“Damn you, Will,” Jessica said, cursing him again for what she felt.
Chapter 8
“Shane, I’m fine,” Will told his youngest son, who sat arms-crossed in a chair beside his bed. “I’m not ill. I’m just not feeling very social. You and Michael go on and eat without me. I’ll grab something later.”
“You’re lying,” Shane accused baldly, not flinching from the weak glare his father managed to send his way. “You need to eat a normal meal. It’s been three damn days, Dad.”
“Look, you bullied me into the shower and I took one. I’m going to rest now, and then I’ll get up and eat later. Don’t you have a date or something?” Will demanded, knowing Shane could be just as stubborn as he under the right circumstances.
“Michael and I are going out. We don’t want to worry about you while we’re gone, so we got you a babysitter,” Shane told him, hoping his Dad would erupt in anger over it.
“Good—they can watch TV and I’ll sleep,” Will said resentfully, stretching back out on the bed, careful to keep his wide open eyes focused on just the ceiling. If he closed his eyes too long without really sleeping, he would just see her art all over again. He’d see piece after piece of four figures, three men doing unspeakable things to a woman, an obviously pregnant woman.
At the thought of what she had depicted in her work, his stomach clenched. Will was seized by urges so violent he was frightened of what he might do under their influence. It was the closest he’d ever come to wanting to kill someone. Each man had only served a term of ten years, and all three were out now. Will thought a lifetime in prison would never have been enough punishment for what they had done.
He also thought making the rape art was the bravest act of creating he had ever seen done by anyone. Neither the rapists nor the world would ever be able to forget it as long as knowledge of Jessica Daniels and her work survived.
Jessica
, Will thought, his heart contracting with pain for her. She probably still carried what had happened inside her like a ticking bomb. She probably had memories and triggers that defied analysis. Her daughter Brooke, the woman he’d met, was the child that had survived the attack. And Jessica had lived through it too, if you could call never loving anyone again living, Will concluded.
He remembered pulling Jessica across him as she rode his thigh, how they had both been turned on and trying to come to terms with it. The thought of never having that innocent level of arousal with her again made Will want to sleep and just forget about ever getting up. Three days ago he had gotten everything in the world he wanted, and learning about her past was like having it brutally yanked away.
“Dad,” Shane yelled, clapping his hands together loudly. “Stop that. Stop drifting off and pay attention to me. Michael and I are going to be leaving shortly. I was saying you can send us a text when you want us to come home.”
Will did close his eyes then, sighing at the edge of panic in Shane’s tone. He wasn’t intentionally trying to worry anyone. He just needed some time to figure out how to be reasonable about this information before he went insane.
Will finally heard the doorbell ringing and was relieved. It meant both boys would be leaving soon. He’d pull himself together until they left and then send the well-meaning babysitter away as soon as the boys were gone.
All he wanted was to be alone.
***
Michael pulled open the door and saw a freshly showered, still wet-haired woman standing there. She smelled lovely, but looked way too fragile to be dealing with his father.
And she’d been crying.
Seeing her red and swollen eyes tore at Michael’s gut. He had a fleeting moment of wondering if it was right to ask for Jessica’s help when she didn’t look a whole lot better than his Dad did at the moment. Then he pushed his concern aside. Maybe his father wasn’t the only person who needed to talk, Michael decided.
“Everything took longer than I anticipated,” Jessica explained. “Finally, I just decided to come over as I was because I couldn’t pull myself together more.”
Michael shook his head. “Don’t apologize. You look great, and we’re glad you’re here. Shane has finally lost patience. Dad keeps drifting off when we try to talk to him and can’t seem to hold a conversation for two minutes.”
Jessica nodded and let out the sigh she had been holding in for hours.
“Can I call you something other than Ms. Daniels? Formality seems odd in this situation,” Michael said.
“Sure. Call me Jessica,” she agreed quietly. “Point me to him so I can get this over with.”
Michael reached out his hand and took one of Jessica’s in his. “Thank you for doing this Jessica—whatever happens. Shane and I are leaving as soon as you give us the word.”
Jessica nodded and sighed. She took a deep breath, and Michael squeezed her hand.
“Okay,” she said, “let’s get this confrontation over with.”
***
“Dad, your babysitter is here,” Shane said, when he saw Michael and Jessica Daniels standing in the doorway of the bedroom. “Wake up and say hello.”
Will opened his eyes and rolled his head to the side. When he saw Jessica, he rolled his head back and closed them again.
“Whatever you think you’re doing boys, stop right now,” he ordered. “Go away, Jessica. Don’t let these two tug on your heartstrings. They’re master manipulators, which I am blaming on their mother. I know you would never have shown up here if they hadn’t coaxed you into it.”
It was the truth, Jessica conceded, when she heard Will saying the words, and any other time she would not have been worried about confessing to it. She had thought the boys had been exaggerating about Will’s condition. Now she could see they had not even told her how bad it really was.
Jessica walked into the bedroom and smartly smacked the bottom of one of Will’s bare feet, making him yelp. He was wearing sweats that had seen better days at least twenty years ago, and he looked like he hadn’t shaved in several months.
“You could have at least shaved,” she said caustically. “You look like a deranged serial killer.”
Will’s eyes lit with anger for moment as he took in her wet hair. “Look who’s talking. You look like a wet dog.”
Well, they were off to a good start, Jessica thought. She walked to the bed and sat on the edge of it taking off her shoes.
Shane averted his gaze and pretended not to be interested in the woman crawling into bed with his father as he asked the inevitable question. “Uh—are you ready for us to leave now?”
“Not yet,” Jessica said smoothly. “You can leave when Will tells you to go.”
“
Tell them to go?
