Page 58 of Refusing Kendall

“My voice?” I ask in a whisper.

Nodding, he answers, “It’ll be off for a bit from the tube. It’s not permanent. Do you remember everything that happened?”

I try not to notice that the guys are hanging on every word that comes out of our mouths as I admit, “Yes.”

“There are some officers here that will want to speak with you when you’re feeling ready for it. Would you like to tell us first?” he asks gently. I get the feeling he’s giving me an opening to break down if I need to and not that he’s simply probing for the sake of curiosity.

A pin could be heard dropping when I whisper my story to them. I leave out several parts that the doctor doesn’t need to know, but I do tell him that I’m ready to talk to the cops. It’s best to do it now and get this shit over with before I lose my nerve. Hopefully, they’ll be able to catch both of them before they leave the country.

Lucas, who took my hand as I was speaking, leans down and presses a kiss against my forehead. I don’t want to get into a conversation with them right now. Shit is going to get emotional, and I want as clear of a head as I can manage to talk to the officers. Apparently, they agree, because no one says anything. They don’t sit either, just stand there like bumps on a log. I swallow the lump in my throat and clamp my lips shut before I do something stupid, like beg them never to leave me again, even if it’s my idea.

We only have to wait a few minutes before there’s a soft knock at the door. Lucas tells them to come in but never lets go of my hand, for which I’m supremely grateful. The young detective that has been working our case walks in first, followed by a regular uniformed officer that doesn’t look much older than him.

“Hi, Kendall,” the detective says, stopping halfway across the room. I don’t know if that’s procedure or he’s just uncomfortable getting closer with all the guys watching him from across the bed. They can be intimidating as fuck sometimes.

“You may have to come closer,” Lucas tells them. “She can’t talk above a whisper right now.”

They nod and move closer. The detective even goes as far as to scoot Goose’s vacant chair up next to me.

“I’m sorry that we weren’t able to catch him before he did this to you,” he starts.

Out of all the people that could blame themselves for this, he is the last that I expected.

“Don’t blame yourself,” I whisper. “He was just waiting for the all clear to get to me.”

He nods, “Do you know who it was?”

That’s one of the things that I withheld from telling the doctor, but I feel Lucas’ hand tighten on mine when I nod slightly. There’s a sympathetic tilt to his lips telling me that he already knows who it was, but for whatever reason, they didn’t tell the guys.

Since they already know, I carefully inch my head to face Lucas and Mav, who are standing closer than the others, “It was my dad.”

Lucas’ mouth drops open, and I see Teagan’s fists clench out of the corner of my eye. Mav is the first one to get his shit together, “I thought he was serving time in prison for murder?”

I’m not sure if he’s speaking to me or the cops, but I close my eyes as I answer him, “He was. He got my mom to confess to the murder by threatening her, and they let him out.”

Four angry sets of eyes turn to the officers, and the detective holds his hands up, “Not us, boys. We just put them in there. It’s out of our hands when they decide to let them out.” He turns to me as he rests his hands on the side of the bed, “Can you tell us what happened?”

Closing my eyes was a very bad idea. It takes me a minute to remember that I’m supposed to be telling them my story, and I have to force them open again. I repeat everything from start to finish, giving them all the gory and personal details that I withheld from the doctor. By the time that I’m finished, the guys look like they’re going to start wrecking shit.

I think the only thing that keeps them from going completely off the wall is the detective telling us their own side of the story, “After you boys called us, we were able to track down Kendall’s car from a police report two towns over from here. Someone had called in to report that a car had been seen going over the cliff out at the overlook, and a motorcycle driving away from the scene. Lucky for us, the good Samaritans followed them for as long as it took us to reach their location.”

His words slowly register in my drug-addled brain, “Are you saying that you caught them?”

He nods, and I close my eyes to hide the tears of relief from the world. Until now, I didn’t realize just how scared I was that he would come back and try to finish what he started. I sling my good arm over my face to hide the ugly crying from them all. Maverick asks them if they’ve gotten all they need. The only other thing the detective mentions is that I’ll need to come down to the station to pick them out of a lineup when I get released from the hospital, but that’s it. Both of them give me their well wishes before heading back out the door.

It has barely closed before the guys are hovering over me. Embarrassingly enough, I can’t stop the tears now that they’ve started. It turns into hiccups that hurt so goddamn bad that I feel like I’m being ripped apart, which makes me cry even harder.

“Fuck. Make it stop,” T begs with a strained voice from the foot of the bed.

Lucas still has a hold of my hand on the left when I feel someone move on my right. The sound of the rail being let down is quickly followed by the scent of Goose wrapping me up as tight as he can somehow helping calm me down some. His hand is clinging to the back of my neck with the side of his face pressed against mine. The position puts his mouth right next to my ear. He kisses it before he starts whispering to me. All kinds of reassurances leave his mouth, and I know that every single one of them are true. Promises of never leaving again, my dad never getting the chance to touch me again and the repeated reminder of how much they love me.

As my hiccupping sobs finally die down, I use my good arm to pull his lips to mine. I’ve missed him so much that it makes me want to cry all over again. When he finally pulls away, I’m mostly put together.

“Better?” he asks softly.

I start to tell him yes, but I stop myself. I’m not in mental breakdown territory anymore, but that doesn’t mean that I’m better.

“Everything really fucking hurts,” I whisper honestly.

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