I'd Kill Just To Protect You

Chapter 14

The ride home was silent. I kept looking over at Marley to make sure she was okay. She hadn’t said a word since she told me that she wanted to go home.

I pulled up in the drive way. Marley didn’t move.

“Do you want to do something to get your mind off what happened?” I asked her, unbuckling my seat belt.

Marley didn’t say anything. She just unbuckled her belt and got out of the car. I followed her.

“Marley, wait.”

Marley stopped and turned to me, burying her face in my chest and burst into tears, scrunching the material of my shirt in her fingers. I wrapped my arms around her, rubbing a hand up and down her back.

“It’s okay, Marley. I’m here.”

She looked up. “No, it’s not okay. I’m sick of being forced into sex. I want to be able to do it willingly, not be forced.”

I wiped the tears from her face, trying to imagine what she must be going through inside her head. She had been raped and then almost raped again two times within this month. Not sure if she remembers anything from the night she was drunk but she probably does.

“Listen to me, Marley. Let’s just go inside and do something to forget everything.”

“It’s not something you can easily forget, Noah.”

I knew she was right. “Let’s go inside.”

Marley nodded. She let go of me and headed inside. She headed towards her room. I told her I was going to make hot chocolate for us. Hopefully we can talk about what happened.

I made some hot chocolate for us and set it down on the coffee table. I grabbed my mug and sat back on the couch. I heard Marley’s bedroom door open and then her footsteps across the floor. She walked into the room with her notebook in her hand and sat beside me, placing the book in my lap.

“You said you wanted to read this so I will let you,” she said. “It’s a diary I keep and write down what I feel.”

I put my mug on the table and then opened up the notebook. I flipped through it until I got to the date the murder took place. I read what she wrote. Everything was written in detail as she described everything in her memory that had happened. Reading it kind of made me want to rip up the book and go find where the killer was and rip him to pieces.

I finished reading and put it down and just sat there, staring into thin air. I can’t believe the things Marley had gone through.

“You’re the first person who has ever read that,” Marley said. “I won’t even let J.J. read it and she is my sister.

I clenched my fist together as I felt anger build up inside of me. But I quickly pushed it aside. Right now wasn’t the right time to feel anger. I needed to feel sympathy. I reached over and pulled her into my lap. She rested her head on my shoulders while I wrapped my arms around her.

“I don’t know why I never told anyone about what he did to me,” Marley continued. “I just was scared and never told the truth with what really happened. I’m so stupid.”

“You aren’t stupid, Marley. And it’s normal to feel scared.”

She rested a hand on my neck, looking up at me. “Why does this have to happen to me?”

I played with her hair. “I can’t explain it.”

“Thank you for being here for me.” She kissed my cheek softly.

The phone began to ring. Marley got off me and I went to answer the phone. It was Chloe. I was surprise she was even talking to me.

“I’m just ringing up to see how Marley is,” she replied.