You’ve got to be kidding. I’ve been trying to get them to leave me the hell alone for days,” he declared. Then he looked at each son individually for a couple of moments. “Go. Leave now.”
“Not yet,” Jessica said firmly to the boys, grateful they were obeying her and not Will. She swung her legs up beside his on the bed. “Move over.”
“No,” Will said. “Go away.”
He closed his eyes to shut out the sight of her. It was bad enough he had to smell her. She must have just taken a shower and washed her hair. Desire curled inside him, but Will ruthlessly pushed it away. Never again, he vowed. Never again would he push unwanted attention on this woman. She could strip and fondle herself, and he still wouldn’t lay a hand on her.
“Fine,” Jessica said, turning to her side and stretching out her length on what little bed Will was allowing her. “If I fall onto the floor, it will be your fault if I get hurt.”
Will scooted over then, moving his head to another pillow and his body to the other side of the queen bed. “There. Happy now?”
Jessica studied him as she moved her body closer to his. “No. I’m not happy, but I’m not curled up in a ball brooding on my bed either. Stop doing this sulking thing and talk to me. Send your sons away so we can be alone, but tell them you’re okay first. They’ve been worried sick about you. Now I can see why. I didn’t know being stubborn could turn into a chronic illness until I saw you today.”
“I don’t need your false sympathy. Just why the hell are you here anyway?” he demanded. “You’re not interested, remember?”
Jessica rolled to her back and looked up at the ceiling. “I lied. I was scared of you, so I lied.”
“Well, for the record, I will never do anything to scare you again. I’m sorry I did the first time. Now go away,” Will said quietly, the knots returning to his stomach.
“I didn’t mean I was afraid of you physically. I’m afraid of how you make me feel. The last time I was this emotionally involved with a man, he left me and died. Are you planning to die on me too?” Jessica asked, her throat tight.
The genuine pain in her words took the angry bluster right out of him. Will rolled to his side, putting an arm around her without thinking about it. “No. I’m not going to die.”
Jessica patted his arm. “Good. Now tell Michael and Shane to go have dinner and catch a movie, and that they can come back in a couple of hours.”
Will looked at his sons standing in the doorway together, faces drawn tight in concern for both Jessica and him. They had been worried about him for days, and now they were worried about leaving Jessica alone with him. He could see it in the way they were trying not to glare at him.
In his whole life, Will couldn’t remember ever feeling less like a good man. His sons didn’t trust him right now to treat her well. He closed his eyes, breathed quietly a few moments, and tightened his hold on Jessica. His relief to be with her again was profound, and he decided to stop fighting it.
When he opened his eyes, Will looked at his sons with sincere regret. “I’m sorry I worried you. Make sure you lock the door on your way out,” he said softly to them. “Jessica and I are going to be fine. I love you both.”
“We love you too, Dad. Call us if you need us,” Shane said.
“We’ll be fine,” Jessica said. “Your father and I are going to be friends if he’s still alive when you get home.”
Michael laughed nervously. “No killing allowed in my house. You sure you don’t want a chaperone?”
“Go away, Michael,” Will ordered, feeling Jessica’s laughing belly under his arm.
He and Jessica listened to the boys walk down the hallway, gather up keys and jackets, and head out the door. There was a deep silence in the house after they had gone.
Jessica turned her head to Will and let her tears flow at last. She had never wanted anything about her to cause him this much emotional pain. She had never wanted it to bother any man, but her regret for Will’s suffering was ten times more than she usually allowed herself. All she could do was try to explain.
“Look, you never hurt me the way you’ve been imagining. I knew eventually you’d discover my past, and I admit it had occurred to me that I would need to talk with you after you found out. I was just trying to spare myself getting more involved, so it took your sons’ interference to make me do what was right.”
Jessica pulled a tissue from her jeans pocket and used it on her eyes. “The only hurt you have ever caused me is in reminding me too much of the boy I married long, long ago.”
Will tilted his head down. It had not occurred to him that he would remind Jessica of anyone. She was the first woman like her he’d ever met. He’d just assumed he would be unique to her as well. To be fair, he guessed Steve Lipton had tried to tell him he wasn’t original when he mentioned all the men Jessica had dated.
Male arrogance, Will admitted, was not something a man could easily discard, no matter how old he was. “Help me understand. Tell me about your husband.”
Jessica closed her eyes. The last thing she wanted to talk to Will about was another man when she was lying in his arms. However, she knew Will was not going to rest until he was convinced that what she was telling him was the truth.
Jessica took a breath and just began. “I was still a child when I married Nathan. My husband was my first lover, and a very insistent, highly sexual man. I loved him madly and as his wife gladly gave him whatever he wanted from me. But I’ve never been able, no matter how much therapy I had, to separate what happened to me from the sexuality I experienced with him. They were too close together in my timeline. The violence I endured took his memories from me. For years after the rape, I had no good memories of sex at all. My therapist called it Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. It doesn’t just happen to soldiers. It can happen to anyone.”
Jessica turned her head away from Will’s intent gaze to stare at the ceiling again. “When you kissed me to stop me from talking, you reminded me of my husband Nathan. Frankly, I’m not sure I’m ready to remember him or what he used to do to me. I was pretty shocked that I tolerated it so long without stopping you.”
“I wasn’t trying to remind you of the past,” Will said softly. “I never meant to hurt you in any way at all.”
“I know. Don’t care about me this much, Everett Williams. Don’t dwell on pain that is thirty years old for me. I have emotional scar tissue on top of emotional scar tissue built up inside me. I refuse to blame myself for your pain, and caring about your mental condition is a responsibility I do not want right now,” Jessica told him.
Will put his forehead against Jessica’s shoulder for a moment, then brought his gaze back to hers.