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Chapter 17

CHARLIE'S P.O.V

Connie didn't say a word all the way back to the dorms. I'd held her hand throughout the whole meeting with Theresa West, not once letting go, or feeling her pull away. When we'd gotten outside, she'd cried harder than I'd ever seen her cry before. I knew, to her the whole point of having all the examinations she'd had was to catch the guy who'd done it. But now they'd told her they were inconclusive, she felt as though it was all for nothing. I could read her like a book.

When I pulled up outside the dorms, Connie sat silently, staring straight ahead. Almost as though in a trance. Her face was troubled, yet I had the feeling that wherever she was in her mind, it was far happier than she felt right now. Not wanting to snap her out of it, I cut the car engine and sat silently beside her. With the silence, I too began to stare into space, going back in my minds eye, to happier times between us, finally getting together, our graduation, our 1st anniversary, starting college together. The list endless, well endless until recently.

"Thanks for coming with me Charlie". She suddenly snapped out of the trance she'd been in, leant over to me, pecked me cheek, then began scurrying out of the car.

"Connie… Connie wait"! I shouted after her. I scrambled out of the car after her, as she ran toward her building, either not hearing or ignoring my calls.

When she'd disappeared from sight, I continued climbing out of the car, closing and locking the door behind me. Without even trying, I was worried about her. The news had hit her hard, and though I knew she wouldn't do anything stupid, the fact that she'd be on her own, as upset as she clearly was, bothered me.

I headed back to my dorm room, feeling a little despondent. Everything seemed so out of control, and nothing seemed to be getting better. Weren't things supposed to get easier eventually. I entered my room, barely noticing Averman hunched over his lap top in the corner, where we kept the desk.

"Hey Conway! Adam's been looking for you". He stated, startling me, but he didn't turn in his seat.

"Oh yeah. What for"? I asked, as I sat heavily on my bed.

"No idea. Don't think it was important anyway". He swizzled the chair around to look at me. "What's"… He began.

"There you are. I've been looking for you all"… Adam started as he entered the room, followed by Russ, Goldberg and Luis. "What's wrong"?

"I've just been with Connie"… I tried explaining.

"Oh yeah"? Luis wiggled his eyebrows as Goldberg and Russ wolf whistled.

"Down the police department". I stated abruptly.

"Wh… Why"? Averman asked, as Luis closed the door tightly behind himself and they all turned every speck of attention to me.

"They rang Connie, and he came over here looking for I suppose anyone but me to go with her. But I saw her first and took her down there. All the test result things are in. They're inconclusive". I informed them.

"Inconclusive"? Goldberg asked.

"Um, they were unable to match the um, you know". They looked at me clueless. "In other words, unless the guy who attacked her, ends up crossing the law at some point, we won't ever find who he was".

"Damn". Russ muttered.

"How's Connie taking it"? Adam asked.

"Um, she was pretty upset. I think she needs to be alone though. When we got back here, she just ran toward her room". I informed them.

CONNIE'S P.O.V

They had no idea who it was! That was the only thing that was on my mind. It could have been anyone, even someone who I had the same classes with. Whoever it was, had gotten away with it, he was walking around feeling freedom, without a care in the world. He was able to do it over and over until he got caught. He could have a girlfriend, or maybe he was married. He could have kids, the perfect kind of life, his loved ones never really knowing what kind of man he was.

Honestly, I had been hoping all along, that when they'd caught him, he'd suffer, suffer like no-one had suffered before. I had imagined psyching myself up to go and stand face to face with him. Imagined asking him why? Why me? I wanted revenge, more than anything I wanted revenge. You see he hadn't only raped me, he'd taken away trust and confidence. But the thing I hated him most for was making me feel so different that I had to break up with Charlie.

When I got in my room, Julie wasn't in, she rarely was these days. I think she'd been getting tired of listening to me drone on about how my life sucked. Even I was getting fed up of hearing myself wallow in self pity. I didn't want to stay in the room any longer than I had too, the four walls were all I'd been staring at for the passed few days and I could take no more. I grabbed my skates and headed back out.

It took me less than 5 minutes to hit the ice. For the 1st time in days, I felt myself relax. I glided gracefully across the ice, turning in tight circles, swapping from skating forwards to backwards in less than 2 steps. I felt so at ease, it felt almost un-natural. After a while, I skated toward one of the players boxes where I knew there would be a few pucks and sticks. I picked one of each up and took to the ice. I handled the puck, skating around with it at first, marveling at how I never once lost control of it. Very different to life I couldn't help but think.

After a few minutes, I began shooting at the open net. Soon enough, I was hitting the puck harder than Fulton and it ricocheted off the Plexiglas back toward me. I hadn't noticed the tears of anger that spilled, until I began shaking with fury. But even then, I didn't stop.

? P.O.V

I was sat in my office, starting some withstanding paper work. It was a Saturday, and though I would have preferred to have spent it with my family, I knew that I wouldn't have been able to get the paper work done at home. Emily was having a sleep over, and as soon as my wife pointed out that there would be 5 loud teenage girls running riot throughout my house, I soon happily retreated to work.

