Chapter 14

Olivia held Natalia until her breathing slowed and she knew she had drifted off to sleep. Laying there staring at the ceiling Olivia felt restless. The events of the day swirling in her head. She decided sleep was not going to come any time soon. Easing out of bed she pulled the covers tight around Natalia. Leaving a note on the bed side table in case she woke up, Oliva dressed and headed out for a much needed drink.

Arriving at the bar she saw a sign that said ladies night. Assuming it's a ladies drink free kind of ladies night she walked in and soon realized it was a lesbian ladies night. Deciding it didn't really matter she headed to the bar and took a seat ordering a martini.

The bar tender approached. "First time huh, don't worry it's not that obvious. It's my job to greet the newbies. Get you all signed up, give ya the free gift."

Olivia laughed nervously.

"Hey look she smiles. Relax honey have fun."

"I, I just thought this um, neverm…I was out walking and I needed to have a drink so."

"Okay."

"I'm not homophobic, and I'm not a lesbian well…maybe I am. It just so happens that right now I'm dating a woman."

"Do you love her?"

"Yeah."

"Does she love you?"

"I think so…I know so. If there's one thing I know it's when someone is in love with me, she's definitely in love with me, the trouble is she, she's having trouble with a man and she's religious. I mean I'm not talking about go to church twice a week kind of religious, I mean her faith is everything."

"Then I'd say walk away."

"What?"

"She's gonna break your heart."

"You don't know her, and you don't know me, and you know something you don't know what we have to offer each other so, thanks anyway." Handing over some cash she grabbed her belongings to leave. Turning around she came face to face with Doris Wolfe.

Doris dragged her outside. "Okay, this is not what it looks like."

"This isn't a lesbian bar?"

"No, it's a straight bar."

"It's ladies only night."

"I am meeting with some of my constituents. I am mayor to all the people."

"I can't believe this."

"What? Just because I was married to Alan Spaulding? Please. You were too?"

"That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about that speech you made. That awful little speech about my daughters paper. My Two Mommies. You made it sound like it was bad, like it was wrong, how could you do that?"

"Same reason that you stormed into my office for it. Look people don't like to be different okay, trust me. I come from a small town nobody wants to be different. People are afraid of different. Do you really think I would have been elected mayor if people thought I was a lesbian? Absolutely not. My own daughter doesn't even know. So what's it gonna take for you to keep this a secret? What do you want? A tax break for the Beacon?"

"I can't believe how you lead your life. Like it's one big secret. Like, like there's something to be ashamed of."

"And yet you stormed my office over a paper your daughter wrote and here you are on ladies night hanging out. Are you a lesbian Olivia?"

"Natalia and I aren't hiding anything, we just don't need it broadcast across the six o'clock news."

"Tell me Olivia, with all that you've done in the past, what's so honest about the way you live you life?" Doris walked away leaving Oliva standing there thinking about all of her past indiscretions feeling pretty bad about herself.

Two days Later Olivia was pacing the living room floor frantic. She was making phone call after phone call. "Jane. It's Olivia. Do you have her? Emma no I, were you supposed…no you weren't supposed to have her I just thought maybe…I don't have her and I called her school and I.. . never mind thanks." Hanging up she dialed another number. "Hi Mrs. Collin. It's Olivia Spencer, Emma's mom. Yeah, look I know that um Emma and Sophia were talking about a playdate and I'm just wondering if Emma you know went over to your house after school without checking with me. No. Alright thank you." Hanging up the phone she exhaled a long breath. "Phillip. You took my little girl you bastard." She ran up the stairs to her room.

Natalia came in to find a frantic Olivia with a gun on her bed. "What is that?"

"It's a 9mm."

"What is it doing in my house?"

"I have it for protection okay. I have a license and I practice at the shooting range."

"I don't know if I like that and I don't know why you chose not to discuss with me the fact that there's a gun in this house."

Olivia rose her voice a little. "I never told you because I never needed to use it."

Natalia matched her voice level. "So you're gonna use it right now?"

"Yes I am." She stated as she walked out the door and down the stairs with Natalia trailing after her.

"What are you doing?"

"Emma's missing I called Jane, I called the school, I called everyone, nothing. Phillip has her okay. I said that he was gonna come back and take her, no one would listen to me so I'm gonna get her back."

"Olivia please, don't be crazy."

"He has my little girl!"

"Alright well you can't shoot him because you're gonna end up in jail."

"What am I supposed to do he's gonna take her out of the country."

"You can't shoot Phillip, you, you'll be the one behind bars. And you can't keep that in here."

Setting the gun down Olivia pulled out a lock box and put it away putting the key on her wrist. "Fine, I'll put it way later. So what am I gonna do?"

"You're gonna go to the police station and I am gonna go looking for her."

"Call my cell."

"Okay."

Walking into the police station Mayor Wolfe was the first person Olivia saw. "Phillip Spaulding has my daughter."

Spinning to face her and looking up from the file in her hand, Doris asked, "what?"

