Chapter Thirty-One

That night, I dreamed about you, Shelby.

It was the first of many dreams I would have where we were together. As strange as it sounds, you’ve always been with me. I’ve felt your closeness all these years. I’ve never stopped talking to you and wishing things had happened differently.

In my dream, you weren’t a baby or even a child. You were all grown up, a beautiful young woman around my age, with dark hair like mine, but straighter and parted in the middle. I could see so much of myself in your face, in those dreaming brown eyes, in the milky pale skin, in the inquisitive little smile on your mouth when you looked at the world and tried to understand it. Those are all things I gave you, even if you don’t realize it. It made me sad, though, to see you without the years in between, because it meant I’d missed your growing up. I hadn’t been there.

That night, though, the dream brought us together. Rebecca and Shelby. Mother and daughter. We held hands. We didn’t talk, but we felt no need to talk. There was this instant, intimate familiarity between us, of knowing each other, of connectedness. Being with you made me happy. You filled me with a glow of contentment, because you were smart and fearless and beautiful.

We were in the forest. Whenever I sleep, I go to the forest. It wasn’t night, but the crowding of the trees created a gloomy grayness around us. Birds flitted through the shadows, but oddly, they didn’t sing. The world was as still as a painting, no wind, no warmth, no chill. We followed a well-walked path side by side, but the dirt at our feet was dry as dust, and we left no footprints. When I looked back, it seemed as if we hadn’t been there at all.

I had so many questions for you. About your life. About your past. Are you married? Do you have children? Do you have friends? Do you laugh?

But I asked none of those things. I simply walked with you through the magical forest, and the farther we went, the more the grayness turned to dark. The birds went away. Night began to fall like a great shadow. A feeling of foreboding crept over me, and I knew what was coming next. It happened this way in all my dreams. In my waking hours, I hunted for the beast, but in my dreams, the beast hunted me.

I heard the noise that had haunted my life, that had become my secret obsession. It was the sound of the monster, drawing near, coming back for me. The reunion that I’d sought since I was ten years old happened every night when I closed my eyes. But this dream was different, because this time, I realized that the beast wasn’t here for me. No, this was much worse.

The Ursulina was coming for you.

A black shape crashed through the underbrush, its breath loud and heavy. In the darkness, suddenly, I had a flashlight in my hand, the way I did years ago. As the monster stormed toward us, my light shined on shaggy fur and the curves of sharp, huge claws. And I heard crying at my feet. When I looked down, I saw that you weren’t a woman anymore, Shelby. You were a baby again, nestled in my Easter basket among green paper curlicues.

Crying. Cold. Scared. Alone.

The beast was coming, and I had to protect you from him. I felt fear like nothing I’d ever known, but also a determined, furious, vengeful rage at the idea that anything would threaten my child. I would never let him hurt you. The beast could have me, it could take me, it could kill me, but you would live. You would be safe. I saw the monster looming in front of me. Tall, hunched, huge. Its great paws raised high, its rancid snorts hot on my face. I saw the claws that would rip me to shreds, open up my body, spill my blood. The teeth that would tear and gnaw at my flesh and consume me until I was completely inside him.

But it would never, never take my baby.

I stepped in front of the basket, shielding you.

“It’s me you want!” I screamed at the beast. “It’s me you’ve always wanted. Here I am!”

*

My eyes flew open. I awakened from one nightmare into another.

I lay on the sofa in my cold living room, where I’d fallen asleep, as I usually did these days. The fire I’d built had died to embers, just enough to cast a faint orange glow. One of my kitchen chairs had been pulled into the middle of the room, and a man sat on it, watching me.

Ricky.

He was back.

For an instant, I wondered if I was still dreaming, but I wasn’t. Immediately, I grabbed for my purse, which was where I kept my gun, but Ricky gave a low chuckle and waved my revolver in the air.

Next I reached for the phone to call for help, but when I picked up the handset, I saw that he’d sliced the cord.

“What do you want, Ricky?” I asked, trying to cover my terror with the ice in my voice. “Why are you here?”

“Very nice, Bec. I haven’t seen you in what? Almost nine months, judging by the basketball you’ve got down there. And that’s how you greet your husband?”

“We’re not married. I divorced you after you beat the shit out of me.”

Ricky shook his head. His lips smacked as he chewed a stick of gum. “I don’t care what a piece of paper says. You’re my wife, and you always will be. We went to church. You swore before God to love, honor, and obey me. Until death do us part. Remember? There’s nothing a court can do to change that.”

“Get the hell out of my house.”

“Our house,” Ricky fired back at me.

