x
Chapter Two
x
It's raining again. I can hear the drops beating down on the roof as I try to sleep. Sleep doesn't come though, and I know it won't. He's been here again, I can feel it. I don't understand why he can't leave me alone. What did I do to him? Oh, right, he says I've hurt him. I can't see how, I thought he was unbreakable. Thought wrong, I guess.
The ceremony was lastnight. Father gave a speech about corruption. I felt like telling the world the things he's corrupted with his power. He has too much power, and he uses it against me. Taunting me with it.
I cannot wait to leave this place. Get out of here as quickly as possible. It's become too normal. Fall is coming, the leaves are changing colors, and I feel as if I too have changed with the seasons. Soon I will be but a leaf caught up in the breeze. Drifting away from the place that haunts my dreams. Haunts my thoughts.
x
"Martin?" Martin jumped when he heard Samantha's voice and felt her hand on his shoulder. "Whoa there. You okay?"
"Yeah. Fine." He answered, looking back at the journal in his hands. This girl had alot more going on with her then what was on the surface.
"What'd you find?" Samantha questioned, leaning over his shoulder, trying to see the journal. He turned around and handed the journal to her.
"Sofia's journal. That's the latest entry, dated three weeks ago."
"Why would a girl like Sofia forget her personal journal at home?" Samantha's eyes drifted over the journal. "A home she obviously didn't like being at."
"My guess is, it was an accident." Martin looked over at Samantha curiously, "They schedule us a meeting with the Governor yet?"
Samantha looked around the missing girls old bedroom, before nodding and walking to the door to continue the search of the other parts of the house. "He'll be here in about an hour, his receptionist said. You going to stay up here? Keep looking?"
"Yeah, I think so. I'm going to see what else this girl's hiding." Martin gave her a small smile, while sitting down at Sofia's desk and opening the journal again.
x
Darkness and I can feel him entering the room. Creeping inside and coming to the bed. I wish to scream, but no sound exits my mouth. I know what will happen if I scream. Father will come to the 'rescue.' Finding him here in my room.
His weight is on the bed. I wish the sheets would swallow me. Give me an escape route before he realizes I'm not asleep. Every part of me hopes he doesn't notice. I know what's to come if he does. The same thing I've been dealing with for months now.
Amazing how Father doesn't see any of this. I'd tell him but so much pain comes with the truth. Pain I don't think I could handle. Even though by now, part of me believes I could go through anything after what he's done to me.
Day after day, night after night, it's always the same. Pain and weakness. The inability to say no to him. Why can't I say no? How hard would it be? Do I love him so much that I can let myself let him down? But, isn't he the one letting himself down?
He's taken my body far too many times to count. It wouldn't even be considered mine anymore, because I've given it to him time and time again.
I can still remember the first time, the feeling of love in the room. There was pain then, but not like this. This is different on so many levels. This is pain that I have no control over. Pain that breaks the soul. And the heart.
x
"Sam!" Martin called, leaving the girl's room and going in search of his partner. He found her in one of the spare bedrooms, going through a closet of what looked like old unused clothes. "We have a problem."
"Get something from the journal?" Samantha asked, closing the closet door and turning to look at Martin. She noticed that his face was pale, and he looked like he was going to throw up at any moment. "Martin, what is it? You look terrible."
"Sofia was being abused."
"Physically?"
"Sexually." Samantha sighed, she could feel the case getting tougher.
"By her father?"
"No. The way she puts it in her journal, it's someone who her father knows." Martin motioned for Samantha to follow him as he walked back to Sofia's bedroom and grabbed the journal, handing it to his partner.
He didn't want to admit that the case was getting to him. They had only been working the case for a few hours. But he could feel the distinct familiarity.
"So who do you think it is?" Sam questioned, bringing him out of his thoughts.
"Either someone her father doesn't like, or someone her father likes alot." He stated, knowing the answer all too well.
x
"I got absolutely nothing from the school administration." Jack stated, walking into the bullpen, where Danny and Vivian sat at the conference table searching through old records. "Please tell me you two got more then I did."
They both looked up at him, facial expressions reflecting his. He knew that was a no.
"The only thing we've got that could even be considered useful would be whatever the tech guys are downstairs pulling out of that computer." Danny answered, reading yet another file on the Governor of Oregon. He figured that by now, he knew more about the Governor then he knew about himself.