"Emma Spencer my little girl is missing, and Phillip, the one who kidnapped her before, he has her."

"Okay wait, wait, wait. Just calm down a minute breathe, just tell me all the details."

"I have told you everything I know."

"Let's backtrack here a little bit. Did you call all of Emma's little friends?"

"I called everyone. I will go over your head if I have to."

"Okay there is no need. I will send out a cruiser for her immediately and we'll put out an APB."

"Then I want you to put Phillip in jail for the rest of his miserable life do you have that?"

"One step at a time."

"It's not good enough how am I supposed to protect my daughter." Leaving the station her phone rang. "Hello, what, where? I'm on my way."

Remy was bouncing Emma on the teeter totter and she was giggling with delight. "This is fun."

"Yeah, yeah it is fun. You know you should of told your mom where you were going right?"

"You think she's mad at me?"

"If she's anything like my mom she'll hug ya and yell at you at the same time."

Natalia was walking around looking for Emma and spotted her and Remy. "Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, Emma. I was so worried about you don't you ever do that to me again."

"I'm sorry."

Standing Remy addressed Natalia. "I saw her walking down main street. I asked her where she was going, she said she was headed to the bus to see her dad."

"Emma you know it's not safe for you to go see your dad by yourself."

Olivia walked up right at that time. "Emma, don't you ever do that again, I was worried sick about you."

"That's the same thing Natalia said."

Natalia looked at Olivia. "She went to go see Phillip and then Remy found her."

Sounding very relieved Olivia looked to Remy, "Thank you."

"Anytime." He looked down at Emma. "So what's our deal lady?"

"Anytime I go out I have to tell mom first."

"You ask mommy. You ask me or you ask Natalia." Olivia clarified.

"If you can't find them you call me." Remy said.

"And you'll let me ride in your truck?"

"Yes with sirens on." He said, high fiving the little girl.

"Cool."

Remy looked at the two women. "You guys okay?"

Speaking almost at the same time, "Barely." "We'll be fine. Thank you."

"Okay, call me if you need anything." He said as he departed.

"Thank you."

Olivia bent down to Emma's height. "You are in big trouble young lady."

"Uhhh," Emma looked to Natalia for help.

"Don't look at me you're on your own." Natalia stated.

Sitting Emma down on the steps to the slide Olivia tried to make Emma understand about Phillip. "Emma, come on, I thought I made myself clear. We talked, your father is just not…" she trailed off.

Natalia picked up for her. "Some people have a sickness in their tummy, or they have a cold in their nose and they have the sniffles and some people…."

Olivia took back over. "Have um, sickness in their head."

"My daddy has that?" Emma asked.

"Yeah he does."

"Does he need medicine?"

"Ah he needs shock treatment." Olivia said in a low voice turning her head away from Emma.

Natalia looked at her with exasperation before turning to Emma. "He needs some time to get better."

"Can I make him a card?"

"Yeah, that's a good idea. Make him a card. We'll make him a card when we get home. Do you wanna go down the slide one more time?"

"Mmm hmm."

Once Emma headed for the slide Olivia leaned close to Natalia. "Phillip is not getting a card from her."

"Well of course not, but you have to let her love her dad for as long as she can."

"I get that she needs to love her dad, but unfortunately, he's a monster." She replied, tears choking her a bit.

Natalia cupped her face in her hands, wiping the tears with her gloved thumbs. "It's gonna be okay baby. We have her. She is safe. We'll talk to the School and Jane, and keep this from happening again. Okay?"

"Yeah, Okay."

"Okay." Placing a tender kiss on cold lips Natalia called for Emma. "Come on Jellybean. Let's go home."

After sending Emma to her room to do her homework Olivia and Natalia were standing in the living room discussing their next plan of action. Olivia was a little upset that Natalia defended Phillip with Emma. "Why, why do you do that?"

"What?"

"Try to smooth things over with Emma when it comes to Phillip. When you know his history. When you know I don't want him anywhere near her."

"Because that's hard on a little girl. We need to let her love her father and figure out how to keep him out of her life."

"So you agree with me about Phillip?"

"I don't know Phillip and I don't know that I'll ever understand what you went through, but today when Emma went missing and I thought for one second that he took her, I wanted him locked up. So we can't let him near her until we are positive he's okay."

"If ever."

"If ever. So we have to figure out how to handle this."

"Okay. So now that you finally get it, how are we gonna keep Phillip away from Emma?"

Deciding they needed a small break Olivia went to lock her gun up while Natalia loaded some books into a box. Coming down the stairs Olivia said with an exaggerated voice, "oookaaay, so I locked my gun up in a very safe place."

"Did you take the bullets out?"

"Yes, it's never loaded. Only at the shooting range."

"Uh, I still don't like it. I don't even wanna know where it is because I'm gonna be tempted to get rid of it."

"Or Shoot me?"

"That too."

"Terrific, lets move on. So if I can't shoot Phillip, what am I gonna do to keep him away from Emma?"

"Uh, well, he's got a trial coming up and he's probably gonna be found guilty and he will be back in jail