What's Left Of Me (The Firebird Trilogy Book 2) by Jennifer Loring Read Free Book Online Page B

because babies have such strange breathing patterns. Tell me I’m not an awful mother. An awful person . “I just can’t sit there doing nothing but taking care of a baby.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “I love her to death, I really do. But I’m not that person.”
    “Some people go back to work right away. Some never do. There’s no right or wrong, only what makes sense for you.”
    Stephanie flopped back in her chair. She drew a deep breath through her nose and exhaled with thoughtful quietness. She’d never been one to rely on others for validation, but motherhood was still largely uncharted territory for her. For now, though, other matters required her attention.
    “So here’s my idea,” Jessica said. “We get out in front of the rape allegation. Take some of the power away from whoever’s doing this.”
    Stephanie shifted her gaze to the window.
    “What’s wrong?”
    “I thought the rape allegation was the worst it could get. But last week he told me someone is threatening to release a sex video. He refuses to tell me what’s on it. Won’t even talk about it.”
    Jessica folded her hands and tilted forward. “What do you think is on it?”
    “I don’t know. I’m sure I don’t want to. But the way he acts when it comes up…” Beyond the glass, Lake Erie reflected pendulous rain clouds, the water’s fragile surface shivering with wind as though it would shatter. “It’s bad. And I have to find out what it is.”
     
    ***
     
    A sudden hush fell over the office, the way it did when the subject of secret gossip walked unannounced into a room. Awkward clearing of throats and heads swiveling back toward monitors. Stephanie set her bag down, dropped into her chair, and switched on her computer, her face hot. A slew of “welcome back” and congratulatory emails had stacked up in her inbox. Thanks to the show, she no longer wrote full-time, maybe one editorial or feature a week instead of a daily column. She had shaved her fifteen-hour days, when as a reporter she arrived at First Niagara Center at 9:45 a.m. and didn’t leave until 12:30 a.m. after scrambling to submit copy, down to twelve. Now she woke at 3:00 a.m. to reach the studio by four for a show that started at six. In bed by 8:00 p.m. Though she usually made it home by mid-afternoon, the idea that she and Alex didn’t spend enough time together had grown increasingly bothersome. She’d been doing little things like hiding naughty notes in his pockets or sending racy photos to his phone, but nothing proved an adequate substitute even for cuddling and kissing, let alone making love.
    She drained half her latte before she considered doing anything more significant than browsing sports blogs and Twitter accounts. That Alex was a trending story came as no surprise, but seeing her own name curdled her stomach. Tweets and blog posts dissecting her motives for staying with him, whom a number of bloggers had already condemned in the court of public opinion. The extremists who believed no woman ever lied about rape and all men were potential predators, an equally insane counterbalance for the whack jobs who claimed rape didn’t exist at all.
     
    Hartwell needs to stop living in denial. She knows his past. The only reason you marry someone like that is for his looks.
    How do you sleep next to a rapist? It’s degrading to every woman who’s ever been assaulted.
    She should stop calling herself a feminist if she’s going to “stand by her man”.
    And now he has a daughter . Can you imagine what her life will be like?
     
    Stephanie crushed the empty cup in her fist. They had no fucking idea what she had endured. How very well acquainted she was with a rapist, and it was not her husband. But the entire goddamned office must know; they’d reacted to her entrance as though she had caught them masturbating. Meanwhile, the internet had decreed, because she shared her words on a website and her face on TV for a living, she was fair game.