"Nothing at all? This girl's been in New York City, on her own, for a week, and you're telling me she hasn't gone to a club or restaurant, or anything?"
"Nothing." Vivian said, looking up at their boss. "These records imply that she hasn't even left her dorm room all week."
"Maybe she was studying." Danny suggested, putting the file down and fully joining the discussion.
"Isn't she eighteen?" Jack questioned. "Would you be studying?"
"No, probably not."
"When was the last time Martin and Samantha called?"
"Haven't talked to them since they arrived in Oregon."
"Call them, see if they're having better luck." Jack directed, before turning and walking off towards his office.
x
The phone rang twice before he hung up. Curiosity struck him as he wondered why neither Sam, nor Martin, could answer their phones. His thoughts were interrupted when one of the tech guys stepped up to his desk and asked him to come down to the lab. Danny smiled, they must've found something.
He followed the technician to the lab and listened to one of the guys trying to describe how they had found the info. Too much technology, Danny felt his head hurting.
"So then, once we got ahold of the deleted files we transfered them to one of our computers." The tech pointed to the screen in front of them. "It's all photographs."
Danny's eyes scanned over the half a dozen photos on the screen, most of which seemed pretty... disgusting. He felt bile rising in his throat as he pulled his cellphone from his belt and dialed his bosses number.
"Malone." Came the answer.
"Jack, you might want to come down to the lab, they found something I think you'll want to see." A dialtone met Danny's suggestion and he knew Jack was on his way.
Within minutes Jack was entering the room and Danny, without muttering a word, pointed to the screen.
"What's it mean, Jack?"
x
Olivia stopped by today while I was studying. She wouldn't stop talking about her wedding. I felt like killing her. Doesn't she realize I don't care how 'special' Eric is? Does she not see that she's throwing salt in my wounds?
The stinging has left, leaving behind a hollow feeling. I wonder if missing limp syndrome happens when you lose your heart. That must be it. That must be why I feel so empty.
I even feel empty when he's here. As if he can't give me enough. He can't fill me with his lust.
I walked in on Father and Natalie fighting earlier. I swear the man cannot find a woman who he gets along with. He's only with them for the publicity. How would it look if the Governor told his people that he was so hotheaded he could not stay with one person for longer then six months?
When this campaign started, I never thought it'd turn out like this. He was like this before, but it got worse as he got more powerful. I cannot remember the last time we sat down to eat dinner as a family. I almost miss those times.
If only he'd see that I have changed. I have grown older. I have become the one his best friend lusts after. The center of another mans pleasure. And not the same pleasure he finds with me. Not the hating, fighting, abusive pleasure. But the lustful pleasure. The sexual pleasure I have found that I can give him.
x
They were getting nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. It only helped to remind Samantha just how much she hated politicians. If it weren't for the journal Martin found, she'd say that the trip to Oregon was completely useless.
Sofia's father barely knew her. She could understand now the hateful words that had been written in the journal. This girl was going through so much and all on her own.
"Mr. Tyler--"
"Please, Joseph."
"Joseph, do you know if your daughter was dating anyone?" Martin asked, cringing at the use of the first name, it for some reason didn't sound right.
"She was a private person, Agent Fitzgerald, if she were, she wouldn't have told me." The man answered, his face showing no feeling whatsoever. It amazed Martin that he could talk about his missing daughter without so much as a hurt facial expression. He was either really good at hiding his feelings, or really good at not having feelings at all. Martin couldn't decide which was true but if the man was anything like his own father, it was probably the latter.
"Do you know the names of some of her close friends?" Samantha questioned, looking from her notebook to the Governor.
"Only one. Olivia Halaman, soon to be Olivia Cartwright. She's to be married in a couple of weeks."
"Could you give us her address?" The man nodded, standing and walking over to a desk in the corner of the room, after a moment of searching through papers he came back with a wrinkled paper with the scribbled address on it.
"Sofie insisted that I keep that address laying around. Most likely for this exact reason." Martin noted that atleast the man had a nickname for his daughter, that had to mean something. Right?
x
Sofia Tyler sat talking to her bestfriend, not really paying attention. It was no use, her mind just wouldn't let her concentrate on the nonsense coming out of the other womans mouth.
"Sof', are you even listening to me?" She glanced over at Olivia and smiled her sweet smile.
"Of course, what makes you think I'm not?"
