“Where will you go?”
“That’s none of your business, Mr. Quinlan. None of what I do is any of your business anymore.”
“The hell it isn’t. Listen, Sally. Tell me the truth about something. When Dillon and I got into your room at the sanitarium, there was this pathetic little guy who looked crazy as a loon sitting on the bed beside you, looking down at you. Did he ever hurt you? Beat you? Rape you?”
“Holland was there in my room?”
“Yeah, you were naked and he was leaning down over you. I think he’d combed and straightened your hair. Did he rape you?”
“No,” she said in a remote voice. “No one raped me. As for Holland, he did other things, that Beadermeyer told him to do. He never hurt me, just-well, that’s not important.”
“Then who the hell did hurt you? That bloody Beadermeyer? Your husband? Who was that man you told me about in your nightmare?”
She gave him a long look, and again that look was filled with quiet rage. “You are nothing more to me. None of this is any of your business. Go to hell, James.”
She turned away from him and walked down the wooden steps. It was chilly now. She wasn’t wearing anything but that too-small shirt and jeans.
“Come back, Sally. I can’t let you go. I won’t let you go. I won’t see you hurt again.”
She didn’t even slow down, just kept walking, in sneakers that were probably too small for her as well. He didn’t want her to get blisters. He’d planned to go shopping for her tomorrow, to buy her some clothes that fit her, to- damn, he was losing it.
He saw Dillon standing near the water line, unaware that she was walking away.
“Sally, you don’t know where you are. You don’t have any money.”
Then she did stop. She was smiling as she turned to face him. “You’re right, but it shouldn’t be a problem for long. I really don’t think that I’m afraid of any man anymore. Don’t worry. I’ll get enough money to get back to Washington.”
It sent him right over the edge. He slammed his hand down on the railing and vaulted over it to land lightly only three feet away from her. “No one will ever hurt you again. You will not take the chance of some asshole raping you. You will stay with me until this is over. Then I’ll let you go if you don’t want to stay.”
She began to laugh. Her body shook with her laughter. She sank slowly to her knees, hugging herself, laughing and laughing.
“Sally!”
She stared up~~at him, her palms on her thighs. She laughed, then said, “Let me go? You’d keep me if I didn’t
want to leave? Like some sort of pathetic stray? That’s good, James. I haven’t known a single person for a very long time who cared one whit about anyone, including me, not that it mattered. Please, no more lies.
“I’m a case for you, nothing more. If you solve it, just think of your reputation. The FBI will probably make you director. They’ll kiss your feet. The president will give you a medal.”
She gasped, out of breath now, hiccupping through the laughter that welled up from her throat. “You should have believed my file, James. Yes, I’m sure the FBI had a very thick file on me, particularly my stint in the loony bin. I’m crazy, James. No one should believe I’m a credible witness, despite the fact that you want very badly to have someone to lock up, anyone.
“I won’t tell you anything. I don’t trust you, but I do owe you for rescuing me from that place. Now let me go before something horrible happens.”
He came down on his knees in front of her. Very slowly, he pulled her arms to her sides. He brought her forward until her face was resting against his shoulder. He rubbed his hands up and down her back. “It’s going to be all right, I swear it to you. I swear I won’t fuck up again.”
She didn’t move, didn’t settle against him, didn’t release the terrible rage that had been deep inside her for so long she didn’t know if she could ever confront it, or speak about it, because it could very well destroy her, and the sheer magnitude of it would destroy others as well.