Underestimated

Chapter 18

Okay. This time I had a real plan. Well, sort of.

The guy at the pawnshop told me that it was a Smith and Weston semi-automatic, nine millimeter, five shot revolver. I used Drew’s credit card and paid for it. It was small enough to fit in the back of my jean shorts so that he wouldn’t see it. I turned just before I got out of the store and picked up a ball bat.

“I’m going to need this too,” I told the clerk.

“I’m not gonna see you on the news later, am I?” The older black male with gray hair asked.

“Maybe,” I replied tossing the bat in the air and catching it by the handle.

“Just take the bat,” he offered. I smiled some kind of crazy person smile. I was crazy. There was no doubt about it.

I left both of my new weapons in Drew’s car. I needed Marta out of the house before I did anything. I didn’t want to put her in the middle.

I slept in Drew’s bed as hard as it was. I talked to him on the phone like nothing was wrong and got up the following morning feeling like a super hero. Yeah, I know it was stupid, but I was going to get answers if it was the last thing that I did.

I walked out to the kitchen and said good morning to Marta.

“You can take off whenever you want. Drew is on his way. We’re going to go away for a few days,” I lied, pouring a cup of coffee. I didn’t know where Drew was, but if he wasn’t in a meeting, or in the air. He was listening to me. He was probably smiling, thinking that I was sending her away again because I wanted him to myself. I did. Him and Derik both.

Marta left shortly after, telling me to have a nice time, not suspecting anything. As soon as I knew that she was gone. I took a shower, pulled my hair back and walked out to Drew’s car to retrieve my weapons. I stuck the pistol in the back of my jeans, and carried the bat in like I was Rambo or something. I started in the kitchen, smashing the tiny camera hidden in the handle of one of the cabinets. I turned and smashed the one in the light switch next.

My cellphone rang. I smiled.

“You don’t need to call me you son of a bitch. You can hear every word I am saying. I smashed the last camera in the kitchen and started in the living room next. My phone wouldn’t stop ringing. I was afraid to hear his voice. I was afraid that I would coward out. I didn’t want to do that. I started to smash a black vase. I always hated that vase. It looked like it had a crack going in a jagged line and the artist had messed up at the top, and it dipped in on one side. I’m sure it was on purpose. I stopped the bat in midair. I knew it had to be expensive, and something told me that it was Mr. Callaway’s money who had bought it and not Drew’s at all, besides, I liked the idea of the screen in front of him going black from the contact of my wooden bat. I decided to stick with smashing cameras.

By the time I had finished smashing the cameras in the living room and hallway to Drew’s office my cellphone had stopped ringing. I knew that he was in the air, or I thought anyway. I just didn’t know where he was coming from this time. Would he be there in an hour, two, ten? I didn’t know. I couldn’t remember where he told me that he was going.

I walked to the lavish painting hanging in the hallway and pulled the key, velcroed to the back from behind it. Yeah, I remembered where that was too. My heart started to beat faster as I unlocked his office door. I walked around and sat in his plush leather chair. I picked up the phone with trembling hands and dialed the number on my little sticky note. I had to hang up and redial three times before my shaky hands got it right.

“Can I talk to Mr. Callaway please?” I asked the lady who I was sure was his nurse.

“I’m sorry, but Mr. Callaway isn’t feeling well today.”

Shit…Now what?

“Who is it?” I heard Mr. Callaway grouchily say in the background.

“Tell him that it is Morgan,” I said quickly before she had a chance to ask or say goodbye.

“Morgan, how are you?” he asked after demanding to talk to me.

“I’ve been a lot better sir,” I lied. I had never been better, well, that’s a lie too. I was better in Maine where I had friends and a man who loved me for all the right reasons. I would have to revisit that later.

“Is there something that I can do for you?” he asked sincerely.

“I hope so. I want Derik to go away. I need for Derik to go away.”

“Derik Hastings,” he asked.

I don’t fucking know.

“The Derik that seems to always be around. Yes.”

“Did he do something to upset you? Derik has been around almost as long as Drew has. I’m sure that whatever it was, a good old talking to from me would do the trick.”

“He raped me,” I blurted out. I didn’t want him to have a talking to. I wanted him dead. The line was silent. I wasn’t sure if he hung up or not.

“Does Drew know about this? When did this happen?”

“It’s been a while ago before I went to Florence. I just remembered yesterday, and no, Drew doesn’t know, and I would like to keep it that way for now. I am home alone, and I am afraid that he is coming here.”

