Sanctuary: Delos Series, Book 9 Page 19

  She shut her eyes, and two tears squeezed from them, running down her pale cheeks. Her fingers tightened against his chest. “I’d just started school, Nolan. I-I was suddenly feeling like I was in the eye of a hurricane. I had so many boys wanting to go out with me and date me. I’d never had a boyfriend before. It threw me off. I loved their attention. I thought it was wonderful, but I felt scared and confused because I didn’t know what I should do or say. One guy, Tony, was really complimentary. He would show up after my classes, carry my books for me, ask me out to have a hamburger at the student union. He made me laugh. And I loved that he devoted so much attention to me.” She took a deep breath and pressed her face into his neck. “It hurts so much to admit all this…”

  “You were innocent, Teren. You came out of a rural environment. And you weren’t socialized to the world of boys dating girls. I’m sure you felt uncomfortable, and you were exploring yourself and men. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s a natural occurrence.”

  A tiny trickle of relief shot through Teren. Nolan understood. “You’re right. I didn’t know what was happening. All I knew was that I felt so special, when I’d never felt that way before.”

  “Sweetheart, you’re a beautiful young woman. I imagine at eighteen you looked so damned fresh and innocent to a lot of those guys who were a lot more experienced and on the prowl for someone just like you. But you didn’t know that, so there’s no crime in you not realizing it.” Again, he squeezed her a little more closely to him, wanting to give Teren emotional support.

  Lifting her hand, Teren quickly wiped the tears off her face. “Believe me, I know that now. I didn’t know it then, which is what got me in so much trouble, Nolan.”

  “Go on,” he urged her quietly.

  Teren hadn’t realized how desperate she was to hear Nolan’s low, thick voice against her ear. She moved her hand restlessly across his chest, the words strained. “Tony prided himself on knowing about all kinds of wines. I had never had a drink of alcohol in my life, Nolan. He would sit and show me books on types of wine. He was always excited by the different reds and whites. And he taught me about them. One night, he said he’d borrowed a friend’s car and we were going to go to a wine tasting. I wasn’t sure I wanted to go, but he insisted and I gave in.”

  “Why did you hesitate?”

  She compressed her lips. “I-I don’t know. Something didn’t feel right, but I didn’t want to disappoint him. I was afraid he’d drop me. I finally had a boyfriend for the first time in my life and I didn’t want to lose him.”

  “Well,” Nolan said, “that about sums up every eighteen-year-old girl’s thoughts.” He cut her an amused look. “Right?”

  “When I was in high school, girls who were fifteen or older had boyfriends, and I never had one. I guess I was jealous.”

  “And now that you had one? All of that played into your decision?”

  Nodding, she said in a disappointed tone, “Yes.”

  “Teenagers make more mistakes per square inch than any other age group,” Nolan informed her. “Twenty-somethings aren’t far behind. That’s how we learn, Teren. Maybe our parents told us to not do this or that, but we didn’t always listen. We were at an age of what I call ‘exploration,’ taking risks and finding out what each of our choices taught us.”

  “I see that now. I wish I’d seen it then.”

  “Did Tony take you to a wine tasting?”

  “He took me to a seedy motel. I asked him why we were there. He said the wine tasting was in a room. We’d go there and taste different wines. I was scared, but I didn’t want to make a scene because he was so convincing, smiling, and telling me I’d enjoy it.” Teren pushed the tears off her face. “There were three bottles of wine on a dresser in that motel room. I’d never been in a motel before, so I was curious. Tony poured me a little wine and asked me to taste it. He asked me to sit down and I did. I drank some of it and it tasted god-awful.”

  “A taste for wine is something we develop,” Nolan said, seeing her eyes darken.

  “I guess. It tasted horribly sour and bad. He urged me to drink the whole glass.”

  “A whole glass of wine?” Nolan asked, alarmed.

  “Yes. Why?” Teren twisted a look up at him.

  “At a wine tasting? There’s usually half an ounce to an ounce of a particular wine in a glass. He didn’t bring you there for that. He’d tricked you.”

  “Oh.” Teren gave him a frustrated look. “See? Even now, I didn’t know that.”