"You're drifting over there." Olivia took another sip of her latte, looking at her friend over the rim of the cup. She set it back down on the cafe table and smiled softly. "You thinking about that guy again?"
"What guy?" Sofia questioned, her attention now focused on the present.
"What guy?" Her friend repeated, laughing. "The guy you've been ditching me for. And don't tell me 'there's no guy,' I know you, there has to be a reasonable explanation. And thats the only one I can think of."
"There's no guy." She replied, stubbornly.
"Sofia Christine Tyler! There is a guy! Spill."
"Fine. There's a guy."
"And...?" Olivia sat foreward, her latte forgotten about as she tried to pry out of her friend every juicy detail.
"And what?"
"Are you sleeping with him?"
"Sort of." Sofia answered. If there was one thing she hated, it was being questioned like this. She recieved alot of it being the Governor's daughter and all, but hated it even more when it was her friends questioning her. Could they not see she didn't like telling people about her personal life? Even if they were her friends and technically were apart of that 'personal' life.
"How do you 'sort of' sleep with someone?" Olivia asked, wondering why her friend wouldn't just come out and answer the question.
"It's complicated, Liv."
"Aren't all relationships complicated?"
"Well, yes, but this ones even more complicated." Sofia took a sip of her coffee, avoiding her friend's gaze.
"He's married, isn't he?" Olivia wasn't granted an answer and her mouth fell open in shock. "Sof' are you having an affair?"
"You could call it that."
"Yes or no?"
"Yes." She whispered softly. "He's in an unhappy marriage. Things just happened."
"How long has it been going on?" Her friend asked, still visibly shocked.
"About a month." Sofia answered.
"You know you're setting yourself up for a fall. Affairs are always trouble Sof'. Unless he's willing to leave his wife for you, you're going to end up heartbroken in the end."
"It's just sex, Liv. Neither one of us is wanting something more." Sofia sighed. "Hell, I'm leaving soon for college. It'll end then. Until we get to that point... we'll fulfill each others needs."
Olivia nodded, she knew convincing her friend that what she was doing wasn't worth it, was useless. She was stubborn and would choose not to listen to the voice of reason. Not unlike her father, even if she hated to believe it.
x
To Be Continued...
Chapter Two
x
It's raining again. I can hear the drops beating down on the roof as I try to sleep. Sleep doesn't come though, and I know it won't. He's been here again, I can feel it. I don't understand why he can't leave me alone. What did I do to him? Oh, right, he says I've hurt him. I can't see how, I thought he was unbreakable. Thought wrong, I guess.
The ceremony was lastnight. Father gave a speech about corruption. I felt like telling the world the things he's corrupted with his power. He has too much power, and he uses it against me. Taunting me with it.
I cannot wait to leave this place. Get out of here as quickly as possible. It's become too normal. Fall is coming, the leaves are changing colors, and I feel as if I too have changed with the seasons. Soon I will be but a leaf caught up in the breeze. Drifting away from the place that haunts my dreams. Haunts my thoughts.
x
"Martin?" Martin jumped when he heard Samantha's voice and felt her hand on his shoulder. "Whoa there. You okay?"
"Yeah. Fine." He answered, looking back at the journal in his hands. This girl had alot more going on with her then what was on the surface.
"What'd you find?" Samantha questioned, leaning over his shoulder, trying to see the journal. He turned around and handed the journal to her.
"Sofia's journal. That's the latest entry, dated three weeks ago."
"Why would a girl like Sofia forget her personal journal at home?" Samantha's eyes drifted over the journal. "A home she obviously didn't like being at."
"My guess is, it was an accident." Martin looked over at Samantha curiously, "They schedule us a meeting with the Governor yet?"
Samantha looked around the missing girls old bedroom, before nodding and walking to the door to continue the search of the other parts of the house. "He'll be here in about an hour, his receptionist said. You going to stay up here? Keep looking?"
"Yeah, I think so. I'm going to see what else this girl's hiding." Martin gave her a small smile, while sitting down at Sofia's desk and opening the journal again.
x
Darkness and I can feel him entering the room. Creeping inside and coming to the bed. I wish to scream, but no sound exits my mouth. I know what will happen if I scream. Father will come to the 'rescue.' Finding him here in my room.
His weight is on the bed. I wish the sheets would swallow me. Give me an escape route before he realizes I'm not asleep. Every part of me hopes he doesn't notice. I know what's to come if he does. The same thing I've been dealing with for months now.