“Get Sal and Dillon over to the mansion… Now! Tell them I will call them on their way and to hurry.” I heard him say to someone. I relaxed a little. I didn’t know why, but for some reason this man would take care of me.

“Thank you,” I said and I meant it.

“I think that you should stay on the phone with me until they arrive,” he assured me.

“I can’t right now, but, I’m fine now. I promise. I just need him to go away.”

“Oh, don’t you worry about that. He is going away. You’ll never have to worry about Derik again. Do you need some help, I mean like, coping or whatever it is that you do when you go through something like that?” he asked concerned.

I smiled. I had been raped so many times I couldn’t even count them. “No. I’m fine Mr. Callaway.”

My intuitions were right. Drew called Derik. I had to put my hand on my shaking knee to stop it or settle it anyway. I couldn’t seem to stop the trembling going on in my body. I heard the door slam. I didn’t think it had been long enough for the two men to show up, not that I knew where they were coming from. It could be hours before they got there.

“You little whore,” Derik yelled with a look that I knew could kill me dead right there on the spot.

“What did I tell you about entering my house without knocking?” I said with my finger shaking on the trigger from my lap.

“You fucking little cunt, I’ll….”

“You’ll do what, Derik? Rape me again?” I asked, pulling the gun from my lap, and stopping him in his tracks.

“You’re not going to ruin this for me,” he demanded. “I have almost ten years of my life invested in this money. I will fucking kill you.”

“No. No. Derik. I don’t think so.” I couldn’t believe how cool my voice sounded. I sure wasn’t feeling cool. I was shaking like leaf. “Do you really think that I won’t pull this trigger?” I asked. I knew that I didn’t have to cock the gun. The old man at the pawn shop had already told me that it was ready. I only did it to add a little bit of excitement to my show, kind of like putting an exclamation mark behind it.

“You don’t have the guts, you little pussy.”

I could have shot him in the chest. I didn’t know how to shoot a gun. I pulled the trigger and grazed his left arm. “Don’t fuck with me,” I said feeling, extremely cocky all of a sudden. “Have a seat.”

His eyes were huge. Did I mention that it was priceless? He stumbled back, holding his arm and sat down.

I saw him debating on whether or not to lunge at me when my eyes darted and I jumped, startled from the ringing desk phone. I kept the gun pointed right at his head while I picked it up.

“Hello,” I answered, having a pretty good sense of who it was.

“Morgan, please,” I heard Drew’s voice.

“I’m sorry, Drew. I can’t talk to you at the moment. I’m a little busy, waiting for your friend to be picked up.” That look was priceless too.

I hung up and then removed the phone from the receiver when it rang again.

It was a good thing that I had the gun. I was sure that the ten minutes for the two men to come and retrieve Derik would have given him plenty of time to stop my heart beat.

They too entered without knocking. Derik looked to them confused while I laid the gun down on the desk, still pointing at him.

“Let’s go, Derik,” the enormously, huge balled man said.

“Me? Get her the fuck out of here. She’s the psycho one,” he demanded, still holding his arm.

The other big man with black as coal hair grabbed him by his suit jacket and yanked him up, shoving him out the door. I almost felt bad for the terrified look on his face. No. not really.

“If you need anything else, you call this number,” the bald man said, handing me his card.

“Thank you,” I smiled, taking the card.

I hadn’t realized that I had stopped breathing until I was once again alone. I sucked in every last bit of air from that room.

Now to take care of Drew. I was running on pure adrenalin. I could feel the blood dry up in my veins and the adrenalin was the only thing keeping me alive.

If only I knew where Drew was, He could have been anywhere. I was sure he was in the air somewhere. I just wasn’t sure where. Was he an hour away, two, four, six? I had no clue. Why the hell hadn’t I asked more questions last night? Oh, yeah, because my brain was overloaded and I couldn’t think straight. I still couldn’t think straight. What was I going to do when he got there?

I sat in the same spot for an hour and forty minutes with my thoughts a scrambled mess. I went from one memory to another. There were so many of them. It’s the weirdest thing in the world to not know who you are or remember things that happened to you. It’s even weirder to have them all come surging back like a lightning strike. I finally got up, taking my pistol with me.

I walked toward the north corridor and knew exactly why I had avoided that side of the mansion. I wouldn’t even do my therapy in that room. I didn’t know why at the time. I just knew that I couldn’t go in there.

I opened the steel door to the still empty gym and looked straight across the room at my reflection in the mirror. I didn’t know who I was looking at. It was like looking into the eyes of a ghost without a soul. I was empty.

