Warning: This chapter deals with Olivia's rape.

Previous Disclaimers Apply

Chapter 25

It didn't take long for the word to spread. Over the next few days when the ladies would run into anyone they knew, it was brought up. For the most part reactions were positive. The Beacon employees were too scared of Olivia to say anything. Life moved along. It was nearing the end of the school year and Emma would be out for the summer. Alan was sentenced to 1 year in prison and 5 years of probation. This time his hot shot attorneys were not able to keep him from going to jail. Olivia was trusting Phillip more with Emma. Olivia had changed his supervised visits to unsupervised but were still limited to a max of three hours per visit. Rafe was doing well. He had started in the maintenance department first at the Beacon. Olivia said he could remain there as long as he wanted and could try a different area if another job interested him.

Olivia agreed to an overnight stay for Emma with Phillip as long as Rafe was there. Olivia didn't have any issues with Emma at the Spaulding mansion since Alan was in jail and Alex was taking her yearly sabbatical in Europe. They made plans for the following Saturday night. Phillip would pick Emma and Rafe up after lunch on Saturday and bring them home before dinner on Sunday. Olivia then planned a special evening for Natalia. She arranged for an early evening massage at the Beacon to give Olivia time to cook dinner. After they had dessert, they took their wine onto the porch to enjoy the warm summer evening.

"Just two more weeks and Emma will be out of school." Said Natalia.

"Yep, our Jelly Bean is growing up. She'll be entering the 4th grade in the fall." Replied Olivia.

Olivia's arm was around Natalia's shoulders and Natalia had naturally laid her head on Olivia's shoulder once they'd finished their wine. They were comfortable in each other's arms.

"They grow so fast, before long she'll be a teenager and you'll be trying to keep the boys away from her." Said Natalia.

Natalia felt Olivia shift, almost as a reaction to what Natalia said about keeping boys away from Emma, at least that is how it felt to Natalia.

"What's wrong?" Asked Natalia now sitting up to look into Olivia's eyes.

"Nothing." Replied Olivia solemnly.

"You're lying."

"God, are you going to do that every time I don't want to talk about something?"

"Birthdays, anniversaries and Christmas' are the only times I won't push. Something is there Olivia. You get this look and I ask you about it, but shut down on me. Will you…will you please talk to me?"

Olivia didn't say anything; she kept staring off into the night.

"This has to do with Rafe, doesn't? How you knew how to help him with all the aggression that he's been holding inside? Your therapist?"

"No, yes."

"Olivia?"

Olivia stood up from the bench and took a few steps away. She was wrestling with her thoughts. She knew she needed to tell Natalia this. There was so much that they didn't know about each other.

Natalia sat there watching her love. She could see that Olivia was struggling with whatever this is. She prayed that her love would find the strength and courage to open up to her. It was a couple of minutes before Olivia said anything more. Olivia turned back around to face Natalia.

"If we are going to have this conversation, I'm going to need more wine. I'll be right back." Said Olivia as she walked back into the house.

Natalia was left with her thoughts. So Olivia needs liquid courage for whatever this…this secret is.

Olivia went straight to the kitchen and splashed cold water on her face. She needed a few minutes to gather her thoughts. It's not like she hasn't told this story before, she told Buzz. But with Natalia it's different, maybe because she has never felt this way about another person before. In her heart she knows that this won't change Natalia's feelings for her, but in her head, not so much. She dries her face and goes to the fridge to get the bottle of wine that they had opened at dinner.

Olivia comes back outside and sits by Natalia. She picks up her wine glass and pours and ample amount of the beverage in her glass and then immediately downs the entire portion.

"Olivia! Olivia, slow down. Here give this to me." Says Natalia as she takes the glass and bottle from Olivia setting it on the ground beside her end of the bench.

Natalia turns to face and Olivia and takes both her love's hands in hers.

"Olivia, look at me, please. Honey, turn your head and look at me. I'm right here."

Olivia slowly turns her head and finds the most loving beautiful brown eyes looking back at her. She could see the love, the concern and the confusion all there.

"Olivia, I want you to know that whatever you have to tell me, that nothing you say or nothing that you could ever do will change how I feel about you. I love you totally and completely and I will until my last breath. Do you know that? Do you believe me?"

"I do." Said Olivia meekly.

"Then you have to trust in my love for you and tell me. Just take a deep breath and start at the beginning."

"OK."

Natalia watched as Olivia swallowed hard and did indeed take in a deep breath.

