Chapter 18

Chapter Eighteen

Law

After I carried her in from the car last night and tucked her into the bed we now shared, Shepperd slept better than I’d seen her do—ever. The paramedics told us to expect her to be tired, but the twelve plus hours of sleep she logged gave me a lot of thinking time. I went over and over every detail I could remember about the party and felt like more questions arose than were answered.

So I did something I could end up regretting, but only time would tell. My heart was in the right place, I knew that for certain. I cared about Shepperd more every day. And what I witnessed at the birthday party rocked me to the bone.

I reached out to Elijah Banks and asked him to meet me for a cup of coffee and some honest conversation. He was definitely curious, if nothing else, and agreed to sit down with me. We met at a downtown coffee shop since he had to drive in from Malibu.

When I arrived, I scanned the café and saw that he had already secured a table and had a steaming cup of something in front of him. A quick look at my watch ensured I wasn’t late, so I assumed he was met with lighter traffic than he expected.

“Hey, how’s it going?” I asked and offered my hand in greeting.

He gave me a shake and fist bump combination, and I took the seat across from him. “I appreciate you meeting me.”

“Yeah, no worries. Hannah’s family means everything to her, so when you said you wanted to talk about her sister, I made the time.”

“I have to be honest, I’m a little worried this might cause trouble between Shepperd and me because she doesn’t know I’m here. As a general practice, I don’t like doing things behind people’s backs, you know?”

“Then why are you?” he asked bluntly, and it threw me off. I was already on the edge about being there and hoped he would at least pretend what I was doing wasn’t as shitty as it felt.

“Because I care about her,” I blurted. And it was the truth. It was more than just caring about her at this point, but I wasn’t here to confess my feelings to the guy. I needed answers. I needed advice.

He tilted his head to one side, calling me on my shit, and his beachy casual hair flopped over one eye before he pushed it back from his face.

“Yesterday at the birthday party,” I began but pulled up short. How did I even dive into all of this without exposing the information Shepperd confided in me. “What happened to the girls,” I continued while turning my cup in a full circle as though I preferred to drink from the other side. Honestly I was stalling while I figured out what to say and just needed to keep my hands busy.

“Look, man,” he said, and I stilled instantly. His green eyes were piercing as he studied me from across the table. “I’ve been involved with Hannah for a while now. I have to assume I have a lot more backstory from her than you do from Shepperd at this point, right? You guys haven’t been dating that long, have you? Like a month or two?”

“Yeah. I mean, we’ve been talking longer than that. We met at the gym we both go to, but things just got serious when her parents kicked her out. She showed up at my door one night, basically without any other option of where to stay. I was stoked she did, but yeah, it hasn’t been that long.”

“The parents what ?” he asked incredulously.

I shrugged. “All I know is her side of the story. But yeah, that’s what it boiled down to. I guess they were threatening to send her away to rehab for eating disorders.”

“Would that have been a bad thing?”

I felt defensive immediately but took a minute to relax and not bite the guy’s head off. There were a lot of things I could appreciate about his directness.

“Yes and no. I don’t really think she needs intervention at that level. From what I’ve seen, anyway. Yes, she’s very thin, but I also know she has an incredible appetite when she allows herself to enjoy a meal instead of worrying she’ll be critiqued about it.” Those occasions seemed to be increasing in number, but I kept that detail to myself. “But her eating habits aren’t what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Okay, fair enough. What is it, then?” he asked, but seriously…after yesterday, he had to know where this conversation was going.

“I really care about her, you know? I want to understand what she has going on up here.” I tapped my temple a couple of times. “Why did they both panic and freeze like that yesterday? You can’t tell me that’s a normal reaction. Everyone else except Stella and Vela, of course, ran for safety. Those four froze like statues and put themselves at greater risk by doing so.”

He tilted his head to the side again. “Think about it, dude. What do those four have in common? Isn’t it obvious?”

I sat silent for a moment and gave it some thought. It wasn’t the first time I’d tried to draw some parallel between them after seeing them all react so oddly but similarly to each other.

“I think it has something to do with trauma, right? All this is new to me, so I’m trying to understand.”

Elijah nodded. “You’re on the right track. I’ve done a lot of reading about trauma, PTSD, panic, anxiety, and so on. When Hannah and I first got together, I didn’t know shit about mental health outside of what I deal with myself. But I knew it would be best to figure it out. Our therapist has helped a lot too.”

I nodded as he spoke.

“Does Shepperd have a therapist?” he asked.

“Mmm, not that I know of. I mean maybe at some point she has gone, but she isn’t actively seeing someone right now. At least not that I know about.”

