A voice, soft and grating, filled the car.
“You been telling lies, haven’t you?” His voice was low and calm. Eerily so. He yanked her hair.
Her scalp stung.
“That was a question.”
Should she say yes? No? He decided for her, shaking her head up and down. She could feel strands of hair snapping.
“I thought so.” His voice was in her ear. So close.
“It’s not your business if girls get rid of their mistakes, is it?” He shook her head from side to side. Acid came up her throat.
“You’re going to start telling the truth now, aren’t you?” His other hand touched her head, and she flinched. He stroked the top of her head gently, as if he weren’t hurting her with his other hand.
“Aren’t you?”
She couldn’t remember the question, but it didn’t matter. He shook her head up and down.
“Good girl.” His lips touched her ear in a kiss.
She flinched.
“I’d hate to see such a pretty girl get hurt. Bad things happen when you tell lies. You don’t want to get hurt now, do you?”
He jerked her head back and forth. His breath reeked of cigarettes and cinnamon.
It was off already. He must mean so it wouldn’t come on when he opened the door. Opened the door … did that mean he was leaving? Please, God.
He loosened his grip on her hair enough that she could lean forward and flip the switch.
“Give me your hands.”
Helpless, she lifted them up in the air. Her heart felt like it might burst from her chest like an airbag. Her hands trembled.
He took one hand and placed it on the headrest, then placed the other there, too. His hand twisted on her hair until she thought her scalp would rip loose from her head. She sucked in her breath.
“I’m going to let go in a minute. You’re going to keep your hands here. You’re going to close your eyes. Then you’re going to sing a song. Let’s see, what shall we make it… ?”
The pain combined with his putrid breath made her stomach twist with nausea. She arched her back, trying to relieve the pressure on her scalp.
“You know Top Goes the Weasel,’ don’t you?”
She nodded her head, feeling the painful pull and wondering if she should’ve waited for him to do it for her.
“I’m going to leave this time, with just my friendly warning. Next time I won’t be so nice, pretty girl.”
She felt something warm and wet on her ear. His tongue. She squeezed her eyes shut.
“Good girl. You keep those eyes closed. I’ll be watching you from outside for one minute. If you move or open your eyes, I’ll have to come back in here and pick up where we left off. Got it?”
He yanked her head up and down. She kept her eyes closed. She heard him moving behind her, then the pressure on her head gave way. She had to force herself to keep her eyes shut.
The door clicked open behind her. “I can’t hear you.”
Singing. She was supposed to be singing. She scrambled for the words. “All around the cobbler’s bench, the monkey chased the weasel. The monkey thought ’twas all in fun, Pop—goes the weasel.”
“I’ll be watching you.”
She kept singing, her eyes closed. She struggled to hear something. Was he still standing there? She couldn’t take the chance. “Johnny’s got the whooping cough, and Marys got the measles. That’s the way the money goes, Pop—goes the weasel.”
Natalie watched Sheriff Whitco walk out the centers door, followed by Hanna’s husband, Micah.
Hanna was propped on the desk, eyeing Natalie carefully. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
Natalie nodded and drew a shaky breath.
“I’ll go call Mom again. She was a little frantic when I called before.” Hanna went into Natalie’s office, and she could hear Hanna punching in the phone number.
Natalie leaned back against her padded chair and closed her eyes, relaxing for the first time in what seemed like hours. She glanced at her watch. Had it really only been a little over an hour ago since she’d walked out into the night?
Those terrifying moments played out in her mind. When he’d grabbed her hair and jerked her head back, she’d thought he was going to kill her. She didn’t know why, but she could feel death’s cold fingers reaching out to grab her.
She wasn’t sure how long she’d sat, elbows in the air, eyes shut, singing that stupid song. But when she opened her eyes, he was gone. She’d been too terrified to get out of the car. She’d pulled the back door closed, pressed the lock button, and dialed 9-1-1 on her cell phone. Then she’d called her sister.
“Mom’s worried about you,” Hanna said, drawing her back to the present.
Natalie hadn’t even heard Hanna talking on the phone, hadn’t heard her enter the room. “I’m OK,” Natalie said.
“Sure you are. That’s why you’re white as a sheet.”
