Hard As You Can

Chapter 15

Wanna talk about it?” Easy asked from the passenger seat.

“No,” Shane said, entirely aware his tone gave a lot away but too fucking tired and pissed to care. Not pissed at Crystal. Pissed for her.

Goddamnit, he could barely breathe for the Humvee of rage parked on his chest.

Shane’s fingers might’ve only been on her back for a few seconds, but he’d felt enough to have a damn good idea what was going on underneath her clothes.

Lines of scars.

Some shallow, some knotted and deep.

Lots of things might’ve made them.

Problem was, he’d seen the backs of men who’d been struck by a whip while serving various places overseas. And whips left a distinctive pattern of diagonally placed straight lines. And that was too damn similar to what his fingers had traced on Crystal’s bare skin.

As if Shane hadn’t been horrified enough by her swollen cheek and bruised arm.

With every fiber of his being, Shane hoped he was wrong about what he’d felt. He might never feel a greater happiness than to know his imagination had run away with him, and he had it all wrong. But instinct and intuition had his stomach rolling and the whiskey he’d drank earlier burning a hole in his gut. Add that to Crystal’s reaction to his discovery, and Shane knew he wasn’t wrong.

And that was another thing his brain couldn’t stop chewing on. Why had she panicked so badly? Why had she run away? She’d nearly thrown herself from his truck, and no way her near fall and barefoot flight hadn’t chewed up the skin on her hands and feet. When he’d finally caught up to her at her truck, she’d been crying so hard he’d worried she wouldn’t be able to see to drive. Jesus, after the privilege of sharing a moment of passion with her, the evidence of her pain had just about broken his heart.

He peered down at the pair of white flip-flops resting on the seat beside him. They had a small fabric flower on the strap over the toes. He remembered them from the night he’d carried Jenna up the steps. As he drove through the quiet, mid-night streets of Baltimore, Shane debated the best form of death for the asshole who’d done this to her. Bruno.

Shooting? Too fast and impersonal. Poison? The scumbag might not be conscious of the fact he was dying. Drowning? Not painful enough. Cutting off his hands and dick? Messy but poetic.

“You like her,” Easy said, his voice pulling Shane from his murder fantasies.

Well, hell. And then there were three teammates who suspected the truth. No sense in doing a duck and cover now. He glanced toward his friend. “Yeah.”

Easy nodded and ran a hand over the side of his head. “Then you gotta get her out of there.”

Gripping the wheel harder, Shane heaved a deep breath and strove for a bit of levelheadedness amid the rage whipping up inside his chest. Everyone knowing he’d crossed an emotional line was one thing. But responding emotionally was another. “I know, but it’s complicated. And we’ve got just about enough of that on our plate these days.”

“I won’t disagree with you there. But most of the time, there’s a difference between what’s right and what’s easy. Maybe you should think about bringing her to Hard Ink.”

Shane cut his gaze across the cab to find Easy staring at him, a tired, almost weary, expression on his face. “I don’t know that I could convince Crystal of that. Or Nick.”

Crossing his arms, Easy shook his head. “I don’t know, man. But how many more people gotta die?”

That was for damn sure. Zane, Harlow, Axton, Kemmerer, Escobal, Rimes. His six teammates who’d died in the ambush on that dirt road that day. Merritt, though he’d brought that shit on himself. If the surgery hadn’t worked out, Charlie might’ve been on that list, too. Might still, depending on how well he responded to the meds.

Molly.

Not that she’d died as a part of this fubar, but she was one more reason Shane refused to allow Crystal to be next. Or Jenna, because he knew enough to know that loss would devastate Crystal to her very core. But it wasn’t like he could drag them to Hard Ink against their will.

Given what he suspected about Crystal’s situation at Confessions and with Bruno, the idea of doing anything against Crystal’s will sat like a jagged rock in Shane’s gut.

“You talk to Jenna at all?” Shane asked as his thoughts churned.

“A little. This whole thing being the clusterfuck that it is, I checked the apartment when we got back. She gave me a little shit for that. And then she gave me a little more for planning to watch over the place until Crystal got home. And then a while later she came outside looking for me and gave me shit because she couldn’t find me right away.”

Shane arched a brow and slowed for a red light at an otherwise empty intersection. “What did she want?”