“Well, she should be. That’s obvious, right? You both should go, really,” he said with authority, and I couldn’t help but agree. This was way more complicated than I had the tools for.

“She seems resistant to it, so I’m not sure if she’ll do it.”

“There’s no way I believe that she wants to live the way she has been. She seems so angry and in pain. She isolates herself from the family, no matter who tries to reach out. Other than her twin, Maye, I’m not sure she even has any friends.”

I hadn’t even thought of that before, but he was right. The only other person I’d heard her talk about besides her sisters was the one girl she worked with. Joy. But Christ, one thing at a time. This was overwhelming.

“She’s a good person. Funny and smart. She’s the kind of girl that usually has hordes of friends,” I said in my girlfriend’s defense.

“Well, not when she pushes everyone away. Either because she’s embarrassed about what she’s dealing with or she’s scared someone will figure her out and insist she do better for herself.”

“Do you really think that’s what’s going on?”

He gave one solid dip of his chin. “I do.”

“Why did they freeze like that? When everyone else was getting out of harm’s way, they froze. I don’t understand.”

“Our therapist has explained it like this… When a child experiences trauma, especially deep emotional or physical trauma, they freeze in time emotionally. They mature physically and intellectually, but emotionally they stay rooted at the age the traumatic event occurred. So, the girls never developed coping skills past a young age. I’m not sure what Shepperd went through exactly, but I do know about Hannah’s experiences. For the most part.”

“The most part?” I asked.

“Yeah, just being real, man. And not because I think she’s keeping anything from me. She just hasn’t been able to get her brain to let down its guard to remember what happened. I’m kind of surprised it still hasn’t happened after everything else she’s been through.”

“You’re talking about the kidnapping attempt?”

“Well, yes and no. I think that’s where she got stuck emotionally, but based on some dream regression therapy she’s done, we’re pretty sure something else happened. We just haven’t unlocked what that was yet.”

Of course I had some potential backstory here but didn’t feel like it was my place to expose the fact that Shepperd suspected the same school janitor who abused her also abused Hannah.

“Wow. That’s intense. But so much of what you’re saying makes sense. I mean with the way Shep behaves in situations. And don’t get me started on the sleep habits. Oh my God, I’ve never seen someone exist on so few hours of sleep.”

Elijah laughed. “Dude, I remember those days all too well. Thankfully, she worked hard on that problem early on. Now that the baby is here, she’s back to very little sleep and not liking it one bit.”

His face changed completely when he spoke about having a child, and I knew then—if I were at all uncertain before—getting my girl squared away was the most important thing in our lives now. She deserved a happy, healthy, fulfilling life, and I wanted to be right in the center of all of it.

I had one more comment floating around in front of my other thoughts, and this was the guy who would understand best. “Can I ask you one more thing? I’ve probably taken up more of your time than you can afford, so if you have to go, I get it.” At least he had an out if he was done talking about the Farsay girls.

Elijah waved his hand between us. “Yeah, go for it.”

“What’s up with the parents? How the hell do they not see what’s going on? Or do they just not care?” That sounded harsher coming out than it did in my head. I winced apologetically, but he didn’t seem to be bothered by the questions.

“You know, I’m not really sure. On the surface, they seem like good people. Good parents, you know?” Then, with a forced laugh he said, “Though my own were such shit, what do I know?”

I didn’t think I wanted to touch that comment with a ten-foot pole. Luckily he went on.

“They seem to clue in on the things that other people might notice. But then they don’t want to ask themselves why the shit is happening. It’s also possible they’re just not capable of asking themselves why these things are happening to their kids. Does that make sense?”

“It does because I can apply that directly to Shepperd. They can see she’s starving herself but aren’t asking themselves why. What happened to her that she’s choosing to do that to herself.”

“Exactly,” he agreed. “I’m not sure if they are more worried about appearances or just don’t have the tools to dig deeper.”

I thought about that for a couple of minutes and concluded I just didn’t know the people well enough to have a solid answer. We both finished our coffees and stood to leave. I was glad we had this conversation. Whether it gave me a better direction regarding handling my home life, I wasn’t sure. So much of where we went from here would depend on Shepperd.

When I got home, Shepperd was awake. I realized I was hoping she would still be sleeping when I felt like I was sneaking through the house trying to be quiet as a mouse. If she was still sleeping, I wouldn’t have to explain where I’d been, but I wasn’t that lucky.

Her go-to inclination was to doubt those around her, and I just set myself up to be lumped into that camp. The sooner I came clean, the less damage I’d do. I knew all this, but instead of having the conversation we needed to have, I ran off to the shower the second I could get out of the chit-chat she tried to initiate.

