“Oh, I see,” he said, leaning back in the couch and facing away from me. He crossed his arms in front of his chest.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He shook his head with a sigh. “Nothing. I’m just… well, I don’t want to start anything now. It’s late and I’m exhausted so—”
“Something happened, Joe,” I said. “Something awful.”
He looked at me, head tilted slightly, eyes narrow. “What happened?”
“Travis,” I said, sobbing slightly.
A frown grew between his eyes. “Your ex-partner? What did he do now?”
“I got suspended today.”
He shook his head, startled. “What? Why?”
“Because of Travis. They think I hit him with my truck, that I put him in a wheelchair. They’re investigating it. They think I have a vendetta against him.”
“I’m confused. You don’t have a truck,” he said.
“I know. That’s what worries me.”
“I’m not following you.”
“Charlene has a truck. It’s registered in my name. For insurance, you know?”
He stared at me, biting his lip. “No, no, that’s—”
I placed a hand on his arm. “It’s true. I think she did it. But I can make a deal with him, he said.”
“Really? What kind of deal?”
I looked down at my fingers. The buzz from the wine was quickly wearing off now, and reality hit me again like a brick wall. “If I take back my statement. About the rape.”
He sat up straight. “What?”
“He wants me to say that I lied. He wants me to clear his name.”
Joe stared at me, his nostrils flaring. “But… you can’t do that.”
“That’s what I said, but there is no other solution, the way I see it. Charlene is more important. They think it’s me, but it wasn’t, and if it was her… I have to protect her. She’s just a child.”
Joe rose to his feet, and he started to pace back and forth. “I can’t believe this. I can’t believe it.”
“I’m gonna do it,” I said. “I have to. For my daughter’s sake. It will ruin her life if she is convicted.”
He kept shaking his head and rubbing his neck. “No, no. There has to be another way. The guy raped you. We can’t let him get away with it. We simply can’t.”
“But there is no other way, Joe.”
He paused, then hid his face between his hands. I couldn’t tell if he was crying or raging in anger.
“Joe?”
He lifted his gaze and looked at me. That’s when I realized it. I could see it in his eyes. I stood up, suddenly feeling completely sober.
“It was you, wasn’t it? You did it? You hit Travis with Charlene’s truck?”
He exhaled deeply but didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. I already knew.
“You’re kidding me!” I almost screamed. “Why would you do that? Why, Joe?”
His nostrils were flaring, tears streaming down his cheeks. “I… I was so angry. Years of bottled-up anger just… made me lose it. I kept imagining him hurting you again and again and couldn’t sleep at night. So, one day I took Charlene’s truck and drove to Ridge Manor. I waited for him to leave his house, then followed him downtown. It wasn’t planned, I promise you, it wasn’t. It just happened. I saw him walk across the street and that’s when I lost it. I couldn’t believe he had hurt you and was still allowed to walk around a free man. I hit him with the truck. I didn’t plan it, I promise. I just… I couldn’t control it.”
I stared at Joe in shock, unable to comprehend what he had just confessed to me. He had hit Travis with Charlene’s truck, risking everything just to seek revenge for what he had done to me. I reached out and took his hand in mine.
“Joe, why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
“I was scared,” he replied, tears still streaming down his face. “Scared of what would happen to us, to our family, if anyone found out. I didn’t want to lose you, Billie Ann. I love you so much. And now I am losing you anyway, how’s that for irony, huh?”
I felt tears prick at the corner of my eyes as I looked at Joe, the man I had been with for eighteen years, the man who I thought I knew everything about. But at that moment, he seemed like a stranger to me.
“We have to tell the police,” I said firmly, my hand still clasping his.
“No, Billie Ann, we can’t,” Joe replied, shaking his head. He pulled away from me. “They’ll arrest me, and our family will be ruined. I’ll lose my job, and we’ll lose everything.”
“But Joe, you committed a crime,” I said, my voice firm. “You have to take responsibility for your actions. And they already know—they think I did it, and they might think Charlene did it.”