"My mother was religious, not like you. She preached that if we didn't live right, be good that God would punish us. My father died when I was 14. Marissa, my sister was 12 and Sam…Sammy was just a few months old. Sammy was not planned. I honestly don't think my mother wanted him. She rarely took care of him, she would leave that me and Marissa. By the time I turned 16, I felt more like a mother to Sam than his sister. I was missing out on being a teenager. Boys were interested in me, but going out with boys would not be proper behavior in my mother's eyes. I was forbidden to date, the few times I did go out with friends it had to be in a group, only on Saturday afternoons and I could be gone no more than three hours. My mother believed in hard labor as punishment. If we did something wrong, she'd have us scrubbing the kitchen floor and stuff like that. I felt so deprived. I would dream about my prince charming coming to rescue me and take me away from my mother and all of her hail fire and brimstone."

Olivia stood up at this point. She felt her back getting stiff sitting on the bench. She paced a little as she continued her story.

"So, I'm 16 and I hear about this big end of the summer party that is going to be at the Embassy in a few months. I want to go, but I know my mother would never let me. So I take my best Sunday dress and save my allowance to buy new material to alter it. The night of the party comes and I tell Marissa what I'm doing so that she can cover for me. And as sister's go, I had the best and she kept my mother from realizing that I snuck out. It was an invitation only party, but I figured I could flash some skin and talk my way in. That worked. So, I'm at the Embassy wandering around looking all these the elite people of San Cristobal. I'm promising myself that someday, I'll have that invitation; that this will be my life. A boy approaches me, a young man really. He was older than me, I thought maybe he was 20 or so. He asked me to dance. We were having a good time and enjoying ourselves. I had worked up quite a thirst on the dance floor so he offered me some punch. I walked with him over to the table while he served the punch on our glasses. I drank two glasses immediately trying to quench my thirst. No matter how much punch I drank I was still so thirsty. I started not feeling well, dizzy. I told the young man I need to lie down. He led me upstairs to the bedrooms so that I could."

Olivia now returned to sit on the bench. For this next part she needed Natalia, she needed to be in her arms when she revealed everything.

"He helped me to the bed. It was now that I realized that the punch had been spiked. My head was fuzzy from the effects of the alcohol. I just wanted to close my eyes for a little while and let it pass. That's what I felt the bed sink. They young man had joined me on the bed. He moved close to me; he started to kiss me. I could feel his hands on my stomach moving up to my breast. The last thing I remember is telling him 'NO'."

Natalia hand shifted closer to Olivia and put her arm around her, pulling her close.

"The next thing I remember is waking up. There's a security guard in the room; the young man I was with is nowhere to be found. My dress was ripped, there was blood. That's when I realized what happened, that he had raped me."

Olivia started sobbing, Natalia just pulled her closer.

"What happened after that?" Asked Natalia gently after Olivia's sobs had subsided.

"The security guard manhandled me out of the room and down a back stair case to the rear of the Embassy. I was put into a limo and dropped off a couple of blocks from my house. It was before dawn, I was able to sneak back into the house and I immediately took the hottest shower I could stand. No one would have ever found out what happened if…"

"If what Olivia? No one would have ever found out if?"

"If I hadn't gotten pregnant. When I realized I was pregnant, I went back to the Embassy. I demanded to know who the boy was. I wanted to know his name. He needed to step up and take responsibility for what he had done. He needed to pay for what he did to me. That same security guard was there. He handed me an envelope fun of cash and told me to take care of it and that no one would believe me because they could produce witnesses who would say that I was drunk and pawning all over the boy. I was devastated. I never found out who he was; I didn't know what to do. Finally, I decided to tell my mother what happened. As much as she preached I thought that she would support me when I went for an abortion. I didn't want the thing that was growing inside me. I wanted it gone, dead. So I work up the courage to tell her. There was no reaction, Natalia. Not concern for being raped, being hurt in that way, nothing. What kind of mother does that?"

"What did she do?"

"She told me I deserved it what happened to me, that I had no business going to that party and this is how God is punishing me and I needed to accept it and live with it. When I asked about having an abortion she flat out refused. She said that since I defied her rules and let this happen then I had to take responsibility for my actions. She said I would have the child and give it up for adoption. My mother and I, we always fought, but this fight it was the worst that we had ever had. As much as I fought for the abortion, she fought just as hard against me. I didn't think I would win. But then she got all quiet. I had turned away from her. When she didn't respond I turned around and she was slumped over in the chair. She had a massive stroke; she died instantly."

Olivia pulled out of Natalia arms and stood again. Natalia watched as Olivia stretched her back, neck and arms before she turned around to face her again.

"I felt for a long time after that, that I had killed her; that I was responsible for her death."

Natalia was immediately on her feet going over to Olivia.

