Lena snapped, 'If I was going to kill myself, I would have done it my first day home.'
'I wasn't talking about you,' Hank shot back.
'Bullshit,' she hissed. She waited a beat, then said, 'I thought you were going home soon.'
'I am,' he answered.
'Good,' she told him, and for the moment, she really meant it. Hank had been living with her since she came home from the hospital, and Lena was over having him pry into every part of her life.
'I got a business to run,' he told her, as if the dilapidated bar he owned on the outskirts of Reece was IBM. 'I need to get back to it. I'll leave tonight if you want me to.'
'Fine,' she said, but her heart started pounding at the thought of being alone at night. Lena did not want Hank in her home, but she knew that she would never feel safe if he left. Even during the daytime when she was working and Hank went to check on his bar, she felt an aching fear that he would get into a car accident or just decide not to come back at all, and Lena would have to come home to a dark, empty house. Hank was not just an unwanted house guest. He was her shield.
He told her, 'I got better things I could be doing.'
She was quiet, though in her mind, she repeated her mantra-please don't leave me, please don't leave me. Her throat was closing up with the need to say it out loud.
The car jerked as Hank accelerated, taking a parking space close to the chapel. He slammed the gear into park and the old sedan rocked back and forth several times before it settled.
He glanced at her, and she could tell that he knew he had her. 'You want me to go? Tell me to go, then. You never had a hard time telling me to leave before.'
She bit her lip hard, wanting to taste blood. Instead of her flesh giving, her front teeth moved, and she put her hand to her mouth, startled by the reminder.
'What? You can't talk now?'
Lena choked a sob, overcome with emotion.
Hank looked away from her, waiting for her to get hold of herself. She knew that he could listen to a room full of strangers whine about wanting needles in their arms or double shots of whiskey, but could not handle Lena 's tears. Part of her also knew that he hated Lena for crying. Sibyl had been his baby, the one he had taken care of. Lena was the strong one who didn't need anybody. The role reversal had knocked him on his ass.
'You gotta go to that therapist,' Hank barked at her, still angry. 'Your chief told you that. It's a requirement, and you're not doing it.'
She shook her head side to side in a violent arc, her hand still at her mouth.
'You don't run anymore. You don't work out,' he began, as if this was part of an indictment against her. 'You go to bed at nine and don't get up until late as you can the next morning,' he continued. 'You don't take care of yourself anymore.'
'I take care of myself,' she mumbled.
'You go see a therapist or I'm leaving today, Lee.' He put his hand over hers, forcing her to turn her head. 'I am serious as a fucking heart attack, child.'
Suddenly, his expression changed, and the hard lines around his face softened. He pushed back her hair with his fingers, his touch light against her skin. Hank was trying to be paternal with her, but the soft way he touched her was a sickening reminder of the way
Lena started to shake. She could not stop herself. Hank moved his hand away quickly, as if he had just realized he was touching something dead. Lena jerked back, her head banging into the window.
'Don't ever do that again,' she warned, but there was only fear in her voice. 'Don't touch me. Don't ever touch me like that. Do you hear me?' She panted, trying to swallow the bile that came up her throat.
'I know,' he said, holding his hand close to her back but not touching her. 'I know that. I'm sorry.'
Lena grabbed for the door handle, missing it several times because her hands were shaking so hard. She stepped out of the car, taking gulps of air into her lungs. The heat enveloped her, and she squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to make the connection between the heat and her dreams of floating on the ocean.
She heard a familiar friendly voice behind her. 'Hey there, Hank,' Dave Fine, the pastor of the church, said.
'Good morning, sir,' Hank returned, his voice kinder than it ever was when he spoke to Lena. She had heard Hank use that tone before, but only with Sibyl. For Lena, there had always been nothing but sharp words of criticism.
Lena concentrated on getting her breathing back under control before she turned around. She could not smile, but she felt the corners of her mouth rise slightly in what must have seemed like a pained grimace to the pastor.
'Good morning, detective,' Dave Fine said, the preacher-compassion in his voice getting under her skin worse than anything Hank had said in the car. For the last four months, Hank had been pushing Dave Fine on Lena, trying to get her to talk to the preacher. Pastor Fine was also a psychologist, or so he said, and saw patients in the evenings. Lena did not want to talk to the man about the weather, let alone what had happened to her. It wasn't that Fine was the Antichrist, it was that of all the people Lena could possibly talk to, a preacher would be the last one she would pick. It was like Hank had forgotten exactly what had happened to her in that dark room.
She gave him a curt 'Pastor,' walking past him, her purse tight to her chest like an old lady at a rummage sale.
She could feel his eyes on her back, hear Hank make his apologies as she walked away from them. Lena felt a flush of shame for being rude to Fine. It wasn't his fault-he was a nice enough man-but there was really nothing she could say to make them understand.
She quickened her step, her eyes staring straight ahead as she walked toward the church. A crowd of people milling around the entrance parted for her as she took the steps one at a time, forcing herself to move slowly and not run into the church like her body ached to do. Everyone except for Brad Stephens, who grinned at her like a puppy, found something better to do as she ascended the stairs. Matt Hogan, who was Frank Wallace's partner now that Lena had been assigned to patrol, focused on lighting his cigarette as if he were attempting nuclear fusion in the palm of his hand.
Lena kept her chin raised, her eyes averted so that no one would talk to her. Still, she could feel them staring at her, and she knew they would start whispering as soon as they thought she was out of earshot.
The people were the worst part about going to church. The whole town knew what had happened to her. They knew she had been kidnapped and raped. They had read every detail of the assault in the paper. They had followed her recovery and return home from the hospital the way they followed their soap operas and football games. Lena could not go to the store without someone trying to look at the scars on her hands. She could not walk through a crowded room without someone casting a sad, pathetic look her way. As if they could understand what she had been through. As if they knew what it was like to be strong and invincible one day and completely powerless the next. And the next.
The doors to the church were closed to keep the cold air in and the heat out. Lena reached for the handle just as one of the deacons did, and their hands brushed. She jerked back as
