Jericho (A Redemption Novel) (26 page)

Dan worked for them part-time. It gave him something to do, he said, but Christian really thought that Dan needed to help the former troops as much as he did.

He pulled back into his driveway no more than twenty minutes after he’d left.

There was a black car parked outside of their house. A black Mercedes that he swore he had seen before. But then he had thought he was paranoid, that somebody had been following him. He jumped out of the car the same time their next-door neighbor came from his house.

“Christian. I think I heard Georgia scream.”

The hair on his neck stood at attention. “Can you take Abby?”

“Of course.” Tim nodded. “Go.”

Christian ran toward the house, his blood pumping through his ears. The kitchen door was open, the doorjamb cracked.

“No, I’m desperate and that’s worse.”

He saw a man with crazed eyes and his hands on his wife’s shoulders. He moved. Ready to charge, ready to kill, when Georgia lifted her knee and stomped on the man’s foot, then kneed him in the balls.

He didn’t know whether to be inordinately proud or homicidal in that moment, but the man dropped to his knees and that was when Christian saw his face.

He looked like Abby.
This must be him. This must be Robert.
He stopped thinking. He picked up the man by his shirt and slammed him onto the floor so hard that his head bounced up.

Christian had killed before, but in war, in a gunfight with terrorists. He’d used bullets then. He’d killed to fight for his unit and his country. He hadn’t felt the way he did right now, this kind of cool calmness, this knowing that today he was going to end a life. He stomped on the man’s testicles, causing him to scream out in pain, but the noise didn’t cause Christian to stop, or pause, or feel the tiniest bit of remorse.

He picked him up and threw him against the wall. He slapped him. A punch was for a man. Not for this thing. This coward who raped and lied and got away with it.

He slapped the other side of his face, splitting his lip. His cheek was already swelling, and a little bit of satisfaction bloomed in his chest. “Hit me back. Fight for your life. Or are you too much of a pussy?”

The man did nothing but moan. The cold fury spread through Christian’s chest, and he lifted Robert up by the neck and slammed him to the ground, stomping on the hand that had held his wife down, kicking his ribs, knowing they broke as his size-fourteen foot connected with them.

“Enough, Christian.” Georgia grabbed his hand and pulled him toward her. “Enough. I love you too much to watch you kill him.”

“He deserves to die. He hurt you.” He glanced at her shoulders, where Robert’s fingers had dug into the flesh. He looked at her face, which was marked by his handprint, her mouth that was messy with blood.

If he hadn’t come home, if he hadn’t walked in when he did, he could have lost her. That was something he couldn’t face. It was something he wouldn’t have been able to live with. “He had his hands on you. Let me make it so he can never hurt you again.”

The police sirens blared, and he knew Tim had called the police.

Georgia looked at him. “He won’t. They’re going to put him away for this.”

He cupped her battered face in his hands and tears welled in his eyes. His throat burned. He could have lost her.

He could have lost her, and he had only ever told her he loved her once.

“It’s not enough, Georgia. I need for him to die.”

“But I don’t. The only thing I need is to carry on with my life with you.”

Two police officers burst through the door, their guns drawn. “Holy shit,” one of them said, putting his gun away. “Is he still alive?”

“Barely,” another one said. “We got a call that there was an intruder. Is this man it?”

“Yes,” Georgia said before Christian could say anything. “He broke in here. He’s the same man who attacked me two years ago. I want him put away for good.”

“Call an ambulance,” the first cop said. “Call two.” He stared at Georgia’s battered face. “Tell them to rush it. The female victim is bleeding from her side.”

Christian lifted Georgia’s shirt. There was too much blood to see it clearly, but there was a large gash on her side.

“I’m fine,” she said quickly, even though she was going pale. “He knocked me against the counter. I’ll be fine.”

She leaned against him with all her weight. “Get them here now,” Christian barked. “She’s pregnant. We can’t lose this baby. We can’t.”

CHAPTER 29

G
eorgia had stayed in the hospital for two days after Robert attacked her. They’d wanted to monitor the baby due to Georgia’s injuries. She had strained a muscle in her back and needed stitches up her side where Robert had thrown her into the counter, and on her lips where he had slapped her, but she was okay.

She was sore and bruised, but she was grateful to be alive, and that Christian had come home when he did, and that their family had survived the ordeal.

It had now been two months since that day, and Christian barely left her side. He worked from home. He had gone to every doctor’s appointment. He cleaned. He barely let her cook. He helped more with Abby. He was doing it all. And she let him, because it seemed to make him happy to do so.

His super overprotectiveness wouldn’t last forever. She hoped it would end before the birth of their son, right after Robert’s trial was over. It was starting today.

Robert had been charged with aggravated assault, a crime that carried a sentence of up to fourteen years. They all thought he would take a plea, that he would go to jail and serve his time, but he pled not guilty, and it was like a slap in the face to Georgia. Till this day he denied what he did to her. He blamed her. He still called her a liar. But she wouldn’t stand for it.