Easy cracked a slow grin. “To see what I was doing. I asked what part of covert she didn’t understand, and she turned around and stomped away, right before she looked back to ask if I needed to use the bathroom or anything.”

“What did you say?” Shane said, chuckling. Shane hadn’t gotten to spend much time with Jenna yet, but she seemed to have a feisty streak, part impetuousness, part fighter.

“I just stared at her until she rolled her eyes and went back in.” Easy rubbed his fingers over the hint of his smile on his lips.

Turning onto Hard Ink’s street, Shane imagined the look Easy had probably given her. The one so intense it made you want to apologize even though you hadn’t done anything. The one that had made the newbies in camp stammer and back away. And here it had just made Jenna annoyed.

Easy chuckled under his breath. “She was fine, though.”

Shane grinned, only too happy to turn the tables. “Interesting choice of words.”

“What?” Easy asked. “Aw, come on, man. You’re cracked out of your head. I didn’t mean it that way.”

Waiting for the fence to open and allow access into the Hard Ink lot, Shane nodded. “Sure, sure. Of course not.” But something had to explain the fact that Easy had said more on the subject of Jenna than on anything else since they’d reunited.

A fist lit into Shane’s biceps, and he couldn’t help but laugh through the ache. “Ouch, motherfucker. Don’t kill the goddamned messenger, now.” He pulled into a spot and killed the engine.

A satisfied smile on his face, Easy reached for the door.

“Hey, E?”

“Yeah?” he said, his smile fading.

Shane girded himself to give voice to what he’d learned—or what he was pretty sure he’d learned, anyway. He wanted the guys on his side if Crystal’s situation escalated because no way was he leaving her to fend for herself. If she’d have him, if she’d let him in, he’d want her by his side. And, for now, that meant at Hard Ink.

“What is it, Shane?” Easy said, all the humor gone from his voice.

“She’s got”—he swallowed, hard, just from the memory of her ruined flesh under his fingers—“she’s got scars all over her back.”

Easy went still. “What kind of scars?”

“I didn’t see them, but I felt them.” He finally looked at Easy, whose gaze narrowed and brow slashed down. “So I can’t be sure.”

“But?”

I’m pretty damn sure. “I think she’s been whipped.”

Easy’s expression was dark, lethal, rankly pissed off. “Then you need to do something about it. I’ll back you up, a hundred percent. However I can help, you just say the word.”

Shane gave a tight nod. He needed to keep himself buttoned up on this and not fly off the handle. He didn’t want to scare Crystal. He didn’t want to make the team doubt his objectivity. And he certainly didn’t want to do anything that might further jeopardize Crystal’s or Jenna’s safety.

“You need to come clean with the team on all this,” Easy said. “That’s the only way forward.”

“Yeah,” Shane said, feeling the lateness of the hour in every bone in his body. “Roger that.” Laying all this out there and trusting his teammates with it was the right way to go. They’d have his back. They always had. “I will. First thing in the morning.”

Easy nodded, and they both shoved out of the truck. The decision invited a sort of peace into Shane’s psyche, calming at least a little the whirlwind of rage he’d felt since he’d discovered Crystal’s scars.

Inside Hard Ink, they made their way up the stairs, surprised to hear low voices coming from the gym.

Shane keyed in the code and followed Easy inside.

“Look, they threw a party and didn’t invite us,” Easy said, crossing the room.

What the hell was everyone doing up? Nick, Becca, Jeremy, and Beckett all sat around Marz, the only one in his street clothes from earlier in the night and still at work on the computer. Becca in pajamas, she and Nick were stretched out on a blue gym mat on the floor, Jeremy sat on a chair close to Marz, and Beckett reclined in one chair while he propped his feet up on another. Even Eileen was here, currently doing an impression of a fur ball curled up on the blanket covering Becca’s legs.

“No rest for the wicked,” Marz said, pulling an earbud from one of his ears. He glanced up from his monitors, a tired smile on his face.

“Everything okay with Charlie?” Shane asked.

Becca nodded from where she sat on the floor between Nick’s legs. “Yeah, thanks. I just couldn’t sleep for worrying about him.”

“That pretty much went for all of us,” Nick said. “Eventually, we all congregated over here rather than risk disrupting his sleep over at the apartment.”

Shane nodded. “Has he woken up yet?”