Amazing how Father doesn't see any of this. I'd tell him but so much pain comes with the truth. Pain I don't think I could handle. Even though by now, part of me believes I could go through anything after what he's done to me.
Day after day, night after night, it's always the same. Pain and weakness. The inability to say no to him. Why can't I say no? How hard would it be? Do I love him so much that I can let myself let him down? But, isn't he the one letting himself down?
He's taken my body far too many times to count. It wouldn't even be considered mine anymore, because I've given it to him time and time again.
I can still remember the first time, the feeling of love in the room. There was pain then, but not like this. This is different on so many levels. This is pain that I have no control over. Pain that breaks the soul. And the heart.
x
"Sam!" Martin called, leaving the girl's room and going in search of his partner. He found her in one of the spare bedrooms, going through a closet of what looked like old unused clothes. "We have a problem."
"Get something from the journal?" Samantha asked, closing the closet door and turning to look at Martin. She noticed that his face was pale, and he looked like he was going to throw up at any moment. "Martin, what is it? You look terrible."
"Sofia was being abused."
"Physically?"
"Sexually." Samantha sighed, she could feel the case getting tougher.
"By her father?"
"No. The way she puts it in her journal, it's someone who her father knows." Martin motioned for Samantha to follow him as he walked back to Sofia's bedroom and grabbed the journal, handing it to his partner.
He didn't want to admit that the case was getting to him. They had only been working the case for a few hours. But he could feel the distinct familiarity.
"So who do you think it is?" Sam questioned, bringing him out of his thoughts.
"Either someone her father doesn't like, or someone her father likes alot." He stated, knowing the answer all too well.
x
"I got absolutely nothing from the school administration." Jack stated, walking into the bullpen, where Danny and Vivian sat at the conference table searching through old records. "Please tell me you two got more then I did."
They both looked up at him, facial expressions reflecting his. He knew that was a no.
"The only thing we've got that could even be considered useful would be whatever the tech guys are downstairs pulling out of that computer." Danny answered, reading yet another file on the Governor of Oregon. He figured that by now, he knew more about the Governor then he knew about himself.
"Nothing at all? This girl's been in New York City, on her own, for a week, and you're telling me she hasn't gone to a club or restaurant, or anything?"
"Nothing." Vivian said, looking up at their boss. "These records imply that she hasn't even left her dorm room all week."
"Maybe she was studying." Danny suggested, putting the file down and fully joining the discussion.
"Isn't she eighteen?" Jack questioned. "Would you be studying?"
"No, probably not."
"When was the last time Martin and Samantha called?"
"Haven't talked to them since they arrived in Oregon."
"Call them, see if they're having better luck." Jack directed, before turning and walking off towards his office.
x
The phone rang twice before he hung up. Curiosity struck him as he wondered why neither Sam, nor Martin, could answer their phones. His thoughts were interrupted when one of the tech guys stepped up to his desk and asked him to come down to the lab. Danny smiled, they must've found something.
He followed the technician to the lab and listened to one of the guys trying to describe how they had found the info. Too much technology, Danny felt his head hurting.
"So then, once we got ahold of the deleted files we transfered them to one of our computers." The tech pointed to the screen in front of them. "It's all photographs."
Danny's eyes scanned over the half a dozen photos on the screen, most of which seemed pretty... disgusting. He felt bile rising in his throat as he pulled his cellphone from his belt and dialed his bosses number.
"Malone." Came the answer.
"Jack, you might want to come down to the lab, they found something I think you'll want to see." A dialtone met Danny's suggestion and he knew Jack was on his way.
Within minutes Jack was entering the room and Danny, without muttering a word, pointed to the screen.
"What's it mean, Jack?"
x
Olivia stopped by today while I was studying. She wouldn't stop talking about her wedding. I felt like killing her. Doesn't she realize I don't care how 'special' Eric is? Does she not see that she's throwing salt in my wounds?
The stinging has left, leaving behind a hollow feeling. I wonder if missing limp syndrome happens when you lose your heart. That must be it. That must be why I feel so empty.
I even feel empty when he's here. As if he can't give me enough. He can't fill me with his lust.
I walked in on Father and Natalie fighting earlier. I swear the man cannot find a woman who he gets along with. He's only with them for the publicity. How would it look if the Governor told his people that he was so hotheaded he could not stay with one person for longer then six months?