He stood up from the chair. When he walked toward me, I cringed. I put my hands over my belly, as if I could cover your eyes, Shelby. I didn’t want you to see this man, to hear him speak, to have him be any part of your life. Maybe he was your father, maybe not, but he was dead to both of us.

“What do you want?” I asked again. “Money?”

“No, I don’t need money. I’ve got money now. I wanted to see you. I’ve missed you.”

Ricky caressed my face with the long barrel of the revolver. I didn’t wince or turn away. Not from him. The thought of grabbing the gun flashed through my mind. If it had just been the two of us, I would have done it. I wouldn’t have cared who lived or died. But I wasn’t alone. I had you, Shelby.

“You look good, Bec,” Ricky told me. “I’d forgotten how pretty that face of yours is. Glowing. Isn’t that what they call it?”

I swore at him in a loud voice. My eyes burned with defiance as I stared back at him, but he just laughed, because he was the one with the gun.

Physically, he’d changed since he’d been away. He’d shaved his bushy mustache, which only made his damaged nose more prominent. His blond hair was shorter. He’d lost the lazy flab he’d put on while he was unemployed, and he looked tough and muscled again. His stomach was taut, his forearms rippling, his fingers thick and strong. But the menace radiating from him hadn’t changed at all.

“I heard you were in Pennsylvania,” I said.

He shrugged. “I was, but only for a month or two. Then I moved on. I figured I’d try the desert for a while. I’ve been working construction in Nevada. There’s good money out there if you don’t pour it all into the slots.”

“So why come back?”

He dragged the barrel of the gun down my neck to my breast. “You and me. We have unfinished business, Bec.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I called a friend in town,” Ricky said. “Just to see what was up. Just to get all the news. Naturally, I asked about you. I wanted to know what was going on with my wife. He told me about that.”

Ricky moved the gun lower, until it pointed into the swell of my abdomen. He pushed the barrel in hard, making you kick. I felt my breathing coming harder and faster, terror and fury rolling together like the swirl of ocean waves. He slid the hammer back, cocking it. I didn’t doubt for a second that he would pull the trigger. Shooting me, shooting my daughter, would mean nothing to him.

“Who will it look like?” Ricky asked me.

It. Like you were an alien. Like you weren’t a person at all.

“Who will the kid look like?” he asked again. “Like I don’t already know.”

“Me,” I spat at him, while I squirmed on the sofa. “She will look exactly like me. Not you. Definitely not you.”

“Are you saying the kid’s not mine?” he asked, poking at my stomach with the gun again. “Is that what you’re telling me? Then why don’t you just admit that you’re a whore? You had it coming, Bec. I gave you what you deserved.”

“Get out, Ricky. Get out of here, and go back to the desert. As soon as Darrell sees you, he’ll put you in prison where you belong.”

“Yeah? You think I’d be convicted of anything because I slapped you around a little? A wife cheats on her husband, he’s entitled to payback. Put any man on the jury, and he’ll see things my way.”

“Get. Out!”

Ricky removed the gun from my belly. He undid the hammer and slipped the revolver inside his belt. Then, reaching out with the swiftness of a snake, he pinched my face until I had to cry from the pain.

“I’m not going anywhere. I’m here to stay, Bec. This is my house. You’re my wife, and you’re carrying my baby. You may as well get used to the idea. You’re going to get the charges dropped. That’s the first thing. I don’t care what you tell Darrell, but you let him know that if he sees me, all he’s going to do is smile and say ‘Welcome home, Ricky.’ And then you and me are going back to church. You’re going to apologize to God for your sins and make a new vow to obey me. Got it? I’m going to move back in here, and I’m going to sleep in our bed again, and you’re going to spread those pretty legs of yours for me every single night.”

He let go of my face. “Understand? Tell me you understand.”

I worked the stiffness out of my jaw and snarled at him. “I’ll never take you back. It’s never going to happen.”

He sat down heavily in the chair again. “Oh, yes, it will. Soon enough, you’ll beg to take me back. Do you think I can’t hurt you? You’re wrong. I’m the one with all the power here. Look at me, Rebecca. I can take everything away from you whenever I want. I can take away your life. I can take away your baby. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

My hands curled into fists. My aching jaw clenched down, my teeth biting together. My nostrils flared as air pumped in and out of my nose. I wished I could spring off that sofa, fly across the room, and wrap my fingers around his neck. But all I could do was sit there, not moving. He snickered at my weakness and then got up and headed to the hallway that led out of the house.

When he got to the doorway, he looked back.

“Remember what I said,” he warned me. “You’re mine, Bec. You always will be. The sooner you accept that, the easier it will go for you. I own you. I’ve owned you from the very beginning.”