A Harmless Little Game (Harmless #1)(38)

Insist on being heard.

“Tara, Mandy and Jenna are fine, upstanding young women who you placed in a deeply unfair position, Lindsay!” Mom peels my fingers off Daddy’s wrist and digs her fingernails into my palm so hard I feel flesh tear. But I don’t move a muscle, because my skin has separated from my body and hovers above us, miles away.

“No, Mom. The only people who placed me in an unfair position were the three guys who tied me up and raped every hole I have.”

SLAP!

My teeth rattle in my skull, my neck jerking to the side, the painful tear of neck muscles causing a tight, splintering spasm that makes me stagger. I don’t fall, but I come damn close, and soon deep voices shout mine and Mom’s names, over and over.

I look up, my lip split, Drew holding my mother’s elbow, Mom screaming in his face.





Chapter 28





Daddy stands back and watches the room with narrowed eyes.

“You get your f*cking hands off me, Andrew Foster. You have no right to touch me like this. I will call security and—”

“I am security, Monica. I’m Lindsay’s security, and you currently represent a physical threat to her,” Drew says, his voice tainted with disgust and a politeness that makes her seethe. Two plainclothes security guys, Daddy’s retinue, flood the room. They assess so quickly I don’t even see it, and Drew gives a sharp nod, letting go of Mom.

Daddy holds his palm up to them. They retreat, like well-trained dogs.

“Don’t you ever harm Lindsay again,” Drew instructs my mother, who stretches her head up and holds his gaze like she wishes he would burst into flame.

“You can’t tell me what to do, you weak little no-account worm who—”

“He’s a decorated war hero who saved my helicopter when it was shot down on a diplomatic visit to Lagos, Monica. For God’s sake. Let up on him. Just because he caught you in the wrong doesn’t mean you should take it out on him,” Daddy says, his commanding voice making everyone freeze in place.

Mom’s gaze moves from Drew to Daddy, the anger unwavering. I didn’t know about the helicopter mission, or Drew’s role in it. So many details I don’t know. Pieces of the situation are starting to fit into the framework of a larger puzzle.

My palm presses against my cheek, which feels wet. Gingerly, I investigate and find a small gash under my eye. Mom’s ring must have torn the skin. She looks at me, chin up, defiant in that way she has, where she’s so convinced she’s right that she doesn’t care about the emotional consequences.

“You should be more respectful in your language, Lindsay.”

This is the moment when I would cower. Before. Before, I would do whatever I was told, but I was free to live my life within the confines of whatever Mom and Daddy set out for me.

Mom is about to get a taste of After.

“I’m so sorry,” I say, lowering my voice with a plaintive, apologetic tone.

Her shoulders relax, eyes narrowing like a cat that knows its prey has been cornered.

I keep up the ruse, using a vocal inflection that makes me sound a little too much like Mr. Rogers, from that old kid’s television show. “I’ll be more careful in how I talk about my gang rape from now on. Would you like to approve the medical terminology I can use to describe how the surgeon reconstructed the wall between my vagina and anus? I believe my medical chart uses the words—”

Drew’s eyes are wide as saucers. Mom looks like she’s about to slap me again.

“Enough!” Daddy roars. “Everyone out. I want to speak with Lindsay alone.”

Numb. My entire body goes numb. No cold. No hot. No inbreath. No outbreath. I turn into a senseless, touchless, tasteless, sightless, soundless being who is frozen in place as I realize my mistake.

I am human. I have an opinion. I have a soul and feelings and I cannot handle having my integrity so deeply breached that people who are supposed to love and support me actually believe all these lies.

And have never, not once, even asked me if what’s been said about me is true.

Mom and Daddy and Drew remain after everyone else filters out. Daddy glares at Mom.

“You too, Monica.”

“No,” she says calmly, as if she expected to be evicted. “I’m staying.”

Daddy laces his fingers around my upper arm and gently guides me out of the room, calling back over his shoulder. “Fine. Have fun.”

I wish I could see Mom’s face.

“Are you hurt?” Daddy’s voice holds a lick of compassion in it, just enough that my shell starts to crack. Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, I beg myself. Please don’t cry. I can cry in my room in a few minutes. Being Strong Lindsay is more important than feeling.

“My lip is. I’m bleeding a little.” He pulls me into a tiny solarium, right off a small sliding door where Mom can’t see us. My vision spins for a second and I lean into him. Daddy’s a wall of rock, his arm around my shoulders, easing me into a chair.

“Lindsay, that was bad,” he says, exhaling with irritability. “You can’t do that again.”

“Do what? Defend myself?”

“That wasn’t a defense.”

“You never gave me a chance. You all convicted me four years ago and sent me away to serve a prison sentence. I was the one incarcerated instead of the guys who violated me.”