Becca smiled, and it was so good to see happiness brightening her face again. “Yeah. And his fever’s down, too.”

Beckett nodded. “We’d been overdue for some good news.”

Damn straight. Shane thumbed over his shoulder. “Is he due for a check? I could go look in on him.”

“No,” Marz said. “I set him up with a walkie-talkie. He’s lucid enough to give a shout if he needs something.”

“Besides, don’t you have some business here?” Easy asked, nodding at the group, a pointed expression on his face.

Right. No sense waiting for the morning with everyone up and at ’em now. Shane pulled a folding chair closer, sat, and rested his elbows on his knees. His head hung on his shoulders, and it felt like it weighed a hundred pounds. The combination of exhaustion and worry and anger.

“What’s up, man?” Nick asked, concern clear in his tone.

Shane lifted his gaze and met Nick’s. No sense beating around the bush, not when most of the team already knew. “I’m falling for Crystal.” Despite the fact that he felt every pair of the eyes land on him at the same time, Shane resisted the urge to squirm or look away. He wasn’t used to hanging his laundry out for everyone to see—hell, he wasn’t used to having laundry of this kind at all, but he wasn’t ashamed of what he had to say, either.

Nick’s entire initial reaction involved a single lifted eyebrow, but Becca’s smile was big and immediate. She glanced around the room at the others, and Shane’s gaze followed. Marz wore a small smile and nodded like he approved of Shane’s admission. Jeremy frowned, like he wasn’t sure why Shane had made this a topic of general conversation. And Beckett’s expression remained a careful, serious blank. Easy stood at Shane’s side, a physical manifestation of the promise he’d made a few moments before in the truck.

“And?” Nick asked. Shane wasn’t surprised the man suspected there was more. Nick Rixey’s instincts were almost always spot-on, and Shane knew that was why the guy had been so hard on himself about Merritt’s deceit. But then, they’d all missed that, hadn’t they?

“And . . . things are complicated.” Shane tugged his hands through his hair and remembered the amazing sensation of Crystal’s hands stroking and pulling. “Here’s what I know: Someone is abusing her—probably this guy Bruno—”

“Oh right,” Marz said, retrieving a printout from a stack by his keyboard. “I looked into him while you were gone. Bruno Ashe. Age thirty-four. Known member of the Church Gang. Criminal record. Probable Apostle-level position according to the gang report Becca’s friend lent us last week.”

Shit. Why didn’t that surprise him? Shane nodded and counted off on his fingers. “Okay, so then, a senior Churchman is abusing and controlling her. She’s afraid to meet or talk in her own apartment. Today we overheard her tell her sister she had no choice but to work at Confessions, which is sounding more and more like she’s somehow being forced given Bruno’s position.” Shane shook his head. “And then tonight, I got her to open up a little. She admitted she knows Confessions is filled with gangbangers and drug dealers and killers. And she confirmed—again—that girls are falling down a black hole at Confessions and never being heard from again.”

“Oh, my God. That’s terrible,” Becca said. “This is the waitress who helped you all the other night?”

“Yeah,” Nick said, hugging Becca in against his stomach. He met Shane’s gaze, and Nick’s eyes were equal parts calculating and sympathetic. “I’m gonna say something, Shane, because it needs to be said. I’m not trying to be an asshole or to downplay what is clearly a horrendous situation that Crystal’s caught up in.”

Knowing what was likely coming, Shane gave a tight nod. Tension seemed to thicken the air around them, because they all knew where Nick was about to go—at least the team did.

“Molly,” Shane said, saving Nick the trouble.

“Molly,” Nick said with a nod.

Jeremy frowned and looked around. “Who’s Molly?”

“My kid sister,” Shane said, eyes back on Nick. “I’m not gonna lie. She’s never far from my mind, and this whole thing might’ve started out as a chance to make something right that I’d once gotten wrong, but that’s not what’s at play now.” Shane looked each of his teammates in the eye, wanting them to see his sincerity. “Nick.” Shane’s throat went tight, and he had to clear it. Twice. “I like Crystal. And, at some point—I don’t know when, she’s been whipped.”

Becca’s gasp joined the men’s low curses.

“Before this thing escalates, and she gets caught in the cross fire, I want to bring her here. If she’ll come.” Lacing his hands together, he waited for the blowback.