I looked over to the padded bench, and the memories once again flooded my awareness. I felt everything Drew had done to me in that room. I felt the shame, the humiliation, the hurt and the neglect when the steel door would close, and I would be left alone in silence for days.

I dropped to my knees and sobbed. I cried for the little girl who lived in poverty. I cried for the girl whose little brother was ripped from her arms. I cried for the girl whose mother deserted her. I cried for the girl whose father sold her to a monster. I cried for Starlight and Lauren. I cried for the only man who had ever truly loved me, and I cried for the girl that was having a hard time believing that Drew was capable of what he had done.

“Morgan,” I heard Drew, quietly say from behind me.

I didn’t move. I stayed on my knees and kept my hands on my lap, covering the gun.

“Do you think it’s still Stockholm syndrome when you fall in love with the Drew that you didn’t know?” I asked.

“Morgan, please give me time to explain,” he pleaded.

I saw him step toward me through the mirror. I spun around and came to my feet. I pointed the gun right at his head.

“Explain what, Drew? Explain how I remember every last thing that you ever did to me? Explain how you used me for your own personal toy or would you like to explain why you used me for your own personal punching bag?” The tears were falling. I knew they were, but I was too shook up to control them. I couldn’t hold my husband at gunpoint and think about that too.

“Morgan. Put the God damn gun down and talk to me,” he yelled in the tone that I remember scaring the hell out of me at one time. The thing was, it didn’t scare me anymore. It pissed me off.

“Back up!” I yelled. I wasn’t intimidated by his over aggressive demeanor anymore. I was Charlie’s Angels, Cagney and Lacey, GI Jane, okay, so I watched a lot of television. It was all that I had to do when I was a prisoner in this house.

“Morgan, it doesn’t have to be this way. Haven’t I let you come and go as you please?”

That pissed me off even more. “You let me? Fuck you! I don’t need you to let me do shit.”

“I didn’t mean it that way. Please, put the gun down. Where is Derik?”

I knew he had sent him to settle me down.

“Don’t underestimate me. I shot him.” Well, I did. It just barely scraped his arm, but I did shoot him.

“Morgan, I am so sorry. Please let me tell you the whole story. I love you.”

“Back up!” I yelled again, when he tried to walk toward me. He took a step back, and I told him to keep going until he was in the far side of the room. I walked toward the door with the gun pointed right at his forehead.

I barely got the steel door locked when he crashed into it. I jumped, but knew he wasn’t getting out of that room until I let him out. I slid down the door, sinking to the floor. I just knew that my heart was going to beat right out of my chest and be lying on the floor in front of me at any second. I thought I was having an adrenaline rush before, but this was ridiculous.

I walked back to Drew’s office and logged onto his computer. I remembered the first password with ease, but when I clicked the icon for the cameras, I had to try three different ones, but finally got it. I clicked on the gym camera and just like magic. There he was. He had removed his jacket and tie, and was pacing back and forth, running his fingers through his too long hair. I told him a week ago that he needed a haircut.

Okay, I could see and hear him. How did I make him hear me? Was there a button somewhere? Where was the microphone? I looked around the desk for something to make him hear me. I couldn’t find anything. I knew there was a way. He had talked to me when I was locked in there. No, he didn’t talk to me. He made me preform for him. I should make the bastard take all of his clothes off and do the same to him. I saw the little microphone in the corner of the screen and clicked it.

“Hello,” well, that sounded stupid. I watched him look right into the camera.

“Morgan, open the door. You’re not thinking straight.”

“Have a seat, Drew. You’re going to be there a while.”

“I can’t fucking be here a while. I have work to do.”

“No. No. You don’t. The only thing that you need to worry about is starving to death. How many days do you think it will take? I’ve heard that it can be anywhere from three days to six weeks. Did you eat today, Drew?” Wow, I was crazy.

“Morgan, what do you want from me?”

“I want answers. I want to know why you brought me here. I’m not buying the whole I wanted a virgin to train anymore. You didn’t just pick a poverty stricken town and pick me. I want to know why?”

I watched Drew sit on the bench and run his hands through his hair. He took a deep breath and looked right at me.

Damnit, don’t look at me like that…

“Mr. Callaway sent me there to get you.”

“Why?” I had a hunch that he had something to do with it. He was too concerned about me.

Drew took another deep breath. He didn’t want to tell me.

“Tell me, Drew” I coaxed.

“I have known Randle since I was thirteen. His son was going to marry my mom before he got cancer.”

