Page 42 of In My Blood
“She’s just there…w-when I close my eyes….she keeps looking at me, Raffy. She blames me.”
“For what?” Rafe asked.
“I sh-should have believed her. I didn’t. I…she was crazy, wasn’t she? I th-thought she was anyway. I drugged her. I…I didn’t know what else to do. She had these episodes and she broke things and made so much noise. She hurt herself and sh-she…she’d get so angry…”
“Did she hurt you, Cara?” Rafe asked.
“Sometimes,” she shrugged. “I was scared we…we’d get thrown out. I needed that place Rafe! I couldn’t do the streets again. I couldn’t, and she….I didn’t know what to do. I got her alcohol and pills…illegal pills. I needed her to be quiet and to… to sleep. I dr-drugged her and those men….they killed her and she blames me! It was m-my fault!” she gasped breathlessly.
“Jesus fuck!” I hissed as I held her more securely. She’d lived on the streets? For how long? The thought made me feel physically ill. Not only was she a tiny little thing, but with her wide eyes and innocent, young face, she would have been every predator’s wet dream come true. I could feel my right hand desperate to reach for the knife I kept at my ankle at just the thought of anyone putting hands on her.
“The pills, in your pocket? They were for our mother?” Rafe questioned.
“You found them?”
“Yeah. I was worried you’d been taking them,” he sighed with some relief.
“No. I don’t….I wouldn’t use drugs…couldn’t have afforded to if I wanted to anyway,” she laughed dryly.
“None of what happened to our mother was your fault, Cara. I have no doubt after what you’ve told me, and from seeing the place the two of you lived, that our mother had mental health issues. You did the best you could in those circumstances, and what happened to her was not on you. Even our cold hearted, bitch of an egg donor wouldn’t blame you for her death,Tesorino. You kept her alive for a lot longer than she would have kept herself going. She owed you everything,” Rafe told her firmly.
“I miss my apartment,” she whispered.
“You did an amazing job of getting that place and making it a home, Cara, but you’re home now. You deserve so much more than you had in Chicago.”
“I belonged there. It was safe and it was mine. I’m n-not safe here!”
“Of course you are. I will never allow anyone to hurt you again now that you’re home,” Rafe assured her.
“You c-can’t promise that, and if you believe you can, then you’re an idiot, You know I’m not safe here. I wasn’t safe in Chicago either, not completely, but I felt safer there than I do here,” she argued, and I admired the way she threw that reality check at her brother. It was the truth. Rafe knew it as well as she did.I did too. We could go to every possible length to ensure the safety of our home and the people within it, but we could never completely promise they wouldn’t be harmed. Life didn’t work like that and Cara knew it only too well.
“Tell me what you need to feel safer here, and I’ll see it’s done, Cara,” Rafe offered, and I groaned. That was one of Rafe’s flaws – his belief that money could solve everything. While it could solve many things, some issues went so much deeper than anything a purchase onAmazoncould cure.
“Dario told me ye know some self-defence moves. Did ye take a class or something?” I asked quickly, before she even had to answer Rafe’s question.
“I knew this guy…Hilton…a bouncer at the club I worked in. A few months after I started there this creep tried to follow me home. I managed to get away, but when Hilt found out he told me I needed to learn to defend myself if I was gonna work in a place like that. He took me to his gym, which it turned out his brother, Dev, owned. They both taught me to defend myself over a few months. It made me feel better…safer. If I’d have known before….well, things would have been a little easier.”
“How old were you when you did that training?” Rafe asked.
“Almost sixteen.”
“Cara, please don’t tell me you were working at that strip club at fifteen?” Rafe despaired.
“What?” I couldn’t hold in my shock.
“As a server! I never…I didn’t strip. It was a g-good job. They p-paid me in cash, and I…the bouncers looked out for me most of the time,” Cara defended herself.
“What about school?” Rafe asked.
“I went when we first moved there, but I was too behind. I missed too much, and I….I’m not smart. I dropped out a couple of years ago and never went back. I needed to work full time anyway,” she shrugged, but I saw how she lowered her eyes with shame, and it annoyed the fuck out of me. She did what she had to, to survive. She should never be ashamed of that.
“What happened to your friends, Hilton and Dev?” I asked.
“They went to jail. They were mixed up in some robberies, at least that’s what the cops said. I didn’t believe them, but, apparently, a bank teller got killed and Dev and Hilt went to jail for it. I never saw them again. The gym closed down after that.”
“Christ, Cara,” Rafe gasped, like he couldn’t breathe, and she lifted her head and looked to him with confusion. When she turned to me I tried to force a smile for her.
“He’s alright. Maybe just give him a wee second though,” I suggested.