Nick inhaled to speak, but Jeremy beat him to it. “This is my house, Shane. I don’t know everything that’s going on, but I’m telling you right now that your friend is welcome, and if you need another pair of hands to pack up her stuff and move it over here, just name the time and place. Because what you just described is some major bullshit. And no one deserves to live like that.” Green eyes blazing, Jeremy crossed his arms and nailed Nick with a stare, silently daring him to challenge.

And just then, Jeremy Rixey became Shane’s brother in every way that mattered.

Nick nodded, anger making sharp angles of his face. “I couldn’t agree more,” he said in a tight voice.

The tension deflated from the room faster than a popped balloon. Relief flooded through Shane’s system. Part of him had been braced for a fight. The more people who stayed here, the more resources they required and the higher the vulnerabilities they possessed. He would’ve understood if the whole lot of them had come at him with a list of totally reasonable reservations.

But they’d been there for him. And Crystal.

“You realize she’s a package deal,” Easy said in a low voice from beside him. “Jenna?”

“Yeah,” Shane said. He suspected Jenna was going to be the sticking point for Crystal. But first things first. Get both of them to safety. And then figure out how to pick up the pieces. That is, if Crystal and Jenna agreed. And he feared it was a big if.

“Well, so were me and Charlie, but you all took us in,” Becca said. “I don’t see why that would make a difference. There’s plenty of room in this building, isn’t there?”

Jeremy nodded. “The apartment above ours has electricity and water. Bathroom’s in, and the drywall’s mostly up. Floors are all cement, but . . .” He shrugged. “It ain’t pretty, but we could certainly buy a couple of beds for up there and let people spread out a little. It’s not like we’re using the space for anything else—”

“Hold up,” Marz said, gesturing for them to quiet down. He scooped the second earbud back to his ear, pressed his fingers against the little black bud, and leaned toward the monitor he’d been eyeing from time to time. “Say it louder, asshole,” he whispered to himself as he punched a sequence of keys. He closed his eyes and pressed his hands to his ears again. “Pier thirteen,” he said almost to himself, and then his gaze whipped up, wide and excited. “I got a voice saying ‘we’re on for Pier thirteen tonight.’”

Holy shit. Was Marz saying what Shane thought he was saying? “You got the location for the delivery?” Shane asked, moving around behind Marz’s chair. Easy and Beckett joined them, then Nick and Becca, until they were all crowded in together.

Marz’s hands flew over the keyboard of a laptop sitting off to the side, the only machine not engaged in the audio and video surveillance of Confessions. He typed in “Pier 13 Baltimore.” A listing of search results appeared on the monitor. Every one related to the same address on Newgate Avenue, at the northwestern end of the marine terminal.

Running one last search, Marz sat back, and the whole group of them watched as a satellite image of Pier 13 took shape on the screen.

“Right there’s where we’re headed, boys.” Marz pointed at the monitor, his tone victorious. “Right there is where we start to get some answers.”

“WHY, WHY, WHY?” Crystal murmured to herself as she peeked in on the bubbling pan of lasagna. Five more minutes, and it would be done. Which meant that she had no more than fifteen minutes before Bruno would be here for dinner. The one she’d invited him to the other night when she’d been trying to gather information about the big meeting at the marine terminal he had in a few hours.

Because she hadn’t wanted him to get suspicious of her questions. And she’d needed him to believe she wanted to spend time with him. And because she’d been trying to appease his anger about a man having been in the apartment.

So when Bruno had called after lunchtime and said he’d like to come over after all, there wasn’t really anything she could do but agree.

How was it possible that conversation had only been a few days before? It seemed like a lifetime ago.

Twisting the hot pads in her hands, Crystal thought back over the week. On the outside, she appeared just the same. Same woman. Same job. Same sorta boyfriend. Same miserable reality. But on the inside, it was like there’d been a flood, and when the waters receded, everything had been reshaped and relocated into a totally different landscape.

The buzzer on the oven screeched. Crystal flinched from her thoughts and shut it off, then she very carefully removed the glass dish from the wire rack and set it on the stovetop to cool.

Lasagna was Bruno’s favorite. It was a shame, really, because as much as she liked it, if she ever got away from him, she might never eat it again.