  “What happened then?” Nolan coaxed, drying her damp cheek with his thumb.

  “I remember I got up and felt horribly tired, like I wanted to go to sleep immediately. It was the weirdest thing, Nolan. My feet felt like they’d suddenly grown twenty-pound weights on each of them. I found it hard to talk, to think…”

  Nolan tried to keep the anger out of his tone. “He drugged you, Teren.”

  “Yes, only I didn’t know that until the next day when I found myself naked, lying on the bed, and Tony was gone.” She felt Nolan tense. He slid his arm around her, holding her tightly against him. Never had his embrace felt so welcome, so strong.

  “He drugged and raped you, didn’t he?”

  Teren heard his tightly controlled lethal tone and closed her eyes, nodding. “I didn’t know what happened,” she whispered, her voice scratchy. “I was cold because there was no heat in the room; all my clothes were in a pile by the side of the bed. I felt sore and my lower body hurt.”

  Nolan mentally cursed, continuing to move his hand soothingly up and down her back, feeling the tension in her. “You’d been a virgin.”

  “Yes.”

  “What did you do then?” he asked, easing his arms open enough so that he could face her, look into her glistening eyes, which reflected so much hurt.

  “I don’t know what all he did. I found bite marks on my breasts, on my stomach, and on the insides of my thighs. I saw blood on the covers. I was sore and I hurt.” She glanced up at Nolan, his face tight, mouth thinned, eyes filled with rage. But he was holding her gently, giving her the strength to go on. “I took a shower, cleaned myself off the best I could. I threw up several times. I was so miserable, and it was almost too much to try to think what to do next.”

  “Because the drug was still in your bloodstream—that’s probably why you threw up.” Nolan felt the urge to find this bastard but held on to his emotions, knowing that if he appeared upset, Teren would retreat and possibly stop sharing the incident. He knew her well enough to know he should remain stable and level-headed to keep her calm.

  “Yes. I walked three miles back to the apartment. My roommate knew something was wrong and asked me, but I wouldn’t tell her anything. I went to my room and slept the rest of the day.”

  “Did you confront Tony?”

  “No. I was afraid to. He disappeared for about two weeks and then he came back, using that same charm, that same smile on me. He said he wanted to take me to another motel.”

  “The bastard had balls,” Nolan growled.

  “I told him no. I told him to go away and leave me alone. He got really angry, his hands curled into fists, and he scared me to death with his temper. I got away from him as fast as I could.”

  “Did he leave you alone, though?”

  Teren heard the wariness in Nolan’s tone. “He began to stalk me. I was so scared. About three months after he’d raped me, I began throwing up every morning. My roommate knew by this time what Tony had done to me. She said I was probably pregnant.” Risking a look over at Nolan, she saw bleakness come to his narrowed eyes. His arms automatically tightened around her.

  Teren forced herself to push forward. “The test came back, and it showed I was pregnant. I didn’t know what to do, Nolan. I couldn’t go home and tell my parents what happened. They’d have been ashamed of me. They’d have shunned me, and I was afraid they’d disown me and kick me out of the house, telling me to never come back to see them again. And my three brothers? My God, if they’d foun
d out, they’d have crucified me with questions until I told them it was Tony. And then they’d have gone after him and probably killed him.”

  “What did you do?” he asked her quietly, cupping her face, holding her stormy gaze.

  “This is the worst part,” she warned him. Without thinking she pulled his hand from her cheek, gripping it, holding it in her lap. “I went to Tony and told him he’d gotten me pregnant. He became very quiet. He said we needed to talk, that he’d take care of the situation. He’d help me. I was angry at him then, but he grabbed me by the arm and hauled me out of the college and into his car. He said we were going somewhere. I screamed at him to let me out, but he’d locked the door. When we arrived at that same horrible, seedy motel, I started crying. I thought he was going to rape me again. I fought him, but he was too strong. He got me into a first-floor room and slammed the door, locking it behind him.”

  She felt Nolan’s hand, so warm and comforting, twine with her damp fingers. Teren felt if she didn’t grip his large, callused hand, she’d be lost.