I did some deep soul-searching while the hot water pelted my skin. Was building a life with this woman worth the obvious hard work ahead? My head and heart agreed… Absolutely.

With that established, I had to give myself a hearty pep talk about telling her about meeting with her brother-in-law. The trickiest detail would be making my intentions clear. I wasn’t trying to sneak around behind her back or betray her in any way. I was hoping to understand what she was going through, what she dealt with on a daily basis. I just had to be honest with her about my motives and feelings and hope she understood and believed me.

I put on some fresh clothes, dealt with my hair, and then went to find my girl. My heart was thundering in my ears, and I had to force myself to take some calming breaths so I didn’t look guilty before I even began talking.

Based on our conversation when I first got home, she already suspected I wasn’t being honest with her. It was all over her body language. I just hoped she hadn’t worked herself up even more while I was getting my thoughts together.

“Shep?” I called out when I didn’t find her in the kitchen. Her purse and keys were still on the table by the front door, so she couldn’t have gone too far.

“Out here,” I heard her muffled voice call from the patio. I had a very small backyard. Really, it was criminal to even call the postage-stamp sized bit of grass a yard, but it was pretty typical for southern California condos.

I found my beautiful woman lounging in the sun with black, oversized sunglasses perched on top of her blond hair. The sun had already kissed the apples of her cheeks, and she looked livelier than I’d seen her look in the past month.

“Wow,” I muttered.

She smiled up at me. “What?”

“The sun looks amazing on you. Do you like going to the beach?” There was so much we didn’t know about each other.

“I used to when I was a kid. I haven’t been in a really long time. I guess that’s kind of lame when you think about it, huh?”

“What do you mean?” I lowered to sit on the end of her chair beside her feet. Kindly, she moved over a bit to make more room for me.

She shrugged. “People come from all over the country to visit our beaches, and we live here and just take it for granted.”

“True. But we also live here and have to make our livings here. We aren’t on vacation every day. Sometimes life gets in the way of the fun stuff.”

“Absolutely. But maybe we just need to make a bigger effort to enjoy what’s right here in our backyard.”

“Good point. Would you like to go to the beach? Maybe next weekend?” The more I thought about it, the more fun it sounded.

“I think I’d love that,” she said with a sweet smile. “How was the shower? You must have been solving world hunger in there.”

“Yeah, I definitely do serious thinking in the shower. You too?”

“Oh, absolutely. Although, growing up in a house with so many other people, someone else always wanted in the bathroom while I was in the shower, so I couldn’t really take my time.”

This conversation was sweet and normal, and I dreaded the fact that the one I had to initiate next had the potential to wreck the whole day. Shit, maybe worse than that.

“What’s up?” she asked after studying me for a few seconds.

“What do you mean?” I asked but also marveled at how astute she was.

“You’ve got something on your mind, I can tell. You have since you came home. Do you want to talk about it?”

I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. “You’re very smart, Ms. Farsay. You know that?” I said with a heartfelt smile. I truly adored this girl and didn’t want to hurt her. In any way.

She looked down at the book she was holding and shyly said, “Thank you.”

I put my hand on her leg and enjoyed how warm the sun had made her skin. “I’m afraid you might be upset with me, and I don’t want to make you mad.”

“Ohhh kaaaay,” she dragged out with worry clouding her features in an instant.

“I’m sorry,” I said at once. “That’s not a great opener, is it?”

“Nope. Not really,” she said, still concerned about what was coming.

Might as well rip the Band-Aid off. “I had coffee with Elijah this morning.”

“Elijah Banks?” she quickly filled in, her voice immediately gaining volume and fear.

I just nodded and stroked her leg. At least she didn’t pull away.

“Why? Did he call you?” she asked, and I couldn’t figure why that mattered—who called who.

“No. I reached out to him and asked him if we could talk. He said he was free this morning, so I took the opening. He’s one busy guy. Did you know he also has a private company in addition to working for Sebastian Shark?” I was totally rambling.

She just slowly shook her head while keeping her eyes glued on mine. Suspicion was all over her body like an ill-fitting, uncomfortable suit.

“Look, Law. I don’t want you to feel like you have to account for every minute of your day. I don’t want to be that girl, you know? Is it a bit concerning that you met with my brother-in-law? I can’t lie and say it’s not. But only tell me about the conversation if you want to. I don’t want you to feel like you have to.”

That all came at me in one long run-on sentence. I could tell she was trying to be mature and brave about the situation, but it wasn’t her natural inclination.

