Enemy From The Past (Unseen Enemy Book 4) by Marysol James

that she helped me, he’d kill her!”
    “OK, whoa.” Chris held up his hands. “Slow down. Nobody’s doing anything to put anyone at risk. Just talk to us. Who’s this woman who helped you? How did she help you?”
    “She knew that he… that he raped me one night when he drove me home from the bar after I’d had too much to drink.” She looked away. “I went with him because he’s a cop and besides, everyone in town knows him. I mean, I went to school with him, for God’s sake. He’s a former high school football star, an ex-Marine, a well-liked and respected policeman. He – he offered to help me. He got me away from some guy who wouldn’t leave me alone, and I thought I was safer with him than the guy in the bar.”
    The men sat still.
    “After he finished, he told me that nobody would believe me. Football star, Marine, cop… those things mean something in my hometown. It’s a pretty small place, and he’s a local hero. I was just a high school drop-out who worked at the hair salon on Main Street. I was – nobody. And I have no idea why, but he decided that he liked me. Or maybe he just liked tormenting me, I don’t know. Maybe for him, it’s the same thing.” Kat twisted her fingers in her lap. “He started coming by the salon most days, just to ‘check in’, you know. But he would get me alone somehow and he’d… he’d whisper things to me, right in front of everybody.”
    “What things?” Jim said, trying to stay in control of his rage.
    “He’d say how much he’d loved it when we were together. How much I’d loved it.” The tears were flowing now, but she didn’t wipe them away. “And he said it was going to happen between us again… that we were meant to be together. That I was – his.”
    “And did it happen again?” Chris said quietly.
    Kat nodded. “He waited for me to leave work and forced me in to the car at gunpoint and raped me. He followed me around town and turned up anyplace I was, just sat and stared at me. He – he broke in to my house when I was sleeping and beat me up.” Her eyes were wide with fear. “He never left me alone. He told me he’d hurt my friends if I said anything to anybody. He threatened my parents. I didn’t know what to do.”
    “ Did you tell your parents?”
    “Eventually, some of it. Not the worst of it… I told them he was following me and scaring me, and that got them worried enough. But they’re not in Oregon anymore, and they have health problems. They have no money, no influence.” She sighed. “And I was terrified to run to them, because I knew he’d follow me. I didn’t have a car, and the bus was the only way out of town. If I left, he’d just have to flash his badge and he’d be able to come after me, no problem.”
    “What happened that made you run in the end?” Dallas asked.
    Kat shook her head. “No… I don’t want to talk about that.”
    “Kat, please.” Dean’s rough voice was quiet. “Tell us. The last straw – what was it? The thing that made you sure it was run or die?”
    She was silent, and they waited. Then she got to her feet and walked to the door. Alarmed, they stood up too, thinking she was going to just pick up her suitcase and leave. They were relieved when she turned around again and leaned against the door, her arms crossed.
    Dallas gazed at her, saw her eyes go to the bag at her feet.
    She’s feeling trapped and she’s close to bolting. Fuck. We have to make her feel safe somehow.
    “Kat?” His Texan drawl was warm and comforting. “Any one of us would step in and protect you from him. You know that, right? You can trust us. I swear it.”
    Kat bit her bottom lip, hard enough to almost draw blood. The silence stretched out. Finally, she sighed.
    “I – I got pregnant.”
    The men inhaled sharply.
    “That was when I knew I had to talk, at last … I went to the police station to report what had been happening, and there was a big parade one town over, so I knew he’d be gone.