“Good.” I nod. As I stare through the window, I wonder how much Katherine McDonough knows about her family. Did she know about Marianne prior to the night of her supposedmurder? How long did she know Remus had been masquerading around as Seamus?
“I am slightly concerned about her mental well-being, however.”
My head turns toward the good doctor. “What do you mean?”
“Katherine has been through some significantly traumatizing experiences,” he elaborates and gestures to her chart. “The doctor who had been taking care of her left extensive medical notes documenting every time Elias came to visit her.”
“While she was awake, of course.”
Radick visibly swallows.
“No.” His jaw clenches angrily. “I wish I could say that any doctor wouldn’t allow for such an abhorrent breach of medical conduct, but I’m afraid that isn’t the case here.”
There is not much that can turn my stomach, but what the doctor is implying churns my insides, bilious and sour.
“How many times?” Fuck, I don’t want to know the answer, but I ask it anyway.
“Once or twice a month for years, and that isn’t counting whatever he did to her while she was awake.”
My teeth grind together, jaw aching as I struggle to keep from being sick. There are times when such things are appropriate under consensual role playing, but this is not one of them. As soon as I am done here, that doctor is going to find out what it means to feel real pain.
“Any lasting damage?”
“She won’t be able to have any more children.” Radick huffs out a breath. “It looks like her ovaries were damaged during the original incident, but as far as I can see, there is no lasting physical damage from the extra involuntary proclivities.” He spits the last few words out angrily.
Blyad’.
“I suggest a therapist,” Radick continues. “Once or twice a week to start, and the schedule can adjust from there. Maybe some antidepressants.”
I nod my head to let him know I hear him, but I won’t agree to medicating Katherine without her permission. She has already been violated without her consent. I won’t allow that to happen again, even on something like this.
“Thank you, doctor,” I tell him sincerely before striding into Katherine’s room. “Hello, Katherine.” I speak softly so I don’t disturb my slumbering wife. Walking over to her, I bend down to pick her up in my arms when a hand slaps against my wrist.
Startled, I look up into the cold, lush emerald eyes of her mother, which narrow at me. There is a storm on her face as she looks at me in silent warning. Radick hadn’t been exaggerating about her improvements. Her grip, although still weak, holds more weight than it did last night when she’d barely been able to move it.
“It is all right,” I whisper to her calmly. “I am only going to move her to the bed. She will have a neck cramp and a backache tomorrow if she stays like this.”
Katherine eyes me suspiciously for a moment, and I realize that Ava must have told her mother everything about us. Sure as hell isn’t going to earn me any brownie points. She glares at me a few more seconds before releasing my hand and looking mildly ashamed when I lay Ava down on the large bed beside her.
Straightening up, I look Katherine straight in the eye.
“No one will ever tear you two apart again. I promise you that.”
She closes her eyes, a tear escaping down her pale face. When she opens them again, they are clearer and full of gratitude I don’t deserve.
“Thank...” She pauses to take a slow breath. “…you.”
“You don’t need to thank me, Katherine,” I tell her softly. “I always protect my family.”
forty-four
I pace nervously around the entertainment room, waiting for their arrival. It has been nearly a month since Katherine woke up, and today is the day she is being discharged from the hospital. I prepared her room across from mine. It is the only one I was able to modify to fit her accommodations.
Katherine is still weak, mostly using a cane to get around for short distances, but anything past that requires a wheelchair. The bathroom is also the only one that has a walk-in shower instead of a tub. I outfitted it for my mother several years ago, in case something was ever to happen. She cursed me out and threw several rags at my face, calling me an ungrateful son and insisting she was fresh as a spring chicken.
Since everything went down with Marianne, I’ve been adamantly avoiding the house we share together. Not that I was ever there much to begin with. It was always too ostentatious for me, but Marianne insisted on a large, opulent home for entertaining.
“I can walk perfectly fine, you know.” Katherine’s voice drifts through the space. The elevator doors open on a ding, but I am too immersed in my thoughts to hear it.