Vicious Cycle (22 page)

But this time no one would come for her. Did she still want to die? What would life be like for her if she didn’t choose to get clean? The drugs would kill her, one way or another. If they didn’t kill her outright, she would turn into her mother.

She remembered fifth grade, when they’d had the DARE
drug program at school, and she’d signed a pledge saying she would never take drugs. She’d learned a song about the stupidity of it, and they’d performed it for their parents. Her mother had stumbled in late and applauded wildly, high on her drug of the week.

It was a long way back to that innocence—too many years had to be erased. But she had made a good start at New Day. She had seen the glimmer of a future. She could get that vision back again.

She closed her eyes and tried to see it—the scars of her beatings healed … a graduation gown … a college dorm room.

“Get up, you little tramp.”

The abrupt, hostile command opened her eyes. Her vision slowly focused, and she saw her brother standing over her. “Zeke?”

“Get up!” he snarled, his eyes wild. “Mama’s in jail! And you’re the one who did that to her, you maggot. Is that what you wanted? After all she was doing for you?”

She pulled her knees to her chest. “Zeke, leave me alone.”

He yanked her IV cord, ripping the needle from her hand. Blood seeped out, so she pressed her other hand over it.

“How could you turn on your own mother?”

“The same way she could turn on me!”

Cursing, he grabbed her blankets and threw them across the room. “Keep your voice down, or I’ll make sure you can’t move your jaw. You’re ruining everything. What were you gonna do? Raise a baby yourself? With no job? With no man to take care of you?”

She got out of the bed, her head spinning, and looked down at her bleeding hand. “Zeke, what do you want from me?”

“I want you to go get that baby and come with me.”

“What? Why?”

“Because you can’t keep it, that’s why!”

“I know that. I’ve made all the arrangements. I signed adoption papers with Loving Arms.”

“No!” With no warning, he hit her across her tender jaw. She stumbled back, almost falling. “You’re coming with me! Do you hear me? If I get the money they’re paying, I can get Mama out of jail and we can all score big.” His voice dropped to a rippling whisper. “Don’t you want that? To never have to worry where you’ll get your next hit? To have it just sitting there waiting for you whenever you need it? We’re talking forty grand! And they’re good for it. They already paid ten.”

She tried to focus, but her jaw was already beginning to swell. His voice softened, and he moved closer to her face. His breath smelled as if he hadn’t brushed his teeth in months. His eyes didn’t focus quite right. One eye seemed pulled to the right, as if some unseen force bent them out of sync with each other. “Don’t you want that, Sis?” he asked, his voice trembling. “To have it right there, a whole stockpile of it? We can live in our own little world and nobody can bother us.”

She did want it. At least the cells of her body, her neurons, her neurotransmitters—everything that had entangled itself with drugs wanted it. But then … there was Grace.

“No. I don’t want it. I want to go back to New Day. I want to give Grace to the people I’ve chosen.”

“For free?” he asked, disgusted. “And nobody gets anything out of it?”

“I’ll get something. I’ll know she’s safe. That she’s got a shot at a better life than I’ve had. And she’ll get good parents who love her.”

He swung again, this time knocking her food tray off her rolling table. It clattered to the floor. She glanced at the door, hoping a nurse would hear the crash and come running. But he’d closed the door. They probably couldn’t hear. She groped for the nurse’s call button, but he jerked the control out of her hand.

“You and me and Mama will get nothing! She’ll sit there in jail and you’ll go into some perverted foster home with some fat guy salivating over you. You ignorant, empty skull—you’re ruining everything!”

“I’m not ignorant,” she said, throwing her chin up. “And I’m not empty. There’s more to me than you’ve always said. There’s more to me!”

Her rebellion only inflamed him more. He shoved the food table out of his way and grabbed her arm, twisting it. “Get dressed. Get the kid and let’s go, or I’ll smash every bone in your face, and nobody will ever want you for the rest of your life.”

When she hesitated, he grabbed her by her throat. “Stop!” she choked out.

He released her neck and grabbed her chin, squeezing her face where it was already bruised. “Are you going to do what I tell you?”

“Yes,” she said, trying to catch her breath. “Just let me go.”