As the scent of warm cheese, spicy sauce, and garlic bread filled the air of the small apartment, Crystal could reduce every bit of the raging storm that was her life right now to two words: Shane McCallan.

The man for whom she’d asked the questions.

The man she’d gone and fallen for. Like an idiot.

The man she could never, ever have.

Not that he’d want her after he’d felt the ruined mess that was her back. If he hadn’t thought her a spineless loser before, he surely would now.

The backs of her eyes stung with regrets and grief, and Crystal let herself wallow in those feelings for exactly one more minute. When the LED on the stove clock flickered from 4:58 to 4:59, she forced herself to box that crap up tight and put it away. For good.

She needed to be a convincingly adoring girlfriend tonight, in every way Bruno expected. In any way Bruno expected. Which was why she’d worn her skinny jeans and the black shirt she’d made with the deep vee in the front that he liked so much. Tonight was all about pleasing Bruno. Grabbing a Sprite from the fridge, she gulped down a large swallow, washing away the sour bile that crept up the back of her throat when she thought of what that likely meant.

You can do it, Crystal. You’ve survived worse.

True. But using that as a benchmark was a helluva way to have to live your life.

Eight months. The hustle and bustle of New York’s Seventh Avenue popped into her mind’s eye. She’d been there once for a long weekend her freshman year of college, and the dynamism of the city had imprinted itself on her forever. Surely, she and Jenna would be safe in a place so large, so busy, so crowded with people.

A key sounded against the door handle, then the door opened.

She pushed the musings away. Showtime.

Crystal swept out of the kitchen with a big smile on her face. “Hey. You’re here.”

Bruno smiled and grasped her face in his hands. “Yes, I am, baby. And something smells good,” he said, kissing her roughly and walking her backward into the kitchen.

Too wet, too much tongue, too much alcohol on his breath, she thought, completely aware she was using a very particular point of comparison in the form of a sexy former soldier with the most charming smile she’d ever seen. But none of that mattered right now, so she threw herself into it and laughed as he backed her into the counter. “Me?” she said, laughing.

Bruno pulled a piece of cheese from the corner of the dish and popped it into his mouth. “Well, you’re okay, too.”

She smiled because since he thought that was funny, she had to react like it was. “You hungry now? Because everything’s ready. I can dish it up right away.”

He stepped back and whipped off his leather jacket, revealing the double holster hidden underneath. “Yeah. Starving,” he said, leaving the kitchen. His coat and guns fell on the couch with a heavy thump. He sat at the small dining table and tapped out a message on his cell phone. Waiting to be served.

Despite the fact that Crystal’s stomach was seriously flirting with a full-scale rebellion, she plated two servings of lasagna and bread and carried them to the already-set table. “What would you like to drink?” she asked, realizing as she said it she’d slipped into her waitress voice. Which when you thought about it made a lot of sense. She lived to serve.

Thumbs still moving over his phone, Bruno shrugged. “You know what I like,” he said without looking up.

She returned to the kitchen and grabbed a can of Natty Boh from the fridge for Bruno and her Sprite. Back at the table, she set the drinks down with a smile and joined Bruno at the only other chair.

Bruno dove right in, taking big forkfuls despite the fact that the sauce was too hot, causing him to suck in mouthfuls of air and gulp down swallows of beer.

“Is it good, baby?” Crystal asked, not yet having touched her own.

He grunted affirmatively and forked in another mound of noodles and sauce. God, he even ate aggressively. How had she never before noticed? With the sounds of Bruno’s eager eating filling the room, Crystal sliced the edge of her fork into the corner of her portion of lasagna and scooped a small bite into her mouth.

It must’ve been good, because Bruno was absolutely hoovering it down, but it tasted like cardboard in her own mouth.

“How was your day?” she asked.

“Um,” he said around a swallow. “Okay. Busy getting ready for tonight. You know how it is.”

“Yeah. You always have so much on your plate.”

He sucked a bit of sauce off his thumb. “That’s why I have you. To relax me. Help me blow off steam.”

Yes, that’s what Crystal was good for. At least as far as Bruno was concerned. She smiled and tucked into another bite, but all she could think about was Shane’s wanting to talk to her, wanting to get to know her. For an instant, she wondered what it would be like to cook dinner for Shane, to have him over to her apartment, to go out on a date with him. Would he hold her hand again? Would he want to hold her again? Would they talk all night or just sit in the quiet peacefulness of one another’s arms?

