Page 52 of Shattered Lives

Jesus Christ.

Chills run down my spine, and it’s hard for me to breathe as images I’ve tried to repress surge forth. I stare at Tucker, remembering in excruciating detail the night we rescued Lila and Charlie. Lila was in bad shape – beaten, bloodied, and raped. Those assholes were brutal to her.

But to Charlie? They were barbaric.

Those savage bastards tortured her. Carved her up with a rusty knife. Burned their filth into her flesh. Strung her up like an animal waiting to be gutted. All that, on top of the beatings and rapes and God only knows what else.

I almost lost her twice, once because I fucked up, and a second time from infection from the shit they did to her.

I close my eyes, horror settling in the pit of my stomach. I fight the urge to vomit.

Charlie’s reliving what those fuckers did all over again.

“Every night?” My voice is hoarse.

Tucker shakes his head. “Not every night. At least, not before she went to San Antonio. I don’t know about now.”

My eyes land on him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

My accusatory tone doesn’t offend him. “There’s nothing you could have done from halfway around the world except worry or get yourself killed by being distracted. Charlie needed you to come home alive, not in a body bag. Lila and I help her as much as she’ll let us.”

Though part of me knows he’s right, my scowl persists. “Does she sleepwalk? How did she make it down the stairs from her room?”

Tucker shakes his head. “She won’t sleep upstairs. Most nights, she barely sleeps at all. She stays on the bench outside your door. She feels safest there because she can monitor the front door, both entry points in the kitchen, and the hall entrance. She has a blanket and pillow and keeps her gun with her, safety off. If she even thinks anything moves, she shoots.”

I recall the spotted paint on the living room wall nearest the kitchen, where there’s both a sliding glass door and a side entrance. It’s the most vulnerable area in her home, which is likely why she faces it. I bet those splotches are patched bullet holes. “She shoots the walls?”

“I’ve completely reframed her living room wall and hallway with solid 6x6 posts. They’re heavy enough to stop the bullets. I replace the drywall a few times a year.”

Jesus Christ. I drag my hand through my hair.

“What did she do while she was in Texas?”

“I sent her a pair of tactical batons heavy enough to break bones. She couldn’t take her gun.”

“I wonder how she slept.”

“Probably like she used to here, with her back against the door. That’s why Lila bought her that bench. But Charlie never slept more than a couple of hours a night at the hotel. She didn’t feel safe. She’s looked exhausted for a while, and she’s lost weight. She does that when she’s struggling.”

My face burns with shame when I recall the accusations I hurled at her a couple of weeks ago, when she was late because she had to buy jeans, and she said she didn’t sleep well in hotels.

God, I was an asshole.

And not just that one time, either. I’ve been a jerk the whole time. She’s been losing weight, not sleeping, struggling to survive, and I’ve been too self-absorbed to even notice. She slapped on a fake smile for my benefit, and I was too busy being a dick to see her distress. The shit that happened to me pales in comparison to the hell she went through.

The hell she’s still going through.

“She never told me,” I mumble. “All this time, all these weeks in a hospital room with nothing for us to do but sit and talk, and she never said one word.”

Tucker sighs heavily. “Charlie’s ashamed of her PTSD. She didn’t want to worry you, and she wouldn’t let us tell you. I’d planned to tell you tomorrow anyway. I didn’t think anything would happen her first night back. I thought she’d be too tired to dream. That happens sometimes.”

Well, that plan nearly got me shot in the head.

I keep that thought to myself and focus on Charlie. “So the camera in the ceiling, that’s so you can keep an eye on her?”

He nods. “It feeds to my laptop in our room. If she cries out or fires her gun, it triggers an alarm. Lila calls her and we talk with her through the phone and the two-way speaker. Once she’s reoriented, she puts down her gun, and Lila calms her down. Usually we can do it from our house, but sometimes we have to come over. Depends how bad it is.” His blue eyes are troubled as he raises his beer bottle to his lips and looks away.

He’s remembering a bad episode. Maybe more than one.

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