“Are the boys all right?”
“All tucked in bed. They don’t know anything. Mom just told them you stayed late at work.”
Trying to recover some sense of normalcy, Natalie shuffled some papers on the desk and put the stapler in the drawer. When Sheriff Whitco had arrived on the scene, Natalie had still been locked in the car. He’d escorted her into the center, where he’d questioned her about the attacker. Hanna and Micah had arrived during the questioning.
“Who do you think it was?” Hanna asked.
Natalie shrugged. “You heard what I told Sheriff Whitco. I work with a lot of clients. It could be any number of angry boyfriends or fathers.”
“Or it could be political. There are organizations that don’t like what you’re doing here one bit.”
“Tough luck.” Natalie drew the blinds beside her desk. She knew there were plenty of people who saw the Hope Center as anti-women. But, for heaven’s sake, she was trying to help women, not hurt them.
“Ah, I see you’ve got your spunk back.” Her sister’s voice held amusement.
Spunk. She’d had no spunk in the car earlier. Her head had been trapped against the headrest while some psycho worked her like a marionette. The helplessness she’d felt hit her full force for the first time. She sank into her chair and buried her face in her hands. A sob tried to work its way out, but she forced it back. Instead, it lodged like a brick in her throat. She felt Hanna’s hand on her shoulder.
“Want to talk about it?” Hanna asked.
If anyone would understand, it would be Hanna. She’d experienced the terror of being held against her will when she’d been raped years ago. But Natalie didn’t want to talk about it. She just wanted to forget. She dragged her hands through her hair. Her scalp was tender. For the first time, she realized she had a throbbing headache.
“It must have been very scary,” Hanna said.
It was. Too scary to think about right now. She felt a sudden longing to be home with her boys, watching them sleep in their beds. “I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to go home.”
“You’ll need to talk about it soon. It’s not good to brush over it as if it never happened.”
Natalie stood abruptly and pushed the chair under the desk. “I just spent an hour talking about it, Hanna.”
“I’m not talking about filing a complaint.”
Her sister meant well, but Natalie could almost feel her nerves coming undone. She grabbed her purse off the filing cabinet and rooted for her ibuprofen. When she’d emptied two into her hand, she turned to see Hanna holding a paper cup filled with water. “Thanks.’ She gulped down the pills.
“I’m worried about you, Nat. Maybe you shouldn’t work at night anymore.” Hanna stood by the glass entryway. “Look at this piddly lock. It’s just a thumb-turn, and with all this glass around it, someone would just have to break it.”
“I’ll be more careful.”
“You should get a security system.”
Natalie huffed. “The center can hardly afford that.”
“Then stop working at night.”
“And when are the parenting classes supposed to meet? Most of these girls work during the day.” She threw her purse over her shoulder at the same time Hanna’s husband walked through the door.
He stopped with the door still propped open, his gaze bouncing between the sisters. “Everything OK?”
“Fine.” Natalie made her way toward the door, and they walked out into the summer night. She walked beside Micah, feeling reassured by his presence. “What did the sheriff say?”
“They don’t have much to go on, really. But I’m sure they’ll work on it. If you remember anything else, call them. Even if it seems insignificant.”
“I will.” They reached her Suburban, and Micah opened the door for her.
“We’ll follow you home,” he said.
She almost refused. She didn’t want to be mollycoddled. She was a grown woman. But sinking into her seat behind the wheel, she could still smell him. Cigarettes and cinnamon. She choked back her refusal and nodded her head.
She made eye contact with Hanna. “Thanks for coming.” She was starting to feel bad about being short with her sister.
Hanna nodded, and in a few minutes, they were driving down the deserted street. The headlights behind her offered a big measure of relief, but Natalie couldn’t erase the memory of being attacked.
She suddenly remembered something she’d forgotten about before. Something she hadn’t told Sheriff Whitco. You’re going to start telling the truth now, aren’t you? Bad things happen when you tell lies.
If he was talking about the things she told girls, about the viability of unborn babies, then she was still in danger. She couldn’t stop telling girls the truth.
Bad things happen when you tell lies.
Natalie depressed the lock button as fear sucked the moisture from her mouth.