“Yeah.”

“I would have inherited it all, millions of dollars. When Michael was on his death bed, losing his battle after six long years, he told Randle about you.”

“What about me?”

“Michael Callaway was your father.”

“What? How could that be? My father is Gary Willow.”

“No, he isn’t Morgan. Remember when I came to your school. We were sitting on the bleacher, and I picked a piece of fuzz from your sweater?”

I did remember that. “Yes, so?”

“It wasn’t fuzz. It was a hair. You are no doubt a Callaway.”

I needed time to process again. What the hell? I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t that.

“What do you buying me have to do with any of that?”

“Randle Callaway had a stroke three days after he buried his son. He was in bad shape. When I went to see him in the hospital and give him the DNA results he cried. He knew from the many pictures that I had taken how you lived. He felt horrible and changed his will the next day, leaving you every last penny. I was pissed. I was to step into that role, not some stupid hillbilly from West Virginia.”

“I’m not a stupid hillbilly.”

Drew snorted and looked up to me again. “No. You’re not, Morgan. You’re a very strong independent, beautiful woman.”

“Stop. Finish telling me how I ended up gracing your presence.” I didn’t want to hear compliments from Drew Kelley at the time.

“Callaway gave me an ultimatum. He wanted me to continue to run his companies, and I would always have his money, but I had to marry you, and promise to take care of you.”

“You didn’t take care of me, Drew,” I sadly spoke. I didn’t even mean to say it. It just came out.

“I know that, Morgan, and if I could go back and change it, I would. I didn’t want you. I didn’t want you to be my wife, and you were ruining everything. I was in love with a girl named Skyler. I wanted to share all of this with her, not you.”

“You punished me for something I didn’t know about?”

“I deserve to starve to death in here, uh?”

“Yeah, you do. I was here for almost six years before I ran away. Why didn’t I ever know that Randle Callaway was my grandfather?”

“He didn’t want you to know. He was ashamed of his son for leaving you there when he knew how you lived. You were his only grandchild. It wasn’t supposed to be for that long. He was in awful shape. We didn’t expect for him to be around very long. I figured you would be here for six months at the most.”

“What were you going to do with me if he died?”

Drew looked down at the floor and buried his face in his hands.

“Were you going to kill me, Drew?”

“You were going to have an accident. That was the only way I would get what was rightfully mine.”

I sunk in the chair. Wow, if Randle Callaway would have died. I would be dead right now.

“Morgan, I don’t know how to make this right. I don’t care about one rotten penny of that money. I care about you, and that’s it. I hadn’t planned on falling in love with you, but you changed, and I don’t mean because you couldn’t remember your name. You are stronger, beautiful, and so much fun to be around. I wished to God that I would have given you the chance to show me that in the beginning. I would walk away from all of it right now if you would forgive me.”

“Drew, do you have any idea what you put me through? You hit me. You used me for a sex slave. You locked me in that room for days, and then, and then…you made me love you.”

Drew dropped his head in shame.

“I’m sorry, Morgan.”

“Where is my mom?”

“Randle paid her to go away.”

“My mom sold me too?” I said it more as a statement than a question. It was a fact.

“You’ve been through hell.”

“I’m still going through hell. What about my little brother. He’s here in Vegas somewhere.”

“How do you know that?” Drew looked up with a wondering look.

“Dawson found him for me.”

“Who’s Dawson?”

“Where is my brother?” I asked. I was asking the questions, not him. He didn’t have that right.

“He was adopted by a client and a good friend of Randle’s. He wasn’t about to leave him in the system, knowing how he would turn out. He’s in a good home with parents who love him very much. He lives in the suburbs on a cul-de-sac. He’s doing very well.”

“Mr. Callaway thinks that we are happily married, doesn’t he?”

“Yes. That is why I got so mad when he insisted that you talk to him without me. I didn’t want you to say anything to blow my cover, and I have been happily married these last few months.”

“Derik was in on all of this too, wasn’t he?”

“Yes. He knew.”

“Did he know that you raped me?”

“Don’t say it like that, Morgan.”

“How would you like for me to phrase it? Did you know that he raped me too?”

Drew stood up. His face was instantly red. “Are you serious? When?”

“A bunch of times, every time he would drive me anywhere.”

“I’ll kill that motherfucker.”

“You don’t have to worry about him. I told Mr. Callaway what he did.”

That got another shocked look right toward the camera.

“When?”

“Before you sent him here to kill me.”