“Crystal? Crystal?” Fingers snapped in front of her face. “Where the hell’d you go?”

“Oh, sorry,” she said as warmth crept into her cheeks.

“More,” he said, pushing his plate toward her.

She scurried out of her seat and grabbed the plate. “Of course. Coming right up.” She nearly collapsed against the counter. Get your head in the game, Crystal. With a deep breath, she got Bruno’s seconds and ran them out to him. “Here you go. I’m so glad you like it.”

He grunted around a bite. God, was he always this much of a cretin?

Probably. Definitely. Now it was so prominent because she had something—someone—to compare him against.

Pushing away the thought, Crystal forced herself to eat more than half of her portion of lasagna while he responded to another series of text messages. She didn’t want to do anything to draw Bruno’s attention and make him wonder any more about her behavior.

“Jenna around tonight?” he asked, wiping his mouth on the paper napkin and throwing it onto his empty plate.

“Not ’til later,” she said, knowing where this conversation was going. “She’s staying on campus to do some research at the library.” And thank God for that. Because after the way they’d been fighting the past few days, the last thing Crystal wanted was for Jenna to witness her little performance here tonight.

“Hmm.” Bruno tipped his beer against his lips and took a long pull from the can, eyeing Crystal the whole time.

“Dessert?” Crystal asked, acting like she didn’t know where his thoughts were going. She rose and reached for their dirty dishes, but Bruno grabbed her wrist and hauled her around the table and in between his spread knees.

He grabbed her breasts and kneaded. “Definitely dessert.”

Too rough. Too scary. Too much about him—always. The gentleness and affection of Shane’s touch was maybe her favorite thing about him, which was why Bruno’s groping now felt so hard to bear. “Well,” she said, clearing her throat and trying to hide a wince from a particularly hard squeeze. “The nice thing is that you can have your cake and eat it, too.”

Bruno stopped and his gaze dragged up to her face. “You made cake?”

Sucker. She smiled. “Yup.”

“What kind?”

“Red velvet with cream cheese icing.” Bruno’s eyebrows flew up. The first time she’d ever made him red velvet had been his birthday four years ago, which had only been about two months after he’d pulled her out of that hole in the basement of Confessions. It was the first night she’d let him between her legs, although she’d quickly freaked out when he’d tried to position his weight there. It had taken another month before she could manage sex with him. She cried for an hour afterward. He’d only stuck around for the first ten minutes of it.

So many things she loved had been ruined by their association with Bruno Ashe.

But not Jenna. Never Jenna.

“Yeah, cake,” Bruno said. “Thanks, baby.” He patted her ass and let her go.

Releasing a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, she cleared the table and took the dirties to the sink. She removed the cover from the cake plate and stared at the creamy swirls of white frosting—then she cut him almost a quarter of the cake.

She carried the hunk of sugar out to him with a fresh can of beer and sat opposite as he devoured it.

Why aren’t you having any?” he asked around a too-big bite.

“I made it for you. Besides, I have to watch my figure, you know?”

“Yeah, I guess you do.” His gaze dragged over Crystal’s breasts, and it made her want to shrink into herself.

As his slice of cake got smaller and smaller, her heart raced and her stomach knotted. It was like facing a trip to the gallows. She knew what was about to happen was inevitable, but that didn’t keep her soul from howling in protest.

And then his forked clanked against the empty plate.

“More?” she asked brightly.

He licked his lips and shook his head. “No. I had enough cake. Now I want dessert.” Bruno lifted his hands, urging her to come to him.

For a moment, her muscles refused to respond. But then her survival instinct kicked in, and she got her butt out of the chair and rounded the table to stand at Bruno’s knees. He helped her straddle his lap and pulled her down as far as her snug jeans and his thick thighs allowed. He fisted his hands in her hair and slowly pulled her mouth to his.

And then his lips smothered hers, and his tongue penetrated her mouth. Crystal was drowning in the sweetness on his breath until she felt like she was suffocating. Bruno grew hard between her legs and slid down in the chair to force them more tightly together. He gripped her hips, hard, and ground her down against the ridge of his erection, unleashing a grunt into their kiss.