“I appreciate you saying all of that. I just didn’t want to feel like I did something behind your back, knowing you don’t get along with your sister, aka his wife.”

“Well, that’s exactly what you did. But like I said, you don’t have to account to me how you spend your time.”

“But I want to be respectful, Shepperd. I don’t want you to feel betrayed. Ever.”

“Betrayed? What the hell did the two of you talk about that the word betrayed would even pop into your head? God, the more you talk right now, the more concerned I’m feeling. Maybe we should just call it here.” She stood abruptly from the lounge chair.

I intercepted her escape and wrapped my arms around her. I wanted her to calm down so she would just listen. I was fucking this up by tiptoeing around the issue even though I had been very careful not to expose any details that she wouldn’t want her family to know.

“There’s nothing to be concerned about, baby. We just talked about what happened yesterday. I thought he might be a good person to shed some light on what we’re dealing with, you know?”

She planted her fists on her hips and glared at me. “And what exactly are we dealing with, Law?”

“I shouldn’t have said it like that. That came out wrong,” I tried to amend, but she was already madder than a nest of hornets. “Please,” I begged and tried to tug her hands away from her hips and hold them in mine.

She was having none of the touchy-feely stuff, and I didn’t blame her. She yanked her hands from mine and put some distance between us.

I sank back down on the end of the lounge chair and buried my face in my hands. This was turning into a train wreck, and we’d barely gotten into the heart of the conversation.

“Oh, don’t look so defeated,” she bit.

“I just don’t want to screw this up. Pissing you off was the last thing I wanted.”

“Well, I can’t imagine what you did want, going behind my back to have a little pow-wow with my family. What next, Law? You’ll be on their side and ship me off to rehab?”

Okay, this was getting out of hand. I shot to my feet and crowded into her personal space. “That’s not fair, and you know it,” I told her in a low voice. My neighbors didn’t need to hear every word between us.

I took a deep breath, hoping to calm down before trying one more time to get her to actually hear what I was saying instead of letting her insecurities run away with the conversation.

“I’m worried about you. That experience yesterday scared the shit out of me, and if there’s something I can do to help you never go through something like that again, then I want to do it. I’m just so far outside my wheelhouse on all of this. So I reached out to someone I thought might be able to shed some light on the topic. Why is that such a bad thing?”

Why was she freaking out? When I explained my thought process, it sounded perfectly reasonable.

“Because no matter what you said to him, what you told him, it will all get back to my sister. And then the rest of my family. Do you really not see that?” she asked, her voice even louder than before.

“Please calm down,” I said. “The entire neighborhood doesn’t need to hear our disagreement.”

As her eyes bulged out of her head, I knew that was the wrong choice of words. Again.

Damn it. I couldn’t win here.

“So appearances are more important than my feelings? You’re just like my parents!”

“No. That’s not true at all. And stop putting words in my mouth. The only motivation behind the get-together was wanting to understand your PTSD better. Do you not realize how much I care about you? How watching that episode yesterday turned my heart inside out, Shepperd? I want to help you. However I can…I just want to help.”

“My PTSD? What are you talking about?”

We stared at each other for a while before either one of us said anything else. The tears in her big blue eyes gutted me. I didn’t want to hurt her. At all. Everything I was afraid of happening was happening. No matter what I said, she was masterfully twisting around to align with her perception.

What a clusterfuck.

“Shepperd,” I began, but she held her flat hand up to my face.

“Just stop. I don’t know how much more of this I can take. Especially after everything yesterday.” Her tone was acidic and nasty, and I didn’t particularly care to be spoken to that way. I didn’t do anything wrong.

“Shepperd,” I tried again, but she had apparently reached her limit. She was fully crying as she glared at me and took off through the house with me hot on her heels.

“Baby, let’s talk this out. I’m not trying to upset you. It’s the last thing I wanted,” I said to her back as I followed her through the kitchen and down the hall to the bedroom.

“Just leave me alone,” she said through her tears that had ramped up to full sobs. She was the first one through the bedroom door and tried to slam the heavy thing in my face. Luckily–and that was probably the only time I would say that—her tiny body was no match for the thick, oak slab, so it closed with much less force and speed than she wanted.

I easily caught the door before it closed and barged right into the room behind her.

She basically trapped herself by storming in here, but maybe with her cornered she would hear me out.

Instead, she started yanking her things out of the closet and tossing them in a heap on the floor.

“What are you doing?” I asked, watching her move back and forth between the closet and the pile.

“What does it look like? Leaving. Then you won’t have to be burdened with the likes of me,” she said in uneven gasps.

I stepped forward and caged her entire torso in my arms. “Stop this.”