He released her and went to the closet, got her clothes, and threw them at her. “Get out of those pajamas. Get dressed and pull yourself together.”

She got her clothes and went into the bathroom. She had to hold the rail on the wall as she steadied herself. What was she going to do? He would kill her if she didn’t do what he said. He was half-crazed from meth and who knew what else.

She would try to wave someone down as she and Zeke
walked down the hallway—one of the nurses, or Karen if she saw her. She wouldn’t even have to call attention to herself. If she made sure Karen saw her leaving, then she would surely call Barbara or the police.

She couldn’t put on these clothes. Her jeans were bloody, and her T-shirt smelled of smoke. She looked down at what Barbara had brought her to wear from Emily’s closet. Flannel pajama bottoms and a T-shirt that said Girl Power. She’d have to wear that out. Maybe someone would realize they were pajamas and it would raise a red flag.

She regarded herself in the mirror for the first time in days — her face disfigured and bruised black, her eyes swollen, her lip split. No one would notice a new bruise forming. What more would Zeke do to her?

She had no choice. She would have to go with him. But she wouldn’t take the baby to the people who were paying for it. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself afterward. There weren’t enough highs to numb that pain. No, she would escape somehow.

The bathroom door crashed open and Zeke stood there. “Why aren’t you getting dressed?”

“I can’t,” she said. “My jeans are bloody. I’ll have to wear this.”

“All right.” He yanked her out. “Put your shoes on. Hurry up.”

She was weak and light-headed as she bent down to pull her shoes on.

He slapped her chin, forcing her head up. “Hurry up, before somebody comes in here.” He pulled a gun out of his pocket and cocked it. “I don’t want to use this, but I will if I have to.”

No, not a gun. “I don’t even know if they’ll let me have the baby. She’s sick.”

“You’re her mother. You can get her if you want.”

“But I signed the papers.”

“You can change your mind. I know the law. There’s a waiting period for you to renege.”

She knew they would probably let her have the baby. The doctor had officially released Grace this morning — they were just waiting for the paperwork to be processed before Madeline and Ben could take her home. Jordan had been told more than once that she had every right to change her mind before then … or even after, until the adoption was finalized.

She muttered a prayer for help under her breath as Zeke took her arm and hurried her out of the room, down the hallway to the nursery. Tears filled Jordan’s eyes as she tried to make eye contact with the nurses hurrying past. But no one noticed.

She looked in the nursery window, hoping that Grace’s bassinet would be empty, that Madeline and Ben had already taken her. But there she was, across the room, her little feet kicking in the air.

God, I don’t expect You to answer my prayers, but Grace can’t pray for herself. Please help her.

She knocked on the door and waited.

“Open it,” Zeke said. “Go in.”

She turned the knob and stepped inside. There were three nurses. The one in Grace’s section looked across the room. “Hi.”

Jordan swallowed. “I … I came to get my baby. I’m leaving.”

The nurse frowned. “The papers are still being processed. But … I thought you were giving her up for adoption.”

Jordan hesitated, and Zeke spoke. “She changed her mind.”

The nurse studied Jordan. “Honey, are you sure?”

“Yeah,” she said in a weak voice. “I need to take her now.”

“But nothing’s ready. We have stuff we’ll send home with you. A package of formula and diapers, her picture, and some other things you might need.”

“She doesn’t need any of that,” Zeke said. “We have everything waiting at home.”

Jordan could tell the woman wasn’t buying it, and she hoped she would pick up the phone and call someone … anyone … who would tell her this wasn’t right.

“But what’s the hurry? It’ll just be another hour or so.”

“We’re just ready to get out of this place,” Zeke said. “Jordan can’t sleep nights with people coming in all during the night taking her blood pressure and stuff.”

Jordan looked at him. He hadn’t even visited her here. How would he know what was going on at night?

“But your injuries,” the nurse said. “Honey, look at you. You aren’t quite ready to go home yet, are you? Has the doctor released you?”

Jordan shook her head. “No, but I feel better.”

“Do you? You really don’t look better.”

Zeke was losing patience. “Just get the kid, all right? It’s her baby, and you can’t keep it against her will.”

