“Si. She is OK, but please. I need to tell you something. She’s OK, but a boy tried to assault her, sexually assault her. She got away.”
I felt the chills any parent would feel after hearing those words.
“Is she there?” My voice cracked. “Put her on.”
Then Tessa’s voice. “Patrick-”
“Tessa, did he touch you? Tell me. Did he touch you?”
“No. I’m OK. I ran away. But I’m scared. I need you.”
I looked over at Lien-hua. The paramedics were with her. She was safe. “I’m coming. I’ll be right there.”
“I’m sorry, Patrick. I-”
“Don’t be sorry. I’m coming.” I shouted to the responding officers, “The Future Relic. The club. Can you get me there fast?”
One of the men nodded to me. “I got you covered. It’s over by the Horton Grand Theatre where Triple Espresso used to play.”
Tessa and I ended the call.
With my gunshot wound, the paramedics were adamant that I stay with them, but Tessa needed me and nothing was going to stop me. Finally, when they saw I was leaving anyway, one of the EMTs hastily dressed the wound and gave me a pair of crutches from the ambulance. “You still need to get to the hospital as quickly as you can,” he said. I assured him that I would.
Before leaving, I told Lien-hua I’d see her at the hospital, and she nodded beneath her oxygen mask. I kissed her lightly on the cheek. Then, as I used the crutches to head toward the door, I heard one of the paramedics say, “He’s still alive. Hurry, let’s get him out of the water.”
So, Terry had survived.
Well, I could deal with that later.
As we drove to the Future Relic I felt the tug of the undertow once again. The whole way there I imagined all the things I wanted to do to the boy who’d tried to molest my stepdaughter. And after fifteen years of seeing the most hideous things one human being can do to another, I had plenty of images to choose from.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.
I imagined in vivid detail how I would make him suffer and then I thought of how I would justify it all in my mind when I was done. The courts would probably be on my side too, at least to a certain extent, but even if they weren’t, I’d find a way to live with myself.
I couldn’t let him get away with this.
I couldn’t. When we arrived, I still wasn’t sure how I’d react when I saw him, but as soon as I stepped out of the car, my thoughts shifted from him to Tessa. She saw me, came running, flew to my arms, and I held her. I held her with the fierce love and pride and dreams and disappointments and fire of a father. She told me she was sorry she’d skipped her flight, and I told her we’d talk about all that later; she told me she’d fought the guy off, and I told her I was proud of her, and then for a moment we were both quiet, and eventually she stopped trembling and stepped back.
She pointed to the police cruiser where her attacker was being held. “That’s him over there.”
“Can you give me a second?”
“Yeah.”
Just then, Detective Dunn came stalking up to me. I was about to ask what he was doing here when he blurted out, “Heard your name on dispatch, thought I’d come to help.” Dunn leaned close and pointed to the suspect. “You want me to give you a few minutes with him?”
I knew what he meant. “Yes. I do.”
Dunn stepped aside, and I hobbled over to the kid sitting in the car. He looked at me through the window with a mixture of defiance and fright.
I felt tension growing in my shoulders, in my arms.
He was going to rape Tessa. You need to make him pay.
Tension. Tension.
I remembered Melice talking about Cain, and the Lord’s warning about sin crouching beside him, wanting to have him. And as I stood there I could sense it crouching beside me too. It’s part of who we are, part of the human dilemma, but we must master it.
I tried to. Really, I did.
But I couldn’t.
Not after what this guy had tried to do to Tessa.
I reached for the door. It feels good, doesn’t it?
Yes, it does.
You’re not like them, are you?
Yes, I guess I am.
My fingers found the handle.
Christie used to say we can’t reach the Light on our own, but the Light can reach us. As I clicked the car door open, I thought of that, and of what Calvin had told me-that maybe we are all monsters.
He was right. We are. None of us make it past the abyss without peering inside. Without stepping inside.
The dark space inside of the car spoke my name and I knew that I would kill this boy, tonight, right now, with my bare hands.
I couldn’t say no, not on my own. Not tonight.
I slid into the car and stared at him, cornered in the backseat, delivered to me. I felt rage.
Fear.
Horror.
Not just because of his choices, his abyss, but because of my own.
And in that moment my heart cried out for courage, cried out to the only one able to bring light to an abyss as deep as me.
We are all monsters, all of us, but we were meant to be so much more.
And as I reached for the kid and saw his trembling eyes, I made a decision.
I leaned back, stepped out, and closed the door. Dunn was standing close by, ready to block the view into the car’s window. When he saw me leaving he gave me a quizzical look.
“I have a better idea, Detective,” I said. “Let’s book him. Pros-ecute him-”
A grin slithered across Dunn’s face. “And send him to prison full of guys who are always thrilled to have new mates to play with.”
“That’ll work.”