Tap… I started studying the game schedule that I had been given a few days tap… previous, trying to decipher when I'd need to book the team bus for. Tap… Out the teams we were lined up to play first, I knew our team wasn't the strongest, yet we certainly weren't the weakest. Tap… Ironically the teams we were to play last, were the weakest ones, which I suppose was both tap… a good thing and a bad thing. Good because the team would be running down and bad because they would most likely underestimate the weaker teams. TAP…

What the hell was that tapping. It was almost rhythmical. Not loud, but loud enough to pull me out of my thoughts. I stood and headed to my office door, where I opened it, listening for the noise again. TAP… There it was again. I slowly followed the noise to the ice. The noise was in fact a puck hitting the boards and Plexiglas. In the middle of the ice, was a brunette, who I recognized straight away as Connie. For a few minutes I watched her, hit the puck toward the goal, catch it's rebound when it hit the boards, then shoot again. Even from here, I could see how tense she was. Slowly and quietly I headed out onto the ice, walking toward her. The puck slid passed her and she turned to retrieve it, noticing me. Straight away, she tensed even more.

"You've got one hell of a shot there. Why don't I see more of that"? I asked gently.

It was common knowledge amongst my team and probably most of the campus that I was this incredibly strict coach. I accept that easily, at least my team focus 80 percent of the time I'm coaching them. Maybe sometimes I'm over strict, but then again, I had yet to warm to my team, they had yet to warm to me and each other. I do however highly disagree when people comment that I'm nasty and have no compassion. If they were telling the truth, then how the hell my wife had put up with me all these years was beyond me, mainly because she wouldn't.

"It's not every day I have as much pent up anger". She replied strongly. It was then I was close enough to notice her tears.

"Are you ok? D'ya wanna talk"? I offered, walking even closer.

"Um, no it's ok". She edged slightly away from me, as though I was going to strike her when I was close enough.

Connie was about the same age as my oldest daughter, Amy. I had been informed by Ted Orion of her situation, after Julie Gaffney had blurted out part of it. On finding out, I couldn't help but feel an odd rage at her attacker. Being a father of 3 daughters myself was probably part of the reason, but the other part was because I had taken straight away to the fiery brunette.

You might think, that I was lying, but Connie had something about her, that was made her impossible not to like. Although we argued nearly every practice, and I pushed her far harder than most of the other girls, it was all because I knew she was capable of much more. Her fiery disposition, that I had quickly found a knack of igniting was invaluable as the more strong headed the better she played.

When I had first taken the job of coaching the team, I had watched hundred of tapes of games of all the girls. All of them had plenty of potential, but all simply played at high school level, apart from 3 of them who played better hockey than some college students I'd seen. 2 being Connie and Julie, the other being a girl called Sandra who never showed up. Though I felt incredibly lucky to have been 'dumped' with Julie, I was even more ecstatic with Connie. She was able to adapt her playing to any situation, she was fearless of other players, and never gave up until the final buzzer. Maybe it was because she'd played on an all boys team her whole life, and had to fight her own battles to stay where she was, but whatever it was, she had more fight in her, than most of the girls I'd ever coached. I'd never known one like her.

"I'm not quite the ogre you all make me out to be you know". I stated simply. "Listen, if you want to talk, I'm just in my office ok". I began to turn, and head back there, hoping she'd come around in her own time.

"Wait". She said loudly, I guess shocking herself in the process.

"Yeah". I responded gently.

"You wanna snag a coke". She offered.

"Sure". I replied.

Within minutes we were sat side by side on the bleaches. Connie didn't say anything for a few minutes, just sipped her drink and stared out at the ice. I sat silently, allowing her to collect her thoughts before she started talking. I wanted her to understand that I was here to purely listen to her.

"You know, for the passed few weeks, all I've been able to concentrate on, was when the police catch the guy who...". She couldn't even bring herself to say the words. "All this would be over, and I'd be able to get on with my life". A few tears ran down her cheeks. "Earlier today, they called me, wanting me to go down there. They didn't say why, and I didn't ask. I went down there, I went down there for them to tell me, they hadn't been able to identify the guy, through matching the DNA they'd got from me". She found difficulty finding the right words to explain the last part. "He's still walking around out there, leading a normal life, every day, and here I am, struggling to get through one day to the next".

"I know I'm going to sound like a broken record here, but things will get better". I told her.

"They don't feel like they're getting better, if anything they're getting worse. God I even broke up with Charlie because of it, my friends all treat and act differently around me". I knew these were feelings she'd been unable to speak to anyone about. "I can't even get through a hockey practice without making a run for it. I mean c'mon, I was actually scared of facing you, I've never been scared of facing you". We both let out a small chuckle.

We sat talking for another hour or two. She continued telling me everything about what had been happening. I was surprised at how open she was being with me. I'd never in my wildest dreams expected her to open up to me, the way she was doing. She told me she wanted to start playing hockey again, and we agreed that it would be just practices for the moment, until we both were confident enough to put her in for games.

I watched her leave, a strange sense of satisfaction surrounding me. I'd finally broke the ice with her, and gotten to know the less fiery Connie Moreau.

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