Page 102 of Pitch Dark

“Detective James,” Tavers warns, but I ignore him.

“Did you put them there, Mr. Stewart?”

I uncross my arms and take a step toward him. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Tavers stand. Mr. Stewart’s shoulders droop, and his hands that are laced together turn white as he grips them tight. His head drops.

I’m two seconds away from prowling to him, yanking him from his chair, and demanding he answer.

“I didn’t put them there,” he says quietly.

“Then who in the fuck did?” I snarl.

“Goddammit,” I hear Tavers mutter. “Niko—”

Mr. Stewart cuts him off when he lifts his head. More tears slide from his now red eyes. Sadness, guilt, and hurt line his face.

“She put them there herself.”

I freeze and so does Tavers. Denial has my heart lurching in my chest. There’s no fucking way Doe put those marks on her body herself. She wouldn’t do something like that. I may not know much about her, she may not know herself, but I refuse to believe she would be capable of self-harm.

Her words from that first day in the hospital come to mind, and they send shards of ice in my blood.

“I remember being hurt but not who did it. I think… I think I did it.”

“Fuck,” I mutter.

I turn away from Tavers and Mr. Stewart. What in the fuck would push her to hurt herself, and do I really believe she did? She doesn’t remember who she is, much less where she’s been or what happened to her. If she doesn’t remember those things, why would she think she hurt herself? Was her mind somehow telling her without giving her the reason why she would do such a thing? What happened to her to resort to that?

I spin back around to Mr. Stewart and pin him with a hard gaze. At the moment, he’s the only one who can tell us.

“Explain,” I demand. I know I’m acting unprofessional, but I couldn’t give one fuck at the moment. Mr. Stewart doesn’t seem to notice anyway as he stands from his chair on wobbly legs with defeat and pain written on his face. Tavers notices, though. He takes a step toward me with concerned eyes. He knows I’m on the edge.

Mr. Stewart walks over to the wall where several pictures of Rebecca as a child and her mother hang. His voice is quiet when he starts to speak.

“When Rebecca came to live with me after her mother died, she was distraught. I tried to console her, but she didn’t want to have anything to do with me. I’m sure it’s because her mother told her she and I didn’t get along. I loved my sister, but we didn’t agree on some things. Our childhood was… intense. My mother chose me to abuse and Natalie to ignore.” His finger lightly trails over the picture in front of him. “As screwed up as it is, I think Natalie was jealous of the attention my mother gave me, even if it was the wrong and painful kind. In turn, I was jealous of the neglect Natalie received. She was older and left as soon as she could. I was seventeen when she got pregnant. When I moved out, I looked her up, hoping we could reconnect. I wanted to be part of both her and Rebecca’s lives. I guess she still harbored bad feelings toward me because she turned me away.”

He turns quiet as he takes the frame from the wall and brings it back to the seat with him.

“That still doesn’t explain the marks on Rebecca’s body, Mr. Stewart,” Tavers says more calmly than how I’m feeling. My give a shit radar is still off regarding him.

He doesn’t look up from the photo when he starts to speak again.

“Although Natalie wouldn’t let me be part of their lives, I still kept tabs on them, just to make sure they were okay.” He swallows thickly. “Rebecca started hurting herself the week after she moved in with me. I was grieving over my sister, so I didn’t notice how bad it was for her at first. Once I did, I tried to talk to her, but she always refused and pushed me away. Anytime I mentioned getting her help, she freaked out and threatened to kill herself. It wasn’t as bad in the beginning, she’d only have fresh marks about once a month, but then they came more frequently. I’d notice a new one a couple of times a week. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I told her I would get help, and she promised she would stop. She would for several months, but then they would start back up again. This went on for years, the process over and over again, and I believed her each time she said she would stop. I know it was stupid of me, and I should have insisted she seek help, but I was so scared I’d lose her for good.”

He finally looks up, and the devastation on his face is profound. A tiny spark of sympathy hits my stomach.

“I couldn’t lose Rebecca too,” he says with agony. “I couldn’t fix things with my sister, and I couldn’t bear the thought of losing Rebecca as well. I tried so hard to help her, you have to believe me, but she was always so sad and withdrawn and angry. It was because of those marks that she never left the house. She felt she was too disfigured for anyone to see her. She was disgusted with her appearance.” His voice is thick by the time he’s done talking.

“Do you know why she was that way?”

He looks at Tavers and shakes his head. “No.”

“Do you know if she hurt herself before she came to live with you?”

I turn away from them both and walk to the side table that holds Doe’s picture. Her name is Rebecca, but she’ll always be Doe to me. I pick up the picture and examine it. It’s an old picture. She looks to be nine or so. Her smile, the same one I’ve been lucky enough to see a few times, seems to be bright and innocent as she stands beneath a cherry blossom tree. Her eyes, though—the smile doesn’t reach her eyes. If you weren’t looking for it, you’d think she was happy, but there’s a deep sadness there. Her brown hair is long just like it is now, but it’s lighter as if she spent a lot of time in the sun. Her complexion is a warm olive, not the pale skin she has now. No marks mar her face or arms. She looks just the same although much younger and with no signs of self-harm.

I keep my back to the room, eyes on the picture, as Mr. Stewart answers Tavers’ question.

“I don’t know. They lived two states away, so I wasn’t able to see them often, but the times I did, Rebecca looked sad. But I never saw any signs she was hurting herself.”

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