“I don’t want to be here with you,” she whimpered while struggling to get away.

Not going to lie. That one hurt.

“I know you’re angry, but don’t say things you don’t mean or can’t take back when this blows over.” It was solid advice from years of maturity on her young twenty-two. “You can’t run away every time we don’t agree on something.”

“Watch me,” she seethed and tried to pull out of my arms again.

So I waited her out. Let her wear herself down struggling in my embrace until she finally collapsed against my chest and cried. I stroked my hand over her head and down the length of her silky hair. The whole time I stayed silent except for lots of shhhhh and random kisses to the top of her head.

“I’m so mad,” she finally croaked from against my body.

“I know, baby. And I’m sorry for that. The last thing I meant was for you to be mad or hurt,” I replied but didn’t move. I was afraid if I let go, she’d take off again.

“Why does everyone think they know what’s best for me? I’m not a child.”

“Having that conversation this morning with Elijah wasn’t because I think I know what you need. In fact, it was the exact opposite of that. I don’t know what you need, and I thought he would have some insight.”

She didn’t respond, but she finally hugged me back as we stood in the middle of the bedroom.

“You don’t have to fix me, Law. I mean, I get that I’m totally fucked up, but just once in my life, can’t someone love me for the person I am? Not the person they wish I were?”

“First of all, that’s not what I said.” I pulled back and ducked down a bit to meet her teary stare. “I said I want to help you. I never said fix you. You have to stop twisting my words around to fit your narrative here.”

Again, she said nothing. I badly wanted her to take responsibility for that habit. It needed to stop, but if she wouldn’t admit to doing it, we were further from that happening than I’d hoped.

But I wasn’t done responding to her last comment. Hopefully, I wasn’t about to make things worse.

“I do love you for the person you are, and I think you’re perfect just the way you are. I don’t have some manufactured version of you I’m trying to mold you into. I love this version of you right here.” I cradled her face in my palms and swiped her tear-streaked cheeks with my thumbs.

“You love me?” she whispered.

I smiled. “It’s definitely feeling that way,” I responded after taking in the features of her angelic face.

Even though she’d been crying, I’d never seen a more beautiful woman. Her eyes were big and bright with unshed tears. The glassy sheen made the blue so much deeper, so much more intense. Her long lashes were stuck together in pointed clusters that framed her eyes like my sister’s childhood dolls. She looked innocent and fragile, and every manly instinct in my body roared to life. I wanted to take care of her and protect her in a way I’d never felt before. If that wasn’t how it felt to love someone, I had no hope of ever feeling it.

“What did you tell him? I have to know what damage control I’m looking at.”

“Damage control?” I asked, frustrated that we were going right back to this. “I told you I didn’t say anything that would betray the confidence you’ve given me. I wouldn’t do that to you.” What I didn’t admit out loud was how much her distrust stung. It really seemed like I was paying for crimes I didn’t commit, and she wasn’t capable of seeing how unfair that was.

But I was exhausted. This whole situation was exhausting, and it was at the point that felt like we were chasing our tails.

Her silence wasn’t helping but I didn’t want to fight anymore. I wasn’t used to this kind of interaction with a woman. Typically, my relationships were very surface level and light spirited. I never got involved deeply enough to involve feelings past passion and, before Shepperd, didn’t care to.

I needed to get my head on straight. I knew that much. If we kept at this right now, I feared things would be said that weren’t meant just because I was frustrated.

So, I pulled her close again and said, “Let’s stop, please. I’m so tired and, to be honest, confused on what else I can say to you right now.”

“That’s fine,” she mumbled, and I couldn’t tell if she was placating me or not.

“Wanna watch TV or something?” I asked. Lying with her in my arms sounded like the perfect way to spend the entire day.

“I think I’m going to go out for a bit,” she said, and I felt like I’d been punched in the windpipe.

“Where are you going?” I asked, worried it sounded a bit too demanding.

Her return stare held a ton of warning, confirming what I’d feared. But I didn’t want to apologize or backpedal. Was it wrong to let your partner know where you were going when you left the house? I didn’t think so. Not in theory, at least.

The tone was what needed work, and I understood that the minute the question flew out of my mouth.

“Like I said, out,” she volleyed back.

I nodded a couple of times and kissed the top of her head. “Please be careful. You can take the SUV if you want. I don’t think there’s been a change in your car’s status.”

Okay, was that a shitty tactic? Maybe. I didn’t want her to feel indebted to me because I would loan her my vehicle. But it also wouldn’t hurt her to be a bit nicer when I’d been nothing but the best version of myself I was capable of in a very unfamiliar situation.