Page 63 of No Second Chances

She nods, biting her lip while she lifts the folder.

The first photo is of her neck, with a handprint wrapped around it, already bruised. Her face is darkened with dried blood, and her hair is matted against her skull.

I have to tune out the gasps from her family. Instead, I concentrate on my ring. The one sitting on Kennedy’s finger.

“Royal beat me.” I feel the weight on her shoulders, the way Kennedy slumps as she admits what she thinks is her greatest failure. “And when I wouldn’t give him what he wanted, he almost killed me.”

That’s all she says. But she slides the pages and the photos out of the folder and onto the table for everyone to see. There isn’t space to move, but we all fit as we stare, one by one, at the images of Kennedy’s worst night.

Streaks of blood and tiny cuts all over her body. A chain. He used a chain, and he cut into her skin. Not deep enough to cause the type of scars I’d expect. But enough that she should have died. There are so many of them. Over a hundred, and that is a light estimate. Her body is covered in them. Bruises from where he hit her either before or during or even after spot her back. The back of her neck is probably the worst. There is an entire patch in one photo where Royal must have ripped hair from her head, because there is nothing but skin and blood where there should be hair.

I keep my shit together better than I think I will. Until the last image. The one with her hand. More blood, and the chain she clenches in her fist, cutting into her skin as she refuses to let it go. I recognize the metal curve as it digs into her hand.

The dog tag I gave her all those years ago. And I’m not the only one who notices it. Every man in the room has worn a set of dog tags at one point in their life. I can’t even meet her eyes, let alone anyone else’s. I can’t face the shame for what I’ve done.

Kennedy wasn’t just beat for fun. Royal didn’t try to kill her because she wouldn’t love him. He is a psychopath at the very least, true. He is the worst kind of man; that is never in doubt. But Kennedy holds back to protect me. When she confided in me about what he did, she didn’t tell me why or if he even had a reason.

The file and the photos are proof. Kennedy almost died because of me.

“I love you.” Her voice cuts through the pain and darkness that has settled around me like an old friend. “I love you, and you did not do this. Regardless of what you think.”

“Why are you showing us this?” Veronica hiccups. “What’s going on?”

“I lied to the responding officer, but they still documented everything, Mom. They took DNA evidence. And I’m going to tell the truth. He killed Mallory Mitchells, and I’m going to do whatever I can to make sure that he doesn’t do the same thing to anyone else.”

Kennedy’s demand, her need to handle it, to keep us from interfering, it all makes sense now.

“I don’t need you to protect me.” Kennedy’s eyes lock on mine, her fingers clenching around my hand. “I need you to stand by my side while I destroy him.”

28

KENNEDY

“I lied,” I admit to the officers sitting in the conference room to take my statement. “I was involved in an abusive relationship with one of the most affluential defense attorneys in the area. I didn’t want him to kill my family, like he threatened.”

Sitting across from the same two men who’d come to the hospital that night isn’t my idea of a good time. Not only that, but they are both watching me with matching looks of disbelief.

“I don’t think I believe you,” Deputy Limm says bluntly. “Don’t get me wrong… I didn’t believe you that night either. And there’s no doubt in my mind that you were involved in an abusive relationship. I just find it hard to believe that it’s only after he accuses your boyfriend of murder that you come out of the woodwork with this.”

I swallow down the rage I feel at his accusation and look at the victim’s advocate that Maya arranged for me. She nods silently, offering her support.

“You don’t actually have to believe me,” I tell him. “I recorded the incident on my phone. Not only that, but he videotaped multiple assaults.”

Both deputies immediately sit forward, their dismissal of my earlier statement gone. “You have the recordings?” They share a look. “Do you know where he would keep the tape of the assault?”

When I shake my head at that, the second officer, Deputy Atwell, shrugs. “With the recording of the assault that you have, we’ll be able to get a warrant for everything.”

He rubs a hand over his beard. “If you had the recording this whole time, why not come forward sooner? That’s bothering me. What can he use against you in court, Kennedy?”

“Nothing,” I admit. “There was no reason. He threatened to kill me. To kill my family. You know my brother and my father.” I nod toward the glass window behind us. I don’t even have to look to know they are standing there, silently offering their protection.

“It’s hard to miss them,” Deputy Atwell says. “But I think your mother has the scariest reputation in the state as far as dispatchers go. I’d be more afraid if she was out there.”

“She is,” I tell them with a smile. “She’s not there, though. She’s hiding out in the dispatch room, no doubt listening to our entire conversation on the other side of the door.”

“You’re damn right I am,” Mom calls through the wall. “You don’t want us to interfere, that’s fine. But I’m gonna protect you any way I can.”

I wave my hand dramatically. “My family for you.”

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