He went ballistic and was swinging the poker around trying to hit her. I tried to grab him and pull him off, but he shoved me. He turned and swung at me, and I fell trying to dodge it. He raised the poker above me, and I was scrambling to get away, but he fell . . . right on top of me. McKenzie had hit him over the head with a wrench, and his head was gushing blood everywhere. I shoved him off of me and got to my feet; I was a wreck. He was lying there, bleeding out, gasping like a fish out of water.
McKenzie and I stood on either side of him, facing one another, the wrench still in her hand, hanging limply at her side. “I was eleven when he raped me,” she said, calmly. “Told me never to tell anyone or he’d kill you and my parents.”
My gaze shot to hers, my heart in my stomach. “Mary-Anne snuck over here while I was in the shower. When I came downstairs, your front door was open, and I knew exactly where she went. I came to get her. She was eating a damn candy bar while he had his hand up her dress.”
I collapsed to the ground right beside him. This man had violated both of these young girls on my watch. I trusted him. I thought he was a good man. I even scolded McKenzie for being so rude to him.
“I swear, Demi,” she cried, a sob breaking loose from her chest. “I’m not lying.”
Tears trickle down my face as I speak, my voice raspy with emotion. “He hurt them, and it’s all my fault.”
“No, it isn’t,” Connor speaks softly, rolling to his side and wiping my wet cheeks with the bed sheet. “These fucking creeps are good; they’re sociopaths. They know how to act and make everyone think they’re trustworthy. The feeble old man act was probably part of it. How could anyone think a man who can barely walk be capable of abusing a child like that?”
“I should have known, though.”
Demi,” he whispers. “This wasn’t your fault. Tell me what happened next.”
“Wipe that wrench off,” I instructed her, my calmness surprising even me.
“I’m going to go to jail, aren’t I?” she cried as she wiped at her nose.
“That’s not going to happen,” I told her. “Wipe that down good and go.”
“What are you going to do?” she asked, panicked.
“Go, McKenzie,” I ordered.
She finished wiping down the wrench and put it back on the table. She looked down at him one last time, then to me. “Should I—”
“Go.”
When she left, I was still kneeling beside him, his mouth still moving as if he was trying to call for help. If I had just left him, he probably would have died from his head injury, but I wasn’t taking any chances.
My gaze meets Connor’s, and his expression is stoic. “I pinched his nose and covered his mouth with my hand.”
I remember feeling something snap inside of me as I suffocated Mr. Jenson; the realization that I was taking a life, killing a man. It changed me, rightfully so. Before I was me, Demi Stevens, regular everyday person. At that moment, I was a soon-to-be murderer. But right now, reliving it, sharing the play by play with Connor, I feel no regret.
“And that’s when I came in,” Connor says.
Mr. Jenson, even with his head injury in his subdued state, began to struggle as he fought for oxygen. I laid half of my body over him in an attempt to hold him down but holding his mouth and nose were difficult in my position. After a few minutes, he stopped struggling and stilled. Collapsing against him, my head thunked against his chest, exhausted by the task. When I managed to look up, his mouth hung open, and his eyes were fixed on the ceiling.
He was dead.
I had killed him.
“Over there,” I heard McKenzie yell just before Connor and Dusty rushed in through the bay door, stopping dead in their tracks. They looked at me, then at each another, both wearing a ‘what the fuck?’ expression.
“Go back to the house with Mary-Anne,” Connor yelled over his shoulder. I knew they were there, but I couldn’t speak as I pushed myself off of the corpse in front of me. His head injury was so severe, there was blood everywhere, and I slipped in it as I attempted to stand, only to fall and cover myself in it, which panicked me even more.
“You fell hard,” Connor notes. “It scared the shit out of me.”
“I hit my head on something,” I state it more than ask it as I touch the sore spot on the back of my crown.
“Tool bench,” he states.
“The next thing I remember is waking up on the gurney.”
“We have to see Wendy and Jeff. Obviously the girls haven’t come forward with what that old fuck did to them, or we would have been questioned about it by now.”
McKenzie was frantic after she hit Mr. Jenson over the head. I have no doubt she’s lied about everything, terrified she’ll go to prison for murder. No matter what happens, I’ll take the heat for all of this—after all, I did kill him. But the most important thing is that the girls get help, counseling to help them cope and understand the feelings something so horrendous might make them feel. My heart aches as I think of McKenzie; the years of carrying the pain around must have been unbearable.
Tears fill my eyes. “I can’t believe that I didn’t know; that I was so blind.”
“You’re so good, Demi,” he murmurs as he kisses my temple, “you only want to see the good in people.” He rubs gentle circles on my back before lying back, pulling me with him. I rest my head on his chest and let my fingers dance over the quote tattooed on his chest.
‘Return good for good; return evil with justice.’
“Is it bad I don’t regret killing him?” I ask my voice monotone.
“I’m the wrong person to ask that question,” he replies.
“Looks like we’re not so different after all,” I sigh.
A loud knock on the door startles us, and Connor climbs out of bed, quickly tugging on his boxers and a pair of jeans that were crumpled on the floor.
“Police. Open up,” a deep voice yells as they knock loudly once more.
Grabbing my white robe, he tosses it to me, and I quickly slip it on, my heart hammering in my chest a mile a minute. They’re going to arrest him. Shit. This is happening.
“Say nothing,” Connor tells me, his stare direct. Then he opens the door, but only halfway so the officers can’t see inside the apartment.
“Mr. Stevens, we’re looking for Demi Stevens,” the officer says.
“And why is that?” Connor asks, closing the door more.
“We have a warrant for her arrest for the murder of Ned Jenson. Is she here?”
“She’s been charged?” Connor asks as if it’s the most ridiculous thing he’s ever heard. “On what grounds?” Connor’s shoulders are pulled back, his chest is out, his stance tense. He’s getting upset. I need him to calm down before he gets himself in trouble.
“Is she here Mr. Stevens?”
“Yes, I’m here,” I call as I round the door, tugging my robe closed.”
“This is bullshit,” Connor yells. “They’ve already charged me.”
“Connor,” I plead as I place a trembling hand on his arm. “Please, calm down. Call Jim for me. I need you to see Wendy and Jeff as well.”
The officer pushes his way inside and begins reading me my rights, while his partner more or less, blocks Connor from me. My entire body is trembling as he cuffs me.
I’m being charged with murder.
And I’m guilty.