Page 37 of Mending Fate
Mai and Hob started cursing under their breath after the first sentence and kept going as I talked.
“Take whatever you’re imagining and make it worse. She talked about it in the hospital, but she won’t talk to the cops about it. Just talking to me…” The anger that had fueled me before was gone, leaving only profound sadness. “She downed all of her painkillers yesterday. One of the other kids found her, and she’s alive. I won’t say she’s okay, because after what happened to her, she’s far from fucking okay. But she’s alive.”
I paused to finish my beer, and they did the same.
“I want to take down the assholes who assaulted her, including the mom’s boyfriend.” I took a breath and peeled the label from the bottle. “Thing is, he’s a cop. And chances are, his gang-raping buddies are too.”
Mai let loose with a torrent of English and Chinese curses. Hob simply set down his now empty beer, a hard look on his usually open face. He was a doctor, which meant he understood the sort of injuries Soleil must’ve had even without seeing her.
“What hospital was she taken to?” His voice was quiet.
I told him, and his expression tightened. “A guy I went to med school with works in the ER over there. Whenever we have a particularly hard day, we’ll meet up after our shifts are done. Friday morning, he texted me, asking if I was free for breakfast. He had this kid who’d come in, beaten and assaulted, and she wouldn’t tell anyone what’d happened to her.”
I rubbed at the pain forming in my temple. “Shit.”
“Yeah.” Hob’s eyes glinted with anger. “This guy was a medic in the army right out of high school, so it’s not like he hasn’t seen his fair share of fucked up stuff, but this one…” He shook his head. “It really had him shaken up.”
“Did she tell anyone other than you?” Mai asked.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Brie and Josalyn would have a legal obligation to report it, and Soleil is terrified.”
“No shit.” Mai stood up and took our empty bottles into the kitchen. A minute later, she was back with three more. “I’d be scared too if the person who’d hurt me was someone who was supposed to protect me.”
“That’s a part of it,” I agreed. “The worst part, though, is that she still wants to believe that he cares about her. Even if I decided to go to the police about it, it’d be hearsay, and she’d never corroborate it. And if the rape kit doesn’t pick up his DNA…” I shrugged, feeling completely hopeless.
“If you’re not going to the cops, what are you going to do?”
Mai knew me well. There was no way I’d simply sit on this information and not try to figure out a way to help. Right now, Soleil was my main focus, but I knew that there was a good chance she wasn’t the first one he’d done this to. And if this man wasn’t stopped, she wouldn’t be the last.
What too many people didn’t understand was that, unlike murderers, sex offenders were hardly ever singular offenders. A man who killed his wife in a fit of rage or a drunk driver who killed someone wouldn’t necessarily do it again. And even multiple murderers, like gang members, could walk away from those circumstances and never hurt anyone again. Sex offenders were almost always repeat offenders, especially if they weren’t caught. And they sometimes would escalate to murder to prevent their victims from reporting them.
I was fairly certain that’s what the bastard had intended to happen to Soleil when he’d given her to his friends. He’d counted on her either dying or being so traumatized that she’d never tell anyone what had happened to her.
The one thing he hadn’t factored into his plan was me. I didn’t give a damn if he threatened me, and I wouldn’t be intimidated by him.
“I want to take him down,” I said. “It took me a couple hours, but I was able to find his name. Clyde Lunsford. That’s the son of a bitch who preyed on her. Him first, then his buddies.”
“I would ask if you’re crazy, but I already know the answer to that question,” Mai said grimly. “The real question is, are you going to let us help?”
Hope swelled in my chest. “I was hoping you’d offer. As much as I hate the idea of bringing you into all of this, I know I can’t do it by myself.”
“We’re in,” Hob said. “What is it you want us to do?”
“That’s just it.” I held up both hands, feeling helpless. “I don’t have a plan. All I’ve really been able to think about is how I can castrate all of them.”
“That would most likely land you in jail, and you couldn’t do anything from there,” Mai said, an angry smile curving her lips. “But I agree with the sentiment.”
“As uncomfortable as the idea of castration makes me, in this case, I tend to agree.” Hob shifted in his seat, crossing his legs. “But Mai’s right. Assaulting any of them, no matter how much they deserve it, won’t solve any problems. We need a way to get this Lunsford guy to either confess to what he’s done or catch him trying to do something else.”
While a part of me still wished I had someone like Eoin in on this – I loved Hob, but Eoin was a hell of a lot scarier – I was grateful to have my friends with me. I’d told Soleil that she didn’t have to do everything on her own, and it was a lesson I was still learning myself. As we began to pitch ideas, I was glad I’d reached out. One way or another, we’d figure something out to get Soleil some justice and keep those men from hurting anyone else.
Twenty-One
Lumen
While the otherkids kept themselves busy with their math worksheets, I called Evanne up to my desk so we could go over what she’d missed the previous week. As she skipped up to the desk I kept next to mine specifically for instances like this, I was relieved to see that she didn’t seem to have been negatively affected by what had happened.
“You and I are going to talk about the lessons you missed last week,” I began. “Anything that you don’t understand, you need to ask about, because I won’t know how to help otherwise.”