Chapter 14 #2
“What if I ask an easier question?” Rupert asks, his tone soothing and kind, as if he understands from my silence how I’m struggling. “Why are you not working as a chef right now?”
The answer to this is easy. “Andy.”
Rupert nods like he’s listening.
“Andy happened.” I don’t realize how much venom is inside me until it all bursts out. “Mother fucking Andy Duvall.”
I ball my hands up into fists, filling up with fury when I so much as think his full name.
“He ruined everything.”
rupert
It’s clearly difficult for Peony to tell me her story, but still, she perseveres in beginning.
“He was so charming, so handsome,” she says, wincing at just the words. “I remember feeling giddy, amazed that he would even ask me out.
“He acted like the perfect gentleman. He was everything I wanted in a boyfriend—attentive, sweet, supportive. But once I was under his spell and we were discussing something more long-term…”
She falls quiet for a moment, taking a few deep breaths to steel herself for what comes next.
“He wanted to move in together,” she says. “But he lived a few towns over. Somehow, he convinced me to quit my job. I don’t even know how. I don’t know why I did it.”
And that was how he slowly peeled away her independence. Peony nearly crumbles as she recounts how he did it—first with her job, then with her family, her friends, even her bank account, until she was fully stripped of her own identity.
“I don’t know how that could have happened to me,” she says, so quietly I almost can’t hear her, even though the woods are silent today. “After my mom left, I thought I was stronger than that. I thought I’d built up higher walls. How could anyone turn me against my own father?”
I try not to let the pity I feel show in my eyes.
If she’s anything like me, the last thing she wants is pity.
And yet, how else can I describe the pain I feel at hearing her story, the way I want to wrap my arms around her and then promise to find this man—Andy—and tear out his larynx the way I would a deer’s?
It is simultaneously the most tender and the most violent I think I’ve ever felt, listening to the way one man carefully, intentionally dismantled Peony’s life from the inside out. At one point, as she talks about the final fight she had with her father over Andy, her voice nearly breaks.
I reach out and place a steadying hand on her shoulder. She gives me an appreciative look, and even leans into my touch, like she wants more of it.
“I should have known by then,” she says, almost more to herself than to me. “I should have never been okay with how Andy treated Dad.”
“Please, don’t berate yourself that way.” I stroke the arm of her peacoat. “That horrible man had trapped you inside a maze.”
She nods, sniffling, but I don’t think she believes me. And I understand, to a degree, how one can end up in a place so radically different from where they started without realizing it’s happening.
“What did me in was the day he broke that bowl.” Peony seems to shrink in even smaller on herself as she reaches this part of the tale.
“He was always breaking stuff when he got mad, but this time, he broke a glass bowl and cut himself on it. His hand was bleeding all over the shards. He held one up and aimed it at me as he yelled, and I knew that if I wasn’t careful, he might just stab me with it.
When I realized that yes, he was most certainly capable of hurting me…
” She’s crying now, diamond tears slipping down her ruddy cheeks.
“I knew I had to go. I put a pillow and a blanket in the trunk of the car and pretended I lost them at the laundromat. Then I stuffed some clothes in there and left in the middle of the night.”
It seems like she desperately needs comfort right now, so I slip my arm around her shoulders, bringing her in against my side. She seems to instantly relax there, though she is crying harder now.
“I still think he’s chasing me,” she says between sniffles. “Most nights, I dream that he’s found me, and then he kills me with the glass bowl.”
“That will never happen.” My voice comes out as more of a growl than I’d anticipated. “If he so much as comes onto the property, I will take care of him for good.”
Her head tilts as she looks up at me. “Don’t kill him, Rupert.”
I say nothing in response. I would easily murder that man and cover it up if I needed to. I would claim he was attacked by an animal while trespassing, and that would be the end of Andy.
“I can’t express how sorry I am,” I say after a few moments of silence. “That you endured this. I am impressed that you were able to escape. And I’m glad, so that you could be here now.”
I think that her cheeks grow redder, but I don’t know if it’s from the cold or something else. I’m still walking with one arm around her, and I don’t move it. Neither does she seem to mind, and so we continue like that through the trees.
“You still haven’t told me your story,” Peony reminds me, a little cheekily.
I sigh, because I was expecting this. “It is a sordid tale.” I cringe just thinking about the man I was. “Are you sure you want to hear it?”
Peony nods, gazing up at me with an innocence in her eyes that won’t last.
“Of course I do. I want to know all about you, Rupert.”
She says that now.
“Are you sure it can’t wait for another time?” I attempt a final Hail Mary. “We’ve had such a pleasant walk.”
“If you’re not ready, then you’re not ready.” Peony reaches up and sets her hand lightly on top of mine where it rests on her shoulder. “You can take your time.”
Her words soothe me. Am I ready to expose that part of me to her? To reveal how sick and greedy I was?
No. I’m not. I want to savor this pleasant moment while I still can. I know that nothing good lies for me at the end, as the old man sealed into his spell.
And you will never find true happiness.
“If it’s all right, I would much rather talk about your shopping excursion,” I say. It is too soon to ruin her image of me, to reveal the truth.
Peony nods in understanding. “Well, there’s not much to tell.” She talks about how surreal it was to drive around in Kellen’s car. “I had to be careful with the gas pedal.”
We discuss cars for a short while, and then our conversation diverges to Kellen, a subject that is still a mite tender after Peony called him “good-looking.” I know it’s a poor mark on my character to be jealous of such an off-handed comment.
“He’s around all the time,” Peony says with a huff. “Does he not have friends? A girlfriend?”
I snort a laugh. “I don’t think women are his topic of expertise.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. “Oh. I see.”
“Indeed. And even then, he has rarely ever expressed interest in dating. But I encourage him from time to time, and he has some friends he visits with on occasion.” I don’t know much about them other than they seem to enjoy having a pint and playing shuffleboard, an American game I still don’t understand.
We spend the rest of our walk back to the manor in a companionable silence. When we finally reach the rear doors, we disengage, and I already miss her warmth under my arm.
“Thank you, Peony,” I say as we step inside, removing our coats and hanging them up in the entryway closet. “This was very, very pleasant.”
“I hope we can do it again.” She lingers before departing to her room. “Tomorrow is Sunday, so I wouldn’t mind another walk. And I would enjoy getting your input on next week’s menu.”
I grin a wide grin, pleased that she’s as eager to spend time together again as I am.