“I never sent him here to kill you. I sent him here to calm you down.”

“He was going to kill me,” I assured him.

“Who’s Dawson,” he asked again.

“My sheriff,” I replied with a sad tone.

“Excuse me?”

“I was going to marry him until I ended back up here in your web.”

“You were going to marry him?” he asked with an almost hurt tone. Good. I wanted him to hurt. “How were you going to do that? You’re married to me.”

“No. Morgan Kelley was married to you. I wasn’t Morgan Kelley there. I had a whole new identity. A whole new life. I was happy there.”

“Do you love him?”

“I loved him more than anything alive. He is the only one who has ever been there for me my entire life, and he loved me too. I do still love him, but I don’t know if it’s enough anymore.”

“I’m sorry, Morgan. I should have let you get on that plane.”

“Yeah. That would have made things easier,” I said it, but I knew that I would have spent the rest of my life wondering the answers to all of these questions.

“Morgan, I know that it’s selfish of me to even think, but I want you. I love you.”

“That is pretty selfish. A leopard’s spots never changes, Drew.”

“My spots started changing the first time you kissed me.”

“You never kissed me before.”

“I didn’t want to be intimate with you. I wanted you to pay for messing everything up.”

“How could I mess something up that I was unaware of?”

“You couldn’t, Morgan. Your dad would be so disappointed in me,” Drew said with his head down. He was ashamed of himself. I never thought I would see the day.

“How did he meet my mom?” I couldn’t say my dad. I never knew the man existed. I thought that when I heard my dad from back home say that he raised another man’s child that he was talking about Justin, not me.

“I don’t know the answer to that. I didn’t want to know any of the details.”

“You said that your mom was going to marry my dad. Where is your mom?”

“She shot herself in the head the day after Michael’s funeral.”

I gasped. “I’m sorry, Drew.”

“Don’t you dare apologize to me. Don’t you ever apologize to me. I deserve to feel every bit of pain humanly possible,” he said, getting angrily.

“I have to go to Mr. Callaway.”

Drew only nodded. He knew that I would.

“You’re not really going to leave me in here to starve are you?”

“No,” I said getting up, “but you are going to stay there for a while.”

I didn’t need an address. Mr. Callaway’s address was programmed into the GPS on Drew’s car. I had found it when I was sitting in his air-conditioned car one afternoon waiting for a game to start.

His house was just as extravagant, only newer. I wondered if that would be left to me too. The grounds were meticulously kept, and the blacktop drive looked like it was freshly laid. It wasn’t quite as big as the house we lived in, but bigger than the normal mind could imagine.

I walked up to the massive door. I’d never seen anything like it. There was an arch built from stone and the double doors were glass with etched tree branches galore. It was breathtaking. I rang the doorbell and all of a sudden felt sick.

The nurse that seemed to always be with Mr. Callaway answered, and I wondered if she was the only one there. She smiled at me.

“He saw you walk up,” she said, gesturing with her hand for me to enter.

Did this man have a camera fetish?

Holy shit…

The house was beyond astonishing. The ceilings looked like they could go on forever and I wanted to run my fingers across the vibrant marble floor. I followed the nurse as my eyes widely took in the surroundings. I was expecting to be taken to his bedroom, but I wasn’t. She led me to a den of some sort. I waited while she opened the wood pocket doors.

Mr. Callaway must have been an advocate hunter. There was every exotic animal on the planet in that room. I almost jumped when I saw the stuffed Black Panther beside of me. It looked so real, and his eyes looked hungry.

Mr. Callaway did look bad. I had never seen him look so sickly. His eyes were sunk into his skull, and his lips were dry and cracked. The nurse pushed the button on his bed and he struggled to sit. I got an immediate cold chill. You could feel death lurking in the air. I didn’t want him to die. I wanted to know him.

He put his hand out to me, palm side up, and I placed mine in his.

“How are you, Morgan?” he asked. I knew he was talking about Derik and what I had been through with him, and I was going to leave it at that. My intentions all along were to go there and expose Drew. I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want him to think that he took me out of a bad situation and put me in a worse one.

“I’m good Mr. Callaway. How are you?”

“I have never been better,” he smiled.

My eyes couldn’t seem to stop looking around the room at death. I’m sure if I would have counted, I would have counted close to fifty dead animals, including the paintings around the room. I couldn’t help but look at the owl straight across from me hanging from a branch that miraculously grew from the wall. His big eyes never left the sight of me.

“You’re a hunter,” I stated the stupid fact.

