First Class Justice (First Class Novels) (2 page)

“You think that coming here is a waste of money?”

“I don’t think that sitting on a couch, well, in a chair,
and spewing out feelings is overly productive. No offense.”

“None taken.” Dr. LaVaughn smiled.

“I just
need
to get back to work."

"Do you
want
to get back to work?"

"Hell, yes!" Katy frowned at the doctor.
"Sitting around doing nothing at home is not helping me, so work would be
a good thing."

“You’re doing nothing all day?”

“Well no, but you know what I mean.”

“Tell me what you mean.”

“I’m in my house all day cuz I’m too screwed up to leave it
very often, even though I desperately want to. I don’t even like going to the
grocery store. I’m always looking over my shoulder. I check the backseat of my
car five times before I get in. If I can go out for a specific purpose, like
coming here today, then I’m sort of okay. If I could drive myself to work and
spend all day at the hospital and feel like I’m doing something, maybe I could
get back to normal!”

"You're a nurse?"

"Yep, and I love it!"

"Do you work in the ER?"

"Yeah, and I have worked as a triage nurse, although right
now I’m working in Same Day Surgery. It's nice to mix it up a bit. Keeps me
sharp, you know?"

Dr. LaVaughn looked at Katy and knew she had her work cut
out for her.

*****

With her second beer in her hand, Katy sat on the deck in
her back yard and watched the sun set. There were glorious shades of pink
rippled across the sky and Katy reached for her phone and took a picture. A
text message popped on the screen. It was from Janie. Katy smiled as she opened
up the message and saw the photo of Janie and Matt, feet in the waves on the
beach looking blissfully happy. The message read, 'Loving Hawaii. I think a girl’s
week here next year is called for. You in?'

Katy smiled and typed back her answer in the affirmative.
She placed the phone back on the table and picked up the beer bottle. She was
incredibly happy for her best friend. To find the love of her life once was
amazing, but to find it again after her first husband died was nothing short of
a miracle. And if anyone deserved a miracle it was Janie.

'She is the best person I know' had escaped her lips on many
an occasion in describing her friend. And she meant it, truly meant it. If Katy
could aspire to be more like anyone, it would be Janie. They had been best
friends forever and she wished her all the happiness she deserved.

"I just wish I deserved some," Katy muttered as
she took another mouthful of the cold beer. She needed to finish this one and
then one more so she could go to bed and not fear that the nightmares would
invade her sleep.

*****

"According to the police report, you said you were not
raped. And there was no semen detected in the rape kit." Sarah looked at
Katy for confirmation.

"Yep. I assume it’s all there," Katy said, nodding
at the file.

"He had you for about thirty hours and he didn't rape
you?"

"No."

"He didn't touch you?"

Katy squirmed in her chair and looked down at her hands in
her lap. Sarah, the Assistant District Attorney assigned to her case, came and
sat next to her and sighed.

"I know this is not the conversation you want to be
having right now, but I need to know everything, every last detail. I can't do
my job properly if I don't have all the information. I can’t put that bastard
in prison."

"He tried to rape me, three times. He failed all three
times cuz he couldn't get it up. That really pissed him off."

"So he did touch you?"

"Yeah, he did." Katy had told herself that it
wasn’t
that
much worse than some of the dates she’d been on where the
men figured they were entitled to grope her because they had paid for dinner.

She told Sarah all about the thirty hours tied to Danny's
bed. She explained how he used a bowl when she needed to pee and how he told
her all about the life they
could
have had if she hadn't been such a
bitch and just gone out with him when he had asked.

"Did he feed you?"

"I had water. He held the glass. He refused to untie
me."

After a few more questions from Sarah, Katy walked out of
the office building into the sunshine. She turned her face up to the sky and
felt the warmth on her cheeks. It felt wonderful. It felt wonderful to feel
nothing but warmth.