When this campaign started, I never thought it'd turn out like this. He was like this before, but it got worse as he got more powerful. I cannot remember the last time we sat down to eat dinner as a family. I almost miss those times.
If only he'd see that I have changed. I have grown older. I have become the one his best friend lusts after. The center of another mans pleasure. And not the same pleasure he finds with me. Not the hating, fighting, abusive pleasure. But the lustful pleasure. The sexual pleasure I have found that I can give him.
x
They were getting nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. It only helped to remind Samantha just how much she hated politicians. If it weren't for the journal Martin found, she'd say that the trip to Oregon was completely useless.
Sofia's father barely knew her. She could understand now the hateful words that had been written in the journal. This girl was going through so much and all on her own.
"Mr. Tyler--"
"Please, Joseph."
"Joseph, do you know if your daughter was dating anyone?" Martin asked, cringing at the use of the first name, it for some reason didn't sound right.
"She was a private person, Agent Fitzgerald, if she were, she wouldn't have told me." The man answered, his face showing no feeling whatsoever. It amazed Martin that he could talk about his missing daughter without so much as a hurt facial expression. He was either really good at hiding his feelings, or really good at not having feelings at all. Martin couldn't decide which was true but if the man was anything like his own father, it was probably the latter.
"Do you know the names of some of her close friends?" Samantha questioned, looking from her notebook to the Governor.
"Only one. Olivia Halaman, soon to be Olivia Cartwright. She's to be married in a couple of weeks."
"Could you give us her address?" The man nodded, standing and walking over to a desk in the corner of the room, after a moment of searching through papers he came back with a wrinkled paper with the scribbled address on it.
"Sofie insisted that I keep that address laying around. Most likely for this exact reason." Martin noted that atleast the man had a nickname for his daughter, that had to mean something. Right?
x
Sofia Tyler sat talking to her bestfriend, not really paying attention. It was no use, her mind just wouldn't let her concentrate on the nonsense coming out of the other womans mouth.
"Sof', are you even listening to me?" She glanced over at Olivia and smiled her sweet smile.
"Of course, what makes you think I'm not?"
"You're drifting over there." Olivia took another sip of her latte, looking at her friend over the rim of the cup. She set it back down on the cafe table and smiled softly. "You thinking about that guy again?"
"What guy?" Sofia questioned, her attention now focused on the present.
"What guy?" Her friend repeated, laughing. "The guy you've been ditching me for. And don't tell me 'there's no guy,' I know you, there has to be a reasonable explanation. And thats the only one I can think of."
"There's no guy." She replied, stubbornly.
"Sofia Christine Tyler! There is a guy! Spill."
"Fine. There's a guy."
"And...?" Olivia sat foreward, her latte forgotten about as she tried to pry out of her friend every juicy detail.
"And what?"
"Are you sleeping with him?"
"Sort of." Sofia answered. If there was one thing she hated, it was being questioned like this. She recieved alot of it being the Governor's daughter and all, but hated it even more when it was her friends questioning her. Could they not see she didn't like telling people about her personal life? Even if they were her friends and technically were apart of that 'personal' life.
"How do you 'sort of' sleep with someone?" Olivia asked, wondering why her friend wouldn't just come out and answer the question.
"It's complicated, Liv."
"Aren't all relationships complicated?"
"Well, yes, but this ones even more complicated." Sofia took a sip of her coffee, avoiding her friend's gaze.
"He's married, isn't he?" Olivia wasn't granted an answer and her mouth fell open in shock. "Sof' are you having an affair?"
"You could call it that."
"Yes or no?"
"Yes." She whispered softly. "He's in an unhappy marriage. Things just happened."
"How long has it been going on?" Her friend asked, still visibly shocked.
"About a month." Sofia answered.
"You know you're setting yourself up for a fall. Affairs are always trouble Sof'. Unless he's willing to leave his wife for you, you're going to end up heartbroken in the end."
"It's just sex, Liv. Neither one of us is wanting something more." Sofia sighed. "Hell, I'm leaving soon for college. It'll end then. Until we get to that point... we'll fulfill each others needs."
Olivia nodded, she knew convincing her friend that what she was doing wasn't worth it, was useless. She was stubborn and would choose not to listen to the voice of reason. Not unlike her father, even if she hated to believe it.
x
To Be Continued...