“I used to be. Have you ever been to Africa?”

“No,” I replied. I had only been out of the country once, and that was when Drew took me for our anniversary.

“You tell that boy I said to take you there, beautiful country,” he assured me.

I dropped my head. I didn’t mean to let him see the sadness, but he did. He read me like a book.

“What’s wrong, Morgan?”

I looked into his cloying eyes. “I know who you are,” I said.

He smiled a warm smile.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you give me time to know you?” I pleaded.

“I’m sorry, Morgan. I don’t always make the best decisions, I guess,” Mr. Callaway confessed.

“I need to know what you expect of me. I don’t think Drew, and I are going to stay together.”

He looked shocked. “Are you two having problems? What did he do?”

“It’s nothing like that. Drew is fine. I just need some time. I don’t know how to process all of this,” I lied. I should have thrown him under the bus right there. Anyone in their right mind would have wanted him to suffer a slow painful death. I wasn’t blessed with a normal mind, whatever that was.

“Morgan, I don’t know how much Drew has told you, but all of this is yours,” he said, waving his weak hand around the room full of dead animals. “You will never want for anything for the rest of your life.”

I knew that was a lie. Money couldn’t buy what I needed.

“None of this will be Drew’s without you. If he walks away now, he’ll be homeless,” he added.

“He’s not the one that wants to walk away. I am. And I don’t want that. Drew runs your company better than anyone could. He is good at it. He takes great pride in it,” I stated, not having any idea what I was saying. Why wouldn’t I render the bastard homeless? He deserved it.

He smiled at that. “He always did, even when he was still just a boy. What do you want, Morgan?”

“I don’t know. I guess I just need some time to figure things out.”

I went there with the intention of finding out how my mother became pregnant by his rich son. I wanted to know where she was, and what she was doing. It didn’t seem to matter anymore. She was obviously one of the people who could be happy with money, and it was also apparent that she didn’t need me.

I cried all the way back to Drew’s or my house I should say. I knew what I had to do, and the sooner the better.

I walked the north corridor and unlocked the door to hell. I didn’t walk in, and stayed back as Drew slowly walked out. He stared at me cautiously with his hands in his pockets.

“I don’t want any of this,” I said, crossing my arms. “I’m going back to my small town, my job, and my friends.”

He nodded. “I’ll have Felix fly you there,” he said.

He took a step toward me and my heart fluttered as I closed my eyes.

I tried not to feel anything when he placed his hands on my arms.

“Morgan, for whatever its worth, I’m sorry.”

“It’s not worth anything, Drew,” I replied looking up to him.

Damnit…Why did I have to go and look at him?

I was fine until he ran his hand up and held my face with his hand to keep me from looking away.

“I know it’s not worth anything, but I do love you, Morgan, and if I could take it all back, I would in a heartbeat.”

I stepped away from him. I had to. I was having an emotional breakdown, and nobody in their right mind would forgive this man.

“I’m going to a hotel,” I said. “I can’t stay here.”

He let me go with a nod as his hand slid back into his pockets.

I stayed locked in a hotel room for three days. I didn’t shower, I barely ate, and I cried a lifetime of tears. Finally, on the third day I called Drew.

“Morgan?” he answered on the first ring.

“I would like to fly out this afternoon,” I said.

“Okay, I will have Felix get things ready.”

I hung up. I was interested in carrying on a conversation with him.

I stopped and visited Mr. Callaway before going back to the house to pack. He looked a little better and talked more. I ate lunch with him, and for the first time in days, I felt like I was going to be okay. He hugged me and told me that I should stop by Desert Springs Hospital and say hello to my friend Derik.

I did do that. I felt the need for some reason. Call me a little malicious. I needed to rub it in.

The nurse directed me to his room. He was in a body cast, and his face was black and blue. He had a tube running down his throat and was hooked up to every machine possible. I didn’t stay but just a minute because I knew that Jena was close by getting coffee, and I didn’t want to run into her.

I bent close to his face. His eyes fluttered open with a look of pure terror.

“I told you not to fuck with me,” I whispered with a honeyed voice. “Have fun shitting in a bag for the rest of your life.”

I was sure that Derik would never touch me or anyone else for that matter again. Ever.

I didn’t see Drew while I packed a few things. I knew that he was watching me from his office, but I paid no mind. I shook my head with a snort when I realized that I didn’t need to pack anything. I was going home, home to my cozy little house in Misty Bay. I had everything there. Thinking about my little house in Maine gave me a warm comfortable feeling.