The Departed

it wasn’t right. Nobody had to know, nobody—
    Daddy found her. More than two months after she’d left the hospital, after she’d run from him, he found her, knocking on the door of the small apartment she rented. The house belonged to the lady she cleaned for, a sweet lady who needed some company around the house, who needed a friend.
    Daddy came inside like he owned the place, and he smiled when he saw her. Smiled at her like he owned her . Then he saw the baby, sleeping in her crib. She wanted to cry, wanted to scream. But he couldn’t make her come back, couldn’t force her to do anything.
    She wouldn’t let him. He couldn’t force it on her. She would talk to him, show him that he couldn’t make her do those things anymore, show him that he didn’t control her.
    And he didn’t. But she paid the price. When the phone rang, her neighbor calling to invite her for dinner, she slipped out of the room, not wanting her father to hear that conversation—she had a friend , for the first time ever. A friend. Her father couldn’t know…
    Because she needed to keep that precious secret, she lost something more precious. She returned to the room only a minute or so later. And saw her father standing over the crib holding one of the pillows from the couch in his hand. He lifted his head to look at her, a smile on his face. He dropped the pillow on the floor. Your baby isn’t breathing, angel. After you deal with this, you’ll come home. You belong with me. Only me…
    * * *
     
    DEZ finally managed to tear herself away, sobs strangling her.
    Jacqueline sank to the ground, whimpering like a caged, trapped animal. “No, Daddy…no…no…”
    The door to the hospital room opened. As Mayor Joshua Moore stepped out and found his wife huddling on the floor, another person joined them on the hospital floor, his arrival announced by the pinging of the elevator.
    Dez, her heart lurching in her chest, turned her head and looked.
    His face had changed a lot—some of the images she’d gotten from Jacqueline reached back from her early childhood. But the cruelty, the possessiveness, and the malice, that was all still the same. Older, shoulders stooped, but nothing about him looked frail.
    He glanced from Jacqueline to Dez, and his face twisted into an ugly, cold mask of rage. “You…you fucking bitch, get away from my girl.” He started toward them, moving faster than he should have been able to, Dez thought.
    Taylor came in between them, but he wasn’t the only one. He wasn’t even the one who got to the old man first. That was Joshua, his face lacking that smiling politician’s glow, his eyes all but blazing with fury.
    “You…old man, I told you, and I meant it. You won’t get near her again, you hear me?” Joshua grabbed the lapels of the older man’s jacket and whirled him around, slamming him into the wall.
    Next to Dez, Jacqueline gasped, her eyes glazed.
    * * *
     
    EVEN a blind man would have been able to sense the fear coming off the woman huddled on the floor. The fear. And the hatred. Taylor looked down at Jacqueline, his heart torn in two. He wanted justice—but Anna needed peace.
    A few feet away, Joshua snarled at his father-in-law.
    “You can’t fucking stop me from seeing my girl,” Beard sneered. “She’s my girl, my angel. I got a right to see her, and my grandson.”
    “ My angel… ” Jacqueline whispered. Her voice was ragged. Broken. She shook her head, the motion jerky, disjointed. “No. I’m not. Not his angel,” she muttered. Her voice was thick and when she looked up, her pupils were mere pinpricks.
    Dez knelt by her side, careful not to touch her. “No, you’re not. You’re a grown woman, a wife. If you don’t want to see him, you don’t have to. He can’t make you do anything, Jacqueline.”
    “Shut up, bitch!” Beard snarled. “I’ll damn well see her.”
    “Watch your mouth.” Taylor moved between them, cutting off the man’s view of his daughter. From the corner of his eye, he could see how she relaxed, even if it was just a little. “You won’t talk to her like that. And no. If Mrs. Moore doesn’t want to see you, you can’t force her.”
    The old man jerked his chin. “You think you can keep me away?”
    Taylor smiled.
    But Moore was the one who leaned in. In a low voice, he said, “I’ll fucking stop you, you fucking pervert.”
    “And ruin your reputation, Mr. Mayor?” Beard started to laugh, a nasty, low little chuckle. “Come on.