His Appeal

Chapter Five

“Honestly,” Doug met her eyes, “I brought you here out of pity.  You looked so defeated and just…exhausted, that I didn’t want to be the last one to see you when you got into your car and wrapped it around a telephone pole.”

Eve visibly flinched at his cold words, but she couldn’t fault his logic.  When he’d told her that Emma was going to need more examinations, she had felt like the last rug had been jerked out from under her.  At least he hadn’t voiced her biggest fear—that she had ruined his life in high school and he wasn’t going to help her.

“Attorney Masters…” she began, her voice fluttering with nerves.

“Doug,” he said.  “My name is Doug.  Use it.”

“Doug,” she repeated.  “This may sound…” Eve struggled to find the right word, “odd; but I have to ask anyway.”  She took a deep breath, “Did we…that is, where did you go to high school?”

“I didn’t,” he said between bites of food, not bothering to look at her.  “I graduated early and went to college at 15.”

Eve released the breath she hadn’t been aware she’d been holding.  Surely if he were the Doug Masters she’d known all those years ago, he would have used the opening she just gave him to call her out on her behavior.  And while she knew the boy she’d abused had been smart, she didn’t think he was smart enough to have gone to college at 15.

“Why do you ask?” Doug asked her, raising his cold eyes to hers.  Doug’s heart thudded heavily in his chest as he tried desperately not to show how much her question affected him.  She didn’t forget about him.  She may not recognize him now, but she remembered his name.

“I went to school with someone of the same name,” Eve responded.  “I…I didn’t think you were the same person, but I wasn’t sure.”

“Were you friends with him?” Doug asked.  He schooled his features by taking another bite of food even though it now tasted like ash in his mouth.

“Umm…not really,” Eve said softly.  “I’m afraid I wasn’t a very nice person back then.”

Doug’s fist clenched around his fork and he fought the urge to cross-examine her.  He focused on the food in front of him and portraying a calm, cool façade—a difficult task given his still bitter feelings.

“And it made you nervous to think that I may be this person?” he finally found his voice.

“More than nervous,” Eve said with a tense laugh.  “Terrified.  I did some things I’m not proud of and it has been hell waiting to see if my past was going to rear its ugly head and punish my sister for them.”  She was talking rapidly, spitting the out words before thinking about them.  “I was prepared for you to scream what a bitch I was and tell me you weren’t going to help and…”

“Take a breath,” Doug said stiffly.  “Even if I were this person whom you knew in the past, it’s been years since high school.  Don’t you think he’s gotten over it by now?”  Doug couldn’t believe her arrogance in thinking that she’d had a lasting effect on him, regardless of the fact that she actually had.

“What I did was bad,” Eve whispered.  “I changed after…” she lowered her gaze to the table again.  “It was too late, though.  He never came back to school.”

“What did you do?” Doug asked her, not sure why he needed to hear her admit the cruelties she’d perpetrated.

“I’d rather not say,” she said, her voice filled with emotion.  “He ended up physically hurt, bad.  I can still remember how he looked lying there, bloody and bruised and in pain.  I didn’t know…”