The woman seemed to deflate. “All right. I guess I can speed up the paperwork. I’ll have to get her prescriptions printed out, and instructions on her care, warnings about what to do in case of a seizure …”

Zeke didn’t press the issue, so Jordan kept quiet. But she knew he was on the razor edge of losing his temper and knocking every bassinet in this room over. And that loaded gun was still stuffed into the waistband of his jeans. Jordan sensed his insane rage next to her as he waited.

Finally, the nurse brought the paperwork. Jordan signed it quickly, knowing that any further delay could put all of these babies at risk.

“Do you have a car seat? We’re not allowed to let you go home without one.”

A glimmer of hope. “No, I don’t have anything.”

“Okay,” the nurse said. “Let me call and get you one.”

“That’s okay,” Zeke said. “She can hold her in the car.”

The nurse dug in her heels. “I’m sorry, but we’re not legally allowed to release her without a car seat.”

Zeke began to pace between the bassinets, his hands trembling in fury. Babies began to cry.

“Please hurry,” Jordan told the nurse.

The nurse was gone only a moment before coming back with a car seat on a rolling cart. A security guard followed her. “Ma’am, can I see some identification?” he asked.

Jordan had nothing. “I don’t have any. I don’t have a driver’s license yet.”

“Your bracelet,” Zeke said, picking up her arm and showing the guard. “Her name is on her hospital bracelet.”

The guard checked it, then gave Zeke a long look. “Jordan, you’re fifteen?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Where’s your mother?”

“In jail,” she blurted, her eyes pleading with him to stop this now.

“She signed adoption papers last night,” the nurse said weakly. “But she still has the right to change her mind.”

The guard said, “I’ll go check on some things while you get everything ready.”

Maybe, Jordan thought. Maybe he would realize how wrong this was and derail Zeke’s plan. Maybe they’d arrest him and throw him in jail too.

The nurse looked troubled as she loaded a box of diapers and some formula on the lower shelf of the cart, then gently peeled the electrodes from Grace’s skin. She removed the IV, then lifted the little ball of baby out of the bassinet and put her into the car seat.

“You slide the seat belt through the back of the seat, like this,” she said. “You have to put her in the backseat. I’ll walk you down and make sure you do it right.”

“No,” Jordan said. “That’s okay.”

“It’s hospital policy,” she said. “We have to do it.”

“She didn’t give birth here,” Zeke said. “The policies don’t apply to her.”

“They apply to everyone. We’re even supposed to wheel Jordan out to the car.”

“Well, break the policy,” he said. “Come on, Jordan, let’s go.” He lifted the car seat by its handle, holding it like a bucket. Jordan grabbed the diapers and bag of formula and followed him out, searching for the security guard.

The guard came out from behind the nurses’ station and nodded to the nurse. What did that mean? That she had to let them go? Didn’t he see she was being forced?

“Jordan?”

She turned back and looked hopefully at the nurse.

“What do you want me to tell the adoptive mother when she comes?”

Jordan’s face twisted. “Tell her I couldn’t help it.”

Then she followed her brother down the hall and out to the rat-trap that they called the family car, and prayed for an escape.

M
orning came before Barbara was ready to wake up, its glaring light torturing her through her bedroom window. Fatigue ached in her bones. She would love to turn over and go back to sleep, but there was too much she had to do before she reported to work at ten. She’d hoped to take today off to spend with Emily, Lance, and Kent, but the store’s owner was coming in today, and they needed all hands on deck. At least Emily wouldn’t be home alone. Barbara had agreed to let Lance stay home from school today, to rest from his weekend in jail and keep his sister company.

But her heart was heavy. With Lance’s case settled, Kent had no more reason to stay. She got up and showered, trying to prepare herself to say good-bye. But she didn’t want him to go.

When he showed up at eight and knocked lightly on the door, she let him in, trying not to cry.

“I know you have to go to work in a couple of hours,” he said. “But I wanted to see you before I fly back.”

She took his hands. “Do you have to leave already?”

“I’ve booked a Delta flight for this afternoon. But I can stay longer if you want me to.”

Yes,
she wanted to cry out.
Stay. I need you.