But once in a while, he’d get a call from someone, and he’d start fanatically counting cash, then he’d hide it in the floorboards of our living room.
“I wanted out but didn’t see a way. Jacy, the pit boss who’d hired me, suspected something, but he couldn’t prove it.
He told me if he did, I’d go to jail. But he’d seen my bruises too, and he understood my situation because he had a sister in a similar one.
He told me that if I finished my hospitality degree, he could get me a job at a tribal casino in Illinois, where his brother worked.
I wouldn’t be on the floor. They wouldn’t trust me near the cards, but I’d have a job, and I’d be away from Eddie.
“It was a sliver of light. A door in the darkness. So, I secretly enrolled in online classes and did everything I could to hide it from Eddie. But he found out anyway, and I took another beating. But somehow, between tears and blood, I convinced him it made me more attractive to the casinos. That I’d be in an even better position, maybe even in the money cage or higher up, if he let me continue.
“By then, he’d trained me how to take cash and chips with a slip of a hand.
Instead of depositing some of the hundreds I took from customers, I’d pocket them, or I’d swipe a chip or two from the table.
I was terrified of being caught. But if I didn’t bring home a certain amount after each shift, I paid for it.