Page 82 of Cuts Like An Angel: Part 3

“Well, I kind of figured if you don't want him to know. It must be about him.”

“Oh no. It isn’t about him,” she paused, flipped open her papers and pulled out the emailed contract and contract papers to dissolve it all. “I got sent this.”

She handed them to Mark and sat back as he flipped through. First reading the original contract and then the one that Peter had sent to dissolve it for the sum of $50,000. She also gave him pictures Peter had had the decency to upload.

“William doesn't know about this?”

Rosie bit her lip. “No. I …” Whatever excuse she could come up with now sounded lame. They sounded like she was a coward, or worse, a liar. Maybe she was. William would think so if he knew.

“You've been in England nearly a year?”

“Yeah. It's not just that. There’s this too.” She handed the letter to Mark. The one her father had given to her. “He says he can get my papers revoked.”

“This is a psychiatric report?”

Rosie nodded, her face flushed with Mark knowing this, seeing that. “It was a long time ago. My father says they’re arranging for me to go back.”

“Why were you in there? Was it voluntarily?”

Rosie paused. The words were like lead, slowly sinking through her body and refusing to come out. All of this. It was meant to be behind her now. Not coming up and biting her. If she ever got away from her parents again, she’d not make the mistake of telling them where she was. Never, ever again. “The reports say I had a psychotic breakdown. That I was a danger to myself, and the family.”

“The reports say that?”

“Yes.”

“But?”

“I had a baby,” Rosie said, pushing back the pain that came with those words. Pushing back the way her chest tightened and her stomach ached. “She, um … she … didn’t make it.”

“So, you were grieving?” It helped her the way Mark spoke, methodical, all business. The way he kept his voice neutral no matter what she said. She took strength from that.

“Yes. I was. The father of the baby was someone who worked for my father. He’d been … I … erm,” she paused again. “I don’t know how to say it. It started when I was fourteen. He was forty-two.”

A flicker of something across Mark’s expression but gone an instant later. Good. She needed that too. She needed the validation of it.

“Did you ever report it?”

“I tried to. Not when I was fourteen, but when I was older. After I had the baby, I know she didn’t make … Well, something changed in me. Like suddenly I could see what was happening. After my baby, my parents just sent me back to work and college as if nothing had happened. No one spoke about it. No one said a word. When I came out of hospital all the things, you know, the crib, clothes? They’d all gone. Like she’d never existed. I did go a little crazy.”

Mark sat back. Nodded. “Well, yes. They pretended you’d not had a baby?”

“They pretended everything. Said I was crazy. My mother tried to calm me down, and I’d pushed her away. She fell. I lost my temper, my sister got involved, my dad.” She took a breath. “My dad told me I was going to be working with Trent. That was my dad’s friend, the one who …”

“The baby’s father?”

Rosie nodded. “I lost my temper, ended up in the psychiatric ward. My dad got one of his friends to sign me in there. I stayed until they decided I’d calmed down. Until I was over things.”

“Until you gave up?”

“Yeah. When I came out, I didn't want to go back to working for my dad. Not with Trent there, so he made a deal with Peter. Peter then was just beginning to take over his own father’s business, so the contract between us meant my father and his father would have legal assets or something like that. I don't know what it was. To be honest, back then, I didn’t care. I just wanted to move on. I met this girl, Stephanie, when I was in the psych. She was like a nurse there. No, not really. A volunteer. We made friends. I’d never had a real friend before.”

“You’re still friends with Stephanie now?”

“Yeah. I mean, I haven't talked to her in a while. She moved here too. That's how I came here. She met an Englishman, and they got married. I used to tell her about Peter, about my dad. She and her husband had a baby, and so they arranged it for me to be the nanny. You know how they have to prove only an American can do the job, and not an English person?”

“Yeah. So, they did that for you?”

“Yeah. Steph’s husband. He’s lovely. I worked for them for a month or so. Lived with them too.”

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