"Jake, of course, eventually found out, and I wasn't allowed to see her anymore. He started picking up Todd from school and telling my mom if she did anything to help me, Todd wasn't coming home one day. Four years ago, I just … snapped one day. He went to work. I took my car, my cash and what clothes I could carry, went to Todd's school, and drove away as fast as I could. Called my mother a month later. She was certain we were dead. She gave me the number for an old attorney friend of my father's, Simon." I pause, regretting the whole mess and wishing I'd had a better plan or way out. I'd done what I knew to do, which was simply to get away.
"Is your mother okay?" Petr asks. There's a note of controlled anger in his tone. He's holding me gently, but he's tense, too.
"Yeah. Jake … liked her. Or maybe he knew I'd always call her someday, and that's how he could find me. He never hurt her, just threatened her against going to the police. He was involved with some really bad stuff, drug trafficking and such. I told Simon everything I had learned about his operations during the time I was with him. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough to tip off the federal authorities that were missing pieces of the puzzle about who was doing it. Long story short, they started investigating.
"I imagine that's another reason why Jake won't just leave me alone. He figured out pretty fast I sold him out. He found us twice the first year and once the second, once the third … twice this year," I drift off. My breathing is off, and I find myself reaching for my face and the bruises that were there five months ago, before desperation led me out of Jake's comfort zone of the south and here to Massachusetts. "He just won't stop."
"These are defensive wounds," Petr says, taking one wrist and rolling it to display the scars along my forearm.
"Yeah. He used a knife last time. He was trying to get Todd. I don't even really know how we got away … I was in such bad shape."
"You've been waiting all this time for the investigation to put him away."
"Yeah. I called Simon yesterday, because I …" I drift off, a little embarrassed.
Petr kisses me on the cheek. "Why?"
"Because I'm tired of running. You make me want to take a chance and live, and I couldn't do that until Jake was off the street," I say in a trembling voice. "Because I really, really wanted to go to dinner with you."