"No, Olivia. You didn't kill your mother. She had a stroke. It could have happened when she was washing the dishes or driving in her car, you didn't kill her. Your fight didn't kill her."

Natalia had pulled Olivia into a hug and held her tight as she spoke.

"I know Talia, but at 16, pregnant after being raped, it felt like my world was ending. I couldn't deal with it. Marissa, God I don't know what would have happened to us if it wasn't for her. She stepped up and took care of Sammy and me. By the time I started to come around and be there for my baby brother and sister, too much time had passed and abortion was no longer an option. As my due grew closer, I realized that my baby was a part of me and just because he or she was conceived in a violent act, that his or her life didn't have to be that way. I could love him or her the way a mother should love their child; not the way my mother did. I wanted to keep my baby; but I knew I couldn't. We were barely surviving just the three of us; adding another mouth to feed would have been impossible. So I had to give me baby up for adoption."

"So, you have another baby out there somewhere in the world?" Asked Natalia hoping and praying that Olivia would say yes, because the other would mean…Natalia didn't not want to think about the other option.

"No, Talia. I've only given birth twice in my life, Emma and Ava."

Natalia pushed out of Olivia's arms and sat back on the bench.

"But Jeffrey is Ava's father?"

"Yes, he is."

"Jeffrey, he…it was Jeffrey that raped you?"

"It was."

"I don't understand. You said you didn't know the boy's name."

"I found out a few years ago, just after I found Ava. He didn't have the same face, that's why I didn't recognize him when I met him. He had plastic surgery to look like Prince Richard, he was his double."

"But you and Jeffrey, you're friends. How?"

"We weren't at first. When I found out who he was, I wanted to kill him. I nearly did. I tried to keep Ava from finding out. I didn't want her to know how she was conceived, but it came out anyway. Jeffrey was different, he wasn't the same man he was back then. So much of his own life was robbed from him because of being Prince Richard's double. He is a changed man. I had to forgive him, for Ava's sake…and my own. If I hadn't, all that rage inside of me would have consumed me and eventually destroyed me. I couldn't do that to Emma or Ava."

"Your therapist?"

"I started seeing her after I found Ava and found out who Jeffrey was. She was able to help me deal with the rage and the aggression. That's how I knew, when I saw Rafe's reaction to Alan's suing me for custody of Emma, what to do. It doesn't matter so much what the cause of the aggression is because if you can't find a way to handle it, it will destroy you; then it won't matter so much what caused it."

"The way you are with Emma, that's because of your mother and how she raised you?"

"It is."

Olivia was now at Natalia, kneeling in front of her taking her hands and bringing them to her heart.

"Natalia, I want to apologize to you for all those times that I mocked your faith. I was raised Catholic, but the teachings my mother tried to instill in me did nothing be turn me against her God and her faith. I never knew that a merciful God existed until I met you. So when I had Emma, I made a promise to myself that I would never be the kind of mother mine was to me. I made sure that my little girl felt my love, my support. I wanted her to know that she can always come to me for anything and that I will not judge her… I…"

"Olivia, you've done that. You've raised a wonderful beautiful little girl. She is smart and talented and so loving. She sees so much good in the world."

"She didn't get that from me. She got that from you. Natalia, for the longest time, I felt like a part of me was missing or I was broken. But you changed all of that, Talia, you fixed me. I love you so much. I don't think I could survive without you."

"Well, it's a good thing that you'll never have to find out."

Natalia pulled Olivia closer to her and captured her lips. As they pulled apart their foreheads came together. Natalia brushed away Olivia's tears before separating to find those gorgeous green eyes.

"Sweetheart, it's been a long, emotional evening. How about we leave the dishes until the morning and let's go to bed."

Olivia did not say anything. She took Natalia's offered hand and rose. They went back inside and locked up for the night. They each took their turns in the bathroom for their nightly routines before settling into their bed.

"When I planned this evening, dinner for you, I had no idea that tonight would turn out like it did." Said Olivia.

"I'm glad it did." Replied Natalia whose head was nestled in the crook of Olivia's neck.

Natalia raised up to find those green eyes again. She needed to see them again.

"Thank you, Olivia, for trusting me tonight. I know reliving such painful memories could not have been easy for you. I am here for you always, whatever you need." Said Natalia as she was gently caressing Olivia's cheek.

"Talia, make love to me, please?" Asked Olivia barely above a whisper.

"I love you, Olivia."

"I love you too, Talia."

Natalia slowly rid Olivia of her tank top and panties as well as her own. She spent the next hour or so showing Olivia just how much she truly loves her.

TBC…