Lust and Lies 04 - Pretty Maids in a Row

man I'm accustomed to dealing with, but I'm fairly sure I can manage it." She could almost see April smiling her approval.
    "That's fine. Remember the advice I gave you, Holly. Think of him as practice. It's not important if you make mistakes, because you're not looking for a permanent relationship with him. If you take off the pressure of being perfect, you'll find it's not so difficult to be with a man."
    "I'm trying, but—"
    "It's not important," April repeated. "Do you enjoy his company?"
    Holly was tempted to lie rather than hear herself say it aloud. "Yes. Very much."
    "Then take the pressure off and have fun for a change. You've accomplished the fundamental part of your assignment. The rest, particularly being able to watch it all unfold, would be a bonus."
    "But I really want that part of it, now that I've begun."
    "So you do understand how we all feel? I'm very relieved to hear that. Listen, I hate to cut you short, but I must feed my poor husband. You know what would be very nice? If you would come up here for a visit next weekend. I'd love to get to know you better."
    "I'd like that, too," Holly replied instantly. She felt good after each talk with April and wouldn't mind deepening the friendship. Holly remembered promising her mother to spend a weekend with them. "I'll see how my schedule looks and let you know."
    That evening was like so many others she and Philip had shared, a blend of friendship and business, but Holly sensed an undercurrent of tension and sought to relieve it by having a cup of coffee with him at his house after the movie. It was the sign Philip must have been waiting for.
    "I hope you don't mind my bringing this up, honey, but I've noticed a change in you in the last two weeks."
    Holly's years of concealing her emotions helped her to show nothing but mild curiosity. "Oh?"
    He shrugged. "Ever since you spoke to your parents about what happened to you in college, you seem a little... I don't know... stronger might be the best word. It frightened me at first. I thought you were... well, it's not important now. I read a book about rape victims and one of the recommendations for recovery is talking about it."
    "Yes, that was the advice a friend gave me. I think it helped."
    "But the book also stated sometimes that's not enough. One of the recurrent problems of the victim is the fear that the attacker will find her again. As long as he's free, she feels threatened."
    She had heard that before too, but he continued before she could say so.
    "There's something I should have told you when we first talked about it, but you seemed adamant about wanting to keep the identity of your rapists a secret, so I let you think it was."
    Holly didn't bother to hide her bewilderment.
    Philip cautiously patted her hand. "It's all right. Your secret's safe with me. You see, after you talked to your parents, your mother pulled out what she called your memory box. Although you'd left Dominion, they'd sent you the yearbook and she had put it away, in case you ever wanted to look at it. Did you know she'd kept every card and letter you ever sent them? Well, in several letters, right before you quit school, you wrote about your new boyfriend, Jerry Frampton, and his fraternity brothers."
    "It was a simple matter to look up the fraternity in the yearbook and find out who those brothers were. Frampton was obviously the boyfriend who hurt you. Your reaction to the Ziegler hearing and the way you freeze every time his name is mentioned suggests Ziegler was the other one. Was he?"
    Holly's mind was spinning. Philip had figured it out! Her mother had found the name! Had she passed it on to her father? She could deny it but she would have to name one of the other brothers to be convincing. At least with Ziegler gone, neither Philip nor her father would be able to confront him. Finally, she simply nodded her head.
    Philip gave her another sympathetic pat on the hand. "The point that I'm trying to make is that I want you to know that it's perfectly normal if you're feeling relieved that Ziegler is dead. You don't have to hide it from me."
    Holly shook her head in protest. "No matter what he did, I couldn't be happy he's dead."
    "Of course you're not happy. Only a wicked person would be happy and I know there's not an ounce of wickedness in your whole beautiful body. I was only trying to understand the change I've noticed. You must realize it started around the time of the murder."
    Holly considered the timing he referred