  “I tried to run past him, tried to rip that door open. The next thing I knew, he’d hit me so hard in the jaw, I felt bones breaking in my face. I remember falling…and that’s all…”

  Sniffing, Teren didn’t have the courage to look at Nolan. Gripping his hand, she closed her eyes, the words tumbling out of her. “I woke up three weeks later in a hospital. My parents were there, standing guard over me. At first, I didn’t even remember my name, but over the hours after I became conscious, I started remembering things. My parents just sat there, staring at me. I felt horrible. They left and later, the doctor came in. He checked me out, and then a nurse came in and told me I’d had a miscarriage, that I’d lost my baby. She went through a list of broken bones I’d sustained. I just lay there, not able to really comprehend it all.”

  “He beat the hell out of you,” Nolan ground out, holding her close, wanting to protect her but unable. “He probably counted on knocking you out and then hitting you in the belly to force the miscarriage.”

  She felt so tired and worn, as if carrying this load by herself for so long had taken an enormous toll on her soul. “Yes, that’s what the nurse told me. Only, when he hit me in the face several times, he gave me a serious concussion, and I was in a coma for three weeks. I don’t remember much after that. I know I slept a lot. And every time I’d wake up, one of my family or one of the parishioners from our church was with me. It helped me. I felt guilty and ashamed. The women who came and sat and prayed for me from the church didn’t look at me like I was a slut. Some were even kind to me, and I needed that so badly…”

  It took every kind of control that Nolan had ever had to remain relaxed, allowing Teren a place to hide and tell her story. He’d seen that her nose had been broken previously the first day he’d met her, but he’d had no idea how it had occurred. A killing rage flowed through him. “How were you feeling then about the baby?” Nolan knew how much she loved those Sudanese children, and they loved her equally. They were always tagging along with her, holding her hands, pulling on her pant legs, touching her, wanting to be close to her. Teren was a natural mother. And to lose her child like that?

  Gently, he kissed her cheek, feeling the wetness of her tears beneath his mouth. She was crying silently, clinging to him, her head buried beneath his chin, holding him. Holding on.

  After weeping, she said, “It took me a couple of years, Nolan, to come to grips with all of it. I was so young, so green. The grief over the loss of my baby was the last to come up and be dealt with. First, I had to deal with the shame and humiliation my family put me through. In their eyes, I’d sinned so badly there was no forgiveness ever coming from them. They shunned me.”

  Shaking her head, Teren felt so much of her fear dissolving beneath Nolan’s quiet, steadying presence. She was amazed he wasn’t judging her like everyone else had. It gave her even more courage to say, “I ended up, after getting well, having to go to court and testify against Tony. The jury gave him twenty-five years in prison. That was a relief, because I’d feared he would be set free, and that he’d find and kill me the next time.”

  Smoothing her hair, Nolan kissed her temple, grazing her shoulders, trying to get her to release the backlog of tension she carried in them. “Yeah, he would have, Teren. What did you do then?”

  “I went back to school and finished my degree. I couldn’t go home. I was persona non grata to everyone. I put my head down, took on two part-time jobs, paid my way through the two-year course in computer science, and graduated. At one of the job fairs on campus, I met some wonderful people from Delos. They were hiring programmers, but they needed them for fieldwork in third-world countries. When I found out that they had a charity near Khartoum, Sudan, I leaped at the chance, and they hired me on the spot. I spent a year in Darfur and then transferred here to Kitra.”

  Brushing the dark hair sprinkled across his chest, she added, “I’ve never been sorry for my decision. Living here at Kitra has been so very healing for me, Nolan. Farida and Hadii adopted me like the lost puppy I was. They always teased me that I was their younger sister whose skin was lighter than theirs, but we carried the same color of blood, the same heart. I liked the way they saw me. I wasn’t white and they weren’t black. We were women who lived our lives loving what we were doing. That brought us together as a wonderful team that’s been so great for the past seven years.”

  “And your baby? When did that loss hit you?” Nolan knew it had taken him years afterward to come out of the shock of losing Linda. One day, unexpectedly, the grief exploded through him, hurling him into a vat so painful and filled with loss, he thought he’d never make his way through it all. But he had. Barely.