Crystal’s throat went tight and her eyes stung, but she responded the way she always did, the way he expected. She kissed back. She moaned. She writhed. But everything within her revolted against his touch and his taste and his scent. Her skin crawled, her mouth soured, her nose recoiled. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get out of her own head. Usually, she could tolerate, she could compartmentalize, she could rationalize. It won’t last long. It’s not that big of a deal. You’ve done it before. Once, you wanted him.

Now, none of those worked. None of those appeased. None of those made her feel any less like she was back in that basement room of Confessions, watching a total stranger undo his belt and leer at her like she was his for the taking whether she wanted him or not. She had been then. She was now.

“Get up, baby. I don’t have a lot of time,” Bruno said, pushing her off his lap. “And I gotta get inside you. It’s been too long.”

Crystal found her feet, though her knees felt soft, like they couldn’t possibly hold her weight. The walls seemed to spin around her.

Bruno grabbed her, kissed her, pulled at her clothing. Her shirt went up, her bra got tugged down. His hands were everywhere, big and hot and harsh. He opened the button on her jeans. Then the zipper. He shoved the denim down over her hips. It chafed at her skin.

“Turn around and brace yourself,” Bruno said in a ragged voice.

And that was when Crystal got out of her head. Out of her body, actually. She had the weirdest sensation of floating, and then somehow she was on the other side of the room. Or, at least, it seemed that way, because instead of seeing the dull white of the plaster wall in front of her face, she saw a couple about to have sex up against a wall, as if she’d become a casual observer not involved in what was going on. The woman’s bottom and thighs were bared, as well as her lower back, showing just the tail ends of her scars.

The man shoved down his own jeans, baring the heavy, corded muscles of his glutes and thighs. He reached a hand in between them and grunted in frustration. She was too tense, too closed. He yanked her hips farther away from the wall. Another moment of attempted consummation. More frustration. Because her body wasn’t responding. Refused to respond. He smacked her ass hard enough to leave a red handprint against the fair skin.

“Damnit, what the hell’s wrong?” Spitting into his hand, he reached between them again.

Keys rattled at the door.

Crystal-the-observer slowly turned her gaze away from the couple, who hadn’t yet heard the sound, and watched the door ease open.

Bruno gasped. “What the fuck?” He jerked his pants back around his waist. “Jesus, Jenna, what are you doing here?”

Crystal boomeranged back into her body. Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God. It was damn close to every nightmare she’d ever had converging into a real moment in time.

Jenna’s expression was total abject horror—brow furrowed, mouth agape, cheeks flushing with anger. “I live here. What are you doing here?” Her eyes were like blue fire as they whipped between his open fly and Crystal’s disheveled clothing.

Oh, God, Jenna, stop. Crystal pulled her jeans up but couldn’t get her fingers to master rebuttoning them. “Sorry, Jen. We just got carried away, didn’t we, Bruno?” She smiled up at him, trying to distract him from what Jenna had just said, and the tone with which she’d said it. “Can I get a rain check?” she asked, wrapping her arms around his neck.

His eyes unnarrowed, just the littlest bit. “Yeah, yeah, tomorrow. Or maybe Friday. I gotta see,” he said, his voice just a few degrees above frigid. “Wrap that food up for me.”

“Uh, yes, sure. Of course.”

Jenna glared at Crystal as she crossed the room, and Crystal threw her a look pleading for her to rein in her anger for just a few minutes. Once Bruno left, Jenna could dump as much of it on her as she wanted.

Crystal’s hands were a jittery mess as she grabbed plastic bowls and matching lids from a cupboard and hefted big slabs of lasagna into one container and thick wedges of cake into another. She pulled a handled brown bag from under the sink and packaged everything up for Bruno.

“What’s your problem?” came Bruno’s voice from the living room.

Crystal’s stomach plummeted to the ground. For a long moment, there was silence. Crystal returned to the living room, still death-gripping her hope that things wouldn’t get worse. “Here you go,” she said, as he finished donning his jacket.

“You wanna know what my problem is?” Jenna asked.

All the blood rushed from Crystal’s face. She felt it, because the room started spinning again, and she perceived sound like it had traveled through a long tunnel. “That’s enough, Jenna,” she said as harshly as she could.

Bruno wrenched the bag from Crystal’s hands and stalked toward her sister. He grabbed her jaw. “Yeah, I’d say that’s more than edamnnough, Jenna. Learn not to bite the hand that feeds you,” he said, shoving her away. She stumbled back a step, and he pushed by her, yanked open the door, and slammed it shut behind himself.

