Touch & Go (Tessa Leoni, #2)(67)

My husband.

I sent my daughter to bed. She’d had enough for one night and needed the rest. Then, though my hands still shook uncontrollably, and I had to pause on occasion to recover my breath, I slowly and gently washed the worst of the blood from Justin’s face.

He sighed.

I kissed the corner of his mouth.

He sighed again. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“I wish…”

“Shhhh. Rest now.”

I got him to quiet down. Then I fell asleep, still sitting up on the edge of the bunk, holding my husband’s hand.


THEY DIDN’T COME FOR US first thing in the morning. Maybe they decided they’d tortured us enough the night before. Or, more likely, they were catching up on their own rest.

Our narrow window lightened with daylight. I awoke with a crick in my neck from sitting with my back against a metal bunk post. I felt weak but less achy. More like a middle-aged woman, badly in need of water, food and a good night’s sleep.

The pills, I figured. Whatever Radar had provided was masking the worst of my withdrawal, temporarily reducing my symptoms. I didn’t know what that might be. Not Vicodin, because that always provided a lovely glow, a softening of life’s hard edges. I felt none of that. No melting wonderland, just fewer tremors, less nausea and despair.

I should ask Radar about the medication, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. Right now, this moment, I was doing better. Given our current situation, I had a feeling that was as good as it was going to get.

I used the toilet while my family slept, then refilled the water jug from the sink, which, given the barely-there trickle, was an accomplishment. This must be what inmates did with their time in prison. Stood around waiting to get enough water out of the faucet to wet a finger, rinse their mouths, wash their faces.

I took tiny sips out of the jug, working on hydration while I peered out the window in the cell door, eyeing the cavernous, overlit expanse of the dayroom, wondering where our attackers might be lurking next.

To the far left end of the dayroom was a bank of showers. Broad, white-tiled stalls, six down, six up. On the left end of the stacked rows loomed one particularly large stall with metal support bars bolted to each wall. Handicap accessible. Things you don’t think about. That not all members of the prison population are big, tough guys. Some are injured or aging or otherwise impaired.

I wouldn’t want to be them in here. I couldn’t even stand it being me.

Of course, none of the stalls offered frosted glass doors or even cheap vinyl shower curtains. Just wide-open exposure. Apparently, showering in prison was a full-monty affair.

I still eyed the stalls with longing. My hair hung down in lank clumps. I’d sweated through my orange jumpsuit, could feel the salt riming my skin. I tried to figure out if I could partially disrobe, try to use the slow dribble of sink water to at least rinse off my torso.

But I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I remained too afraid of alien beetles, who might burst through the cell door at any time. Not to mention the look that would come into Mick’s crazy blue eyes if he could catch me partially unclothed.

Prison had eyes, Justin had said.

Even now, they were watching us. Watching me.

I sipped more water, turned away from the cell door and discovered Justin, now awake on the lower bunk, staring at me.

“Ashlyn,” he croaked.

“Asleep.” I brought over the jug of water. Helped hold up his head while he took the first few sips. He winced the moment I touched him, but didn’t comment.

“They didn’t…come back?”

I didn’t know what he meant, eyeing him in confusion.

“After they got me. They didn’t…come for you?”

“No,” I assured him.

“I hoped…not. As long as they were beating me… I knew they couldn’t be…hurting you. But then, Z. He disappeared. I didn’t know…what that meant.”

“We didn’t see him.”

“Okay.”

“Justin…why? If this is about money…” I gestured to his horribly swollen and distorted features. “Why?”

“I don’t…know. They kept telling me…to stop. Stop what?” Justin grimaced, sipped more water. “Then they’d say they were the ones asking the questions, and hit me again.”

I frowned, considering the matter. “Have you…have you been doing something you shouldn’t?”

My husband smiled, but it was a sad expression on his battered face. “You mean other than cheating on my wife?”

I flushed, looked away.

“I ended the relationship, Libby…as you requested…six months ago. I never should’ve started it in the first place.”

“Maybe, something else? Maybe related to work?”

But Justin wouldn’t be put off. “I’m sorry. You know that, right?”

I didn’t answer, just looked away.

“But you’re still not happy,” he said, and again, the expression on his face…

“I’m trying,” I said at last.

“I looked forward to our date night.”

“Me, too.” But I still wouldn’t meet his gaze, couldn’t meet his gaze. I wasn’t prepared for this conversation. It was easier for me to view my husband as the bad guy. He had lied, he had cheated. If I kept that perspective, then the total collapse of my life didn’t have to be my fault.