  Looking down at Teren, he eased her against his shoulder, studying her in the near-darkness, her cheeks glistening with tears. The small light out in the hall shed just enough illumination into the room so he could see her anguished eyes.

  “The third year I was here at Kitra, there was a rash of abused women who had come to Kitra pregnant. It just ripped off that scab inside me.” She grimaced and looked away. “I wasn’t much good for about three months after that, paralyzed by the grief of losing my own baby. I never told anyone why. Farida and Hadii thought it was my reaction to the losses of the women. They weren’t far from the truth…”

  “I’m glad they were here to support you,” he whispered, shaking his head. “You’re so damn strong, Teren. You really are.”

  “I don’t feel strong, Nolan. I feel a hollowness right here.” She pressed her hand against her belly. “Even now, I sometimes dream about my lost baby coming to me, and we talk and we laugh with one another. I always wake up with this ache of loss in my heart. Every time that dream happens, it heals another little part of me.”

  “Yeah,” he rumbled. “It sure as hell is a process, isn’t it?”

  She gave him a sad look of understanding. “You lost your wife and your baby. I just can’t imagine what you’ve gone through, Nolan.” She eased away from him, sitting up, facing him, her legs crossed beneath the blanket. “You aren’t judging me, are you?”

  He gave her a perplexed look. “No. Why would I do that, Teren? You didn’t do anything wrong. You were young and innocent, and you trusted. You did the best you could at the time.”

  She pulled in a ragged breath. “I thought…well…I thought you might not want to be around me anymore after you found out what I did.”

  Nolan stared at her, the silence thickening. “Let’s get this clear, Teren: you did not do this to yourself. It was done to you. Tony drugged and raped you. Got you pregnant. And then when he found out, he wanted to get rid of the baby. And I think he really wanted to kill you and probably thought he had.” His mouth turned downward, his words grating. “But you lived, Teren. You survived.”

  “I carry so much guilt over it, Nolan. Even to this day…”

  “Because your family sees you as having done something wrong.”

  “Yes. I’m older no
w, but it still sneaks up on me sometimes. Most days,” Teren shrugged wearily, “I blow it off. But when you came smashing into my life, I was so drawn to you, it scared me.”

  “Did you think I was another Tony?”

  “No…never. You’re the exact opposite of him, Nolan. What I did fear was you knowing what had happened to me, that you’d blame me for it, for my poor choices, or see me as something less than you saw me before.”

  She bit down on her lower lip, watching his expression turn tender. He reached out to her.

  “I don’t want you away from me right now, Teren. Come here.” He held his hand out to her. He could see her need to be silently supported and loved no matter what she thought she’d done. Nolan realized that she was still seeing life through that faulty lens of her parents’ misshapen religious beliefs, making her feel judged and hounding her to this day. At least she was aware of it and was fighting not to let it run her life.

  When she placed her damp fingers into his hand, he smiled gently, tugging her back into his arms—where she belonged. And if he had anything to say about it, she would be staying with him forever.

  CHAPTER 16

  Teren was happy—there was no getting around it. Where had two weeks gone? She was sitting with the children around the fountain, waiting for Nolan, who was finishing up a meeting with Ayman in his office. The children, boys and girls, all between four and eight years old, squirmed and wanted to get as close as they could to her, like little bookends. Two girls sat in her lap. The boys crowded on either side of her. She drank in their smiles, the happy glow in their brown eyes. Their laughter made her heart expand even more—if that was possible.

  It was five thirty p.m., and everyone was lining up at the dining room entrance. The children standing in line with their mothers had spotted her and raced over to where she was sitting. Within moments, Teren was laughing with them, kissing them, ruffling their neatly cut hair, and enclosing her arms around as many as she could fit beside her. The mothers in line smiled and waved in her direction. Often in the past, when Teren had time, she would help out at the childcare center with the Sudanese women who ran that portion of Kitra. She loved playing with the children, enjoying their innate intelligence, burning curiosity, and innocent trust of everyone.