one who raped a woman — well, let’s just say I felt a burning desire to make sure he’d no longer own any equipment to even make that a fucking possibility. I wanted to… I raged inside, and yet I knew the woman seated on my lap was as fragile as the crystal globe I could see sitting in a place of honor on my mantel. There was a small figurine of a ballerina inside that globe, protected by the glass surrounding it, and I had to be satisfied my job was to protect Clara from the memories that had haunted her for years.
“Why didn’t you ever tell the media the truth?” I asked. “Why have you always allowed yourself to be abused? If people understood your reasoning behind it, they’d be much more willing to forgive you. You made a mistake. People understand that. You were in pain from watching your grandmother’s health begin to deteriorate. You grew addicted to drugs and drank too much. There are valid reasons for what you did. Not right, but at least reasons some people would understand and maybe relate to. We all would do whatever it took to take care of a loved one.”
Clara took a moment as if to seriously consider my words and then shook her head. “Why did I never try to defend myself? Why didn’t Lara ever come forward and talk about what really happened that night? I suppose because neither of us thought we’d be believed. I was barely twenty, and Nikolai was not only twice my age, he had so much power. I became used to hearing I was nothing more than a jealous, conniving bitch, to being told dancing with the devil would send me straight to where I belonged… Hell. And, to be honest, a lot of it had to do with the fact I knew I deserved their disgust and all that came with it.”
“You didn’t deserve all of that, Clara. A great number of the media would have printed shit, that’s true, but there are still honest journalists out there. Men like Baker.” I paused and shook my head. “Did you know his editor informed him the interview he did with you wasn’t worth the paper it was written on because there was no real ‘dirt’ in it?”
She shook her head. “No. I didn’t even know when it was supposed to come out. To be honest, when I saw you get out of your car in your sexy suit, my first thought was you’d read the story and had come to see what else you might get.”
“Sexy, huh?” I said, unable to keep from grinning though the story she’d shared was as far from amusing as one could get. Still, the words had begun to cut through the tension, slicing through the shroud of ugliness that had descended upon the telling of her story. I was determined to keep slicing until every last piece of it was gone.
“And, it didn’t really matter what the press thought I deserved. I was so ashamed at all the things I’d done, I suppose I felt the need to punish myself. So, when I say I understand why people don’t trust me anymore, it’s true. How can they when I’m not sure I trust myself.”
“I trust you,” I said softly. “I’ve trusted you the entire time.”
This time when she looked up to meet my eyes, she lifted her hand and placed it against my cheek. “It’s taken me a long time to learn to trust anyone again, but I trust you, Alek. My life shifted again the day you appeared. No matter what happens now… on stage or between us, I want you to know, I will always treasure the moment you pulled into my driveway and offered me another chance.”
There was a lusty, heavy atmosphere surrounding us. It had been brought on by Clara finally opening up to me. I had never wanted to push her to do it, and now I was glad for that because I think she respected me more for letting her come to me on her own terms. Probing might have gotten me the basics, skimmed the surface of what had happened. But by waiting until she trusted me enough to reveal the darkest details, she’d shared the memories that had caused her so much physical pain as well as mental and emotional distress. And then, when she told me that her life shifted when I appeared in it, something