She was going to testify against him. She was going to be in that courtroom every day until the case was over. The prosecutor assured her it wouldn’t take very long. He told her that they could make a case without her testimony, but it was important to her to face her abuser, to tell the whole world their history, to tell them what he had planned to do to her and her family.

Her life was good. She was happy. Now instead of hatred, the only thing she could feel for Robert was pity. He was going to die alone, unloved, uncared for. He was going to have nothing while she had the world.

That was a sad existence for anyone to face.

Christian pressed a kissed to Georgia’s cheek as they sat in the car on the side of Charleston’s beautiful courthouse. “Are you sure you want to do this? I’ll take you away from here right now. I’ll take you wherever you want to go.”

She smiled at her handsome husband. “I want you to take me for waffles and those big link sausages, but after this. I’m going to this trial. I’m going to be here every day.”

“You are so brave.” He took her face in his hands and kissed her mouth softly. “I love you.”

“I love you, too, Christian. I know it’s strange, but I keep thinking that if it weren’t for him I would have never met you. So I can’t hate him. I just need to know he’s out of my life for good.”

“He will be. I’ll make sure he is.” He glanced out the window behind her. “I think your family is here.”

They all were. She saw when they got out of the car. Her mother was there. She had gone back to her father, but things had changed between them. Her mother was no longer broken. She was happier. Abraham no longer ruled any part of her life. Georgia and Carolina spent a lot of time with her. She drove down on the weekends and spoiled her granddaughters. Carolina had a little girl named Grace. She was there that day with Miles. They vowed to support her. And they had in every way they could.

“Hey, sis.” Gideon had come home on leave from Germany to be with her. He was so handsome in his dress uniform. Georgia hugged him tightly. He was no longer a baby, but she still worried about him. Their family issues had taken a much bigger toll on him than she had thought.

“You look beautiful, girl.” Eli hugged her next. He had moved out of state, out of the South, to a little town in Delaware where he could start over again. Being around them seemed too hard for him, but Georgia understood. Sometimes a person needed to break away to start over again.

Josiah didn’t hug her. He was busy helping her father out of the car.

Her father had come? That shocked her.

She hadn’t spoken to him since that day in the hospital, but she kept up with him. She always asked her mama about it. He was dying. He had heart failure. He looked older than she had ever seen, but he was there, with his oxygen tank hooked to his nose. He was wearing his best suit and had a determined expression on his face.

Christian gripped her shoulders lightly, pulling her back into his warm, hard chest. She shut her eyes for a moment, letting herself sink into him. She needed him in that moment. Seeing her father was harder than she’d thought. It was harder than facing the prospect of dealing with her brutalizer in court. Her father, in the end, had hurt her more than Robert ever could. He’d thrown away her love.

“Open your eyes, love,” Christian whispered.

She did. Her father had stopped before her and then did something she never expected him to do. He fell to his knees before her, grasped her hands and brought them to his wrinkled mouth and wept. She had never seen her father cry before. Not even when Abel had died. She didn’t know how to handle it. It was all too much. It was too hard to see. Too hard to hear. Too hard to take.

“Daddy...don’t.” She got on her knees and embraced him as hard as she could, as hard as she could stand.

“I turned away because I was too ashamed to look at you that day. I was wrong. I was wrong. I was so wrong.” He sobbed onto her shoulder. His breath was coming hard and heavy, causing Georgia to worry, causing her to pray he would stop. “I cannot ask for forgiveness I do not deserve, but I’m sorry. I’m sorry and I love you. I need you to know that. I need you to know that before I die.”

She didn’t know what had happened to her in that split second, but as she heard those words, as his tears mingled with hers, she felt a heavy weight that she’d never known she was carrying lift from her shoulders, from her heart.

“I’ve always loved you, Georgia. I just forgot how. You saved my life when you should have let me die. That is more than I deserved. That is more than love. That is more than I’ve given to you.”

“It’s okay, Daddy.” She pulled away from him and wiped his tears. “I listened to your sermons in church. I remembered those messages. I remembered how you used to love.”

“Excuse me.” The prosecutor was there when Georgia looked up. “We’re getting ready to start. Are you sure you want to do this?”

“Yes.” She tried to stand, but her knees were still weak, so Christian came to her aid. “I’m sure. I’m ready.”

Her brothers helped their father to his feet and walked him inside. Christian hung back. He wrapped both of his arms around her and kissed her. “Can it be so simple for you? Can you forgive just like that?”

“No. It’s not simple to forgive. Or easy. But it’s something I have to do. It’s something I need to do. Things happen for a reason. After all of this, I realize that. All of what happened to me, what happened to you, brought us together, and I wouldn’t change that. I wouldn’t change my life with you for all the do overs in the world.”

* * * * *

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ISBN-13: 9781460332764

JERICHO

Copyright © 2014 by Jamie Pope

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