Page 84 of Home With You

"What guy?"

"A guy I met at the mall. I was walking around and he saw me and said he noticed I wasn't walking right. I told him about the car accident. How it hurt my back. He offered me a pill. It made the pain go away so I asked for another. And another after that. I couldn't stop. As long as I paid him, Jacob gave me as many as I wanted. He's the friend I told you about. The one who got me hooked."

"He wasn't a friend."

"No, but at the time I thought he was. It was another stupid mistake. I trusted him like I trusted Rob. I kept trusting the wrong people. But going back to this girl, the one who showed up at the door, I told her I'd tell Rob she stopped by but she wouldn't go. She started getting really mad and that's when I recognized the signs. The need. The desperation. Not letting anyone stand between you and the drugs. She took a knife out and slit my hand." Raine holds up her palm, showing me the scar. "Then she shoved the door open and ran up the stairs. I followed her and found her in the spare bedroom. She opened the closet where Rob kept his suits and other work clothes. He dressed there in the mornings so he wouldn't wake me up. The girl took one of his suit jackets from the hanger and started searching the pockets. She pulled out a plastic bag. It was full of pills. The same kind I'd taken. The kind that ruined my life." Raine drops her head, shaking it side to side. "It was then I realized I'd been dating a man who was purposely leading others down the path I'd been on. The path that took away the plans I had for my life and almost landed me in prison."

"So he was like the guy you met at the mall? He found people and got them hooked?"

"No. He hired people to do that. People like Jacob, the guy who made me an addict. I never met the dealer Jacob worked for but I used to imagine him looking like the devil, with a red suit and a black tie. Turns out it was a black suit and a blue tie."

"Wait." I turn to her. "Are you saying..." I wait for her to tell me.

She nods. "Rob was the dealer. He sold the pills to Jacob and Jacob went out and found users. He got a commission for each sale."

"But Jacob's in jail. So why isn't Rob?"

"They couldn't trace it back to him. He's good at covering his tracks. He hires guys like Jacob so that they'll be the ones who get arrested, not Rob." Raine takes a breath and shuts her eyes. "I was dating the man who made me an addict. I know it wasn't him directly but he was the one in charge of it all. The one who got the pills and distributed them to guys like Jacob. He trained them on what type of people to look for. People like me, who were obviously in pain. Then he trained him on what to say to get people to trust him. The first three pills were free. Just enough to get the person hooked. Rob knew exactly what he was doing. He'd developed a system and it worked. It was why he was so rich. And the worst part?" A tear slides down her cheek. "I benefitted from that money. The house. The clothes. The car he got me. The jewelry. It was all bought with money he got from addicts. People just like me whose lives had been ruined by Rob, the guy I thought I loved."

"Holy shit," I mutter. That wasn't the story I was expecting her to tell. I don't know what I thought she'd say but it definitely wasn't that. "And he told you all this?"

"Not until a week later. Rob was out of town when that girl came over. He was on a business trip, probably trying to recruit new sellers so he could expand his territory. I didn't want to confront him over the phone so I waited until he got home. By then, I had a plan to leave. I should've left while he was gone but I didn't. Part of me didn't believe it was true. I didn't want to believe Rob had done this and had been lying to me the whole time."

"Did he admit to what he'd done?"

She nods. "When he got home from his trip, I dropped the bags of pills in front of him and told him to start talking. At first he tried to deny it. He said they weren't his. I tossed more bags at him, the others I'd found hidden in the house, and demanded he tell me the truth. He did, but only if I asked him questions. He wouldn't admit to anything himself. I had to come to my own conclusions, then ask him if they were true."

"And after that, you tried to leave?"

"I should've, but I didn't. Because I didn't have a place to go. My plan was to stay with a friend from high school. I hadn't talked to her in years but she was the only friend I knew who would take me in. But when I looked her up online, I found out she'd joined the military and lived overseas. Next I called my dad but his number changed. Someone else picked up and said they'd never heard of him. I knew he'd moved but he never told me he got a new phone number. I'm not sure where he is now. The info I found online is all old. So I decided to stay with Rob until I could find a new place to live. But then two days later we had a huge fight and I threatened to tell the cops on him." She pauses. "That's all I remember."

"What do you mean?"

"He hit me so hard I passed out. When I woke up, I was in the hospital with bruises all over my body. He'd shoved pills down my throat, so many I could've died. But I got to the hospital just in time."

"How'd you get to the hospital?"

"I don't know. The nurse said someone dropped me off there but I don't know who. It could've been the pool guy. He was supposed to work later that morning and he had a key to the house. If he saw me like that he wouldn't just leave me. He liked me. We'd talk whenever he'd come over to clean the pool. I'm sure it was him who brought me in.”

“What happened to Rob? He took off?”

“He probably went to his office. I think he was hoping it'd look like I'd overdosed and fallen down the stairs to explain the bruises."

"I want to kill that fucker," I say, gritting my teeth. "Tell me where he lives and I'll make sure he pays for what he did to you."

"He doesn't live there anymore. When I was about to be released from the hospital, I called my neighbor and made up this story about how I was out of town and lost my phone and wanted her to tell Rob something. I didn't tell her or anyone else what had happened to me. I was too afraid of what he'd do to me if I told. Anyway, Doris, my neighbor, told me Rob had moved out a week ago, the same day I arrived at the hospital. She said new people were already moving in. Everything I had at the house was gone. My clothes. The phone he'd bought me. The car he gave me to use. It was all gone. I was homeless with my only possessions being the clothes I wore to the hospital." She turns to me. "That's it. The whole story."

She gets up and runs down the stairs.

I catch up with her in the kitchen. "Raine, you have to go to the police. You can't let that guy get away with this. Not only what he did to you but what he's still doing. He's a criminal and he needs to be in prison."

"He's gone, Miles," she says, leaning against the kitchen counter. "Along with my ability to trust myself and anyone I meet. I wish I could, and someday I will. But not now. It's too soon. That's why this has to end."

19

Raine

Miles stands across from me, looking like he's still trying to process what I said. My story was a lot to take in and I'm sure it's not at all what he was expecting. But it's the truth, and as much as I didn't want to relive it all just now, I had to tell him so he'd understand the reason we can't be together. If it were a different time and I was at a different place in my life, I'd date him without any hesitation. But we met at a time when my life's a mess and I need to figure things out, which tells me this relationship just wasn't meant to be.

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