Pale and shaking, Jenna gaped at Crystal for a long minute, then she slipped the security chain across the door. “You want to explain what that was all about, Sara? Why I just got accosted in my own home?”

Crystal grappled to respond, but whatever force had been holding her upright for the past fifteen minutes stopped working at that very instant.

The room went wavy, her skin grew clammy, and her knees buckled. Crystal’s body went into a free fall.

The tenor of Jenna’s words changed. From anger to panic. “Sara!” Jenna rushed to Crystal’s side, to where she’d fallen in a heap in front of the couch.

Crystal curled into a ball and hugged herself as hard as she could.

“Sara? Sara, please,” Jenna said, stroking her hair and her face and her arm. “Tell me what to do.” More stroking, and Crystal became conscious that Jenna’s fingers were wet from where they’d wiped at her cheeks. Someone was making the most mournful sounds, long, low wails of grief and loss. “Sara? Did he . . . did he rape you?”

No, he didn’t rape me, she thought, shaking her head against Jenna’s thigh. The one bright spot in this whole mess. Her body had locked up so completely that he hadn’t been able to penetrate her. Though, had Jenna not come home when she did, Crystal knew Bruno wouldn’t have been deterred much longer. It hadn’t always stopped him in the past.

“I’m gonna call nine-one-one, sweetie. I’ll be right back,” Jenna said, stroking her hair again.

“No!” Crystal said, twisting to grip Jenna’s wrist before she rose. “No, don’t. I’m okay.” Her voice sounded warped, strained.

“You’re not okay,” Jenna said, a deep frown on her face. Though it was one of fear and concern, not anger.

Crystal shook her head. “He didn’t rape me. He didn’t hurt me. I promise,” she rasped.

Jenna eased back to the floor. “You didn’t look okay. When I came in . . . God. Sara, you looked like you were three seconds from a panic attack.”

“I know,” Crystal said, hiccuping. “I know.” She pushed onto her hands, but the sudden movement left her dizzy.

“Don’t rush,” Jenna said. “Just lie here with me for a little bit.” When Crystal laid her head in Jenna’s lap again, Jenna rubbed her back. “You’re the one usually taking care of me,” she said.

“Yeah,” Crystal said. “I never mind.” Her breathing shuddered, and the crying left her wrung out and headachy. She had to pull herself together.

“Well, I don’t mind either. I just really hate seeing you this way. Nobody should get to do this to you,” she said, keeping her voice as calm as she could as she rubbed wide circles over Crystal’s back. Jenna’s hand slowed. Stilled. “Sara?” she asked in a high-pitched voice.

Crystal closed her eyes. She’d been so wrapped up in herself, she’d forgotten. For a moment, she’d just let herself be comforted. And now Jenna knew. Now, Jenna had seen.

Slowly, the cotton of Crystal’s shirt slid farther up her back, just a few inches, as Jenna leaned around her.

Jenna gasped. “Oh, Sara. Oh, my God. What is this? Oh, my God.”

Crystal’s tears started again, and she burrowed into Jenna’s lap and wrapped her arms awkwardly around her waist. Jenna leaned down and returned the embrace as best as she could. They cried together for a long time.

When Crystal’s body simply had no more tears left to give, she slowly rolled onto her back, her head on Jenna’s legs. “I didn’t want you to know,” she said, her voice a raw scrape. “I didn’t want you to . . . think . . . less of me.”

“Less of you? How could I?” Jenna asked, shaking her head. “My God, I would never have thought this was your fault. Because it’s not. How could it be?”

“I know,” Crystal said, her throat tight again. “I was just so ashamed.” She covered her mouth with her hand, and Jenna stroked her palm over Crystal’s sweaty forehead.

“Will you tell me now?”

The thing she’d never wanted to do. Crystal was supposed to have shielded Jenna from all this. Let her live her life free from the knowledge of this reality. It was part of what she’d promised their father, at least that’s what she’d always told herself. Too late now. The failure sat like a ten-pound weight on her heart. Crystal’s head moved down in a nod without her telling it to, but it was the right thing to do. “I’ll tell you,” she whispered. “I’ll hate it, but I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”