*****

Mark sat in the San Francisco airport waiting for his
connecting fight. He needed Angela, Matt's secretary, to start making his
travel arrangements instead of his secretary, Jill. Why she booked him on a
flight from Phoenix back to New York that went through San Francisco, he
couldn't understand.

He checked his phone again. There was still nothing from
Katy. He’d left three voicemails for her and she hadn't returned any of them.
He was getting really worried.

He had offered to fly back to Portland from New York with
Katy after Matt and Janie’s wedding two weeks ago. He wanted to see her home
safely and that is what he’d done. He had ridden with her in the cab back to
her house. He had gone into her house with her and carried in her luggage. He
had made sure that everything was safe and secure and then he’d gone to a hotel
for the night. The next day he had picked her up and met the police to get her
car back from Danny's house. All of her clothing and personal items were still in
police evidence but at least her car was released back to her. He had gone with
her to see Sarah at the District Attorney's office to answer some more
questions. And he had given her every phone number and email address he had so
she could get a hold of him at any time. And then he had returned to New York
and Katy had not contacted him since.

Mark headed for the ticket agent's desk and changed his
ticket. He would be in Portland in just a couple of hours.

Katy hoped that her second appointment with Dr. LaVaughn
would be as painless as the first. They had talked about the weather, her son
Derek who had just started his junior year at Portland State University, and
the fact that she was in the middle of painting several rooms of her house. She
sat in the waiting room reading a magazine and waited her turn.

The door opened and a young girl around sixteen, Katy
guessed, left the doctor’s office, tissue in hand, blowing her nose. Katy
watched as she walked through the waiting room and out the door. 
I hope
she’s okay. How could someone hurt a child? What kind of animal does that?

Dr. LaVaughn said hello to Katy and told her she’d be with
her in just a moment. Katy sat and thought about the girl who had just left.
Dr. LaVaughn specialized in sexual abuse victims and so Katy had to assume that
the poor girl had been through something pretty bad. It was heartbreaking to
see her so sad. She replaced the magazine on the side table and hoped that this
girl would be able to get the help she needed so that she could move on with
her life and find happiness.

The doctor interrupted her thoughts and Katy entered her
office, sitting in the same chair as the last time she had come.

“She seemed so sad,” said Katy. “I hope your other patient
is going to be okay.”

Dr. LaVaughn smiled but didn’t answer.

“It’s just terrible what people will do to others,” Katy
continued. “It’s so sad to see someone so young here. Although I guess it’s sad
to see anyone here. Well, I guess some people probably
need
to see you.”

“I can’t talk about my other patients, Katy. And we’re here
to talk about you.”

“But she’s so young and she looked so sad. I’m sure
she
needs your help. I hope someone beat the shit out of the motherfucker who did
that to her.”

“Did someone beat the shit out of the man who hurt you?”

“Yeah, they did. And I’m glad. I’d like to get a few kicks
in myself.”

“Do you think kicking him would help you?”

“I’d like to find out.”

"Katy, why don't you tell me about the morning you
drove to Danny's house."

Katy visibly retreated. She folded her arms, her shoulders
sunk and her head lowered, her eyes on the floor.

"Pretending that it didn't happen doesn't work,"
Dr. LaVaughn continued. "Not talking about it doesn’t work either. Just
because the physical scars have healed and you don’t see them anymore doesn’t
mean the emotional and psychological scars are healed and gone too. They take
much longer to heal, Katy. Keeping it all bottled inside will just turn you
into a ticking time bomb. In order to move on with your life, in order to find
fulfillment and happiness in future relationships, you are going to have to
deal with it. And the sooner the better."

Katy didn't move.

"So why don't you tell me about what happened."

It had been almost three weeks, and with the exception of
having to answer Sarah's questions at the DA's office, she had tried to put the
ordeal out of her mind. And now that there were no more yellow rooms in her
house, she felt much more comfortable there. She was almost able to pretend she
was the old Katy. She slowly lifted her head to see the doctor watching her.

"Janie had moved a couple of months before. She’s my
best friend. We've known each other since we were teenagers and are more like
sisters I guess. I don't have any sisters so she
is
my family. I met
Danny a few years ago at Janie and Robert's. Danny lived next door to them. Robert
was her husband but he died," Katy explained.

Dr. LaVaughn nodded and Katy continued.

"So Janie sold the house a couple of months ago and she’d
met Matt and they got married a few days ago. But she was going back and forth
to New York, because that's where Matt lives, and Danny called me to say the
new owners of Janie's house had found a box of Robert's stuff in the
garage."

There was a pained expression on Katy's face as she recalled
the phone call from Danny.

"I don’t even know how he got my number. Although I
didn’t even think about that ‘til, well, until after. I figured Janie would
want the box, at least so she could go through it to make sure there wasn't
anything in there that she’d want to keep, so I said I’d go pick it up on my
way to work."

Katy recalled the conversation as best as she could, giving
the doctor what she wanted to hear, but there was no emotion in her voice.

"So you pulled up at his house and went to the
door?"

"Yep." Katy stood up and stepped to the window,
her arms wrapping around her body.

"And he used pepper spray on you?"

"Yeah, but you know what?" Katy turned back to the
doctor, anger on her face. "I have taken a dozen self-defense courses. I
stopped a kid from grabbing my purse at the mall. I work out five days a week.
I am
not
a wuss. I am
not
a victim. But he sprays pepper spray in
my face and the next thing I know I'm gagged and tied to a bed?" She was
seething; her teeth gritted and fire in her eyes. "I should have done
something," she whispered.

"Katy, this is NOT your fault. You are alive and that's
the most important thing. You did what you did in order to stay alive, Katy. You
are incredibly brave and courageous. And Danny is going to go to prison for a
long time."

Katy relaxed the grip she had on her arms and looked back
out the window.

"I don't see how re-hashing it is going to help
me," she said.

"You need to work through the feelings and emotions and
get them out. Keeping them buried is only going to hurt you. It might feel
better right now, but in the long-term, it won't be."

*****

Katy thought about the doctor's words on her drive home. She
didn't want to think about those thirty hours, but she also knew that drinking
it away every night wasn't going to help either. If only she could go back to
work and back to her old life. Her co-workers had donated their sick time to
her benefits bank and she had received several weeks of paid time off. She
appreciated the gesture, she really did, but was it helping her? Being alone
with her thoughts day after day?

She pulled into her driveway and turned off the car.
Maybe
I should paint the outside of the house too.

Walking to the front door she looked at the dismal state of
the flower beds.
Janie's flowers would never look like this
, she
thought.
No, Janie's would be lush and beautiful.

Her friend had lost her husband to cancer a couple of years
ago and it had been devastating for her, but Katy couldn't help but be a tiny
bit envious of her. Janie had met a delicious guy on the way to New York and
had ended up marrying him just a couple of weeks ago. Honeymooning in Hawaii
and a spacious apartment in lower Manhattan with the dreamy Matt Lathem was her
future. Janie deserved it all. NO doubt there. She was the best person Katy
knew, but Katy had wondered on more than one occasion when it would be her turn
to deserve the happy ending.
Maybe I don't.

*****

Mark parked his rental car in Katy's driveway behind her
Subaru. Feeling hesitant about his impromptu trip to Portland, he walked to the
door and rang the doorbell. After a minute or so he rang it again. And after
another minute he walked around the side of the house to the gate and into the
backyard.

He saw her on the deck, dressed in lycra shorts and a sports
bra doing yoga. Her long blonde hair was in a ponytail and her body was
contorted into something Mark thought was impossible. He sighed with relief
knowing she was safe. He took a few steps towards her and said hello. Katy's
head whipped up and she fell with a hard thump on the wood.

"Shit! You scared the crap out of me!" she growled
as she looked up and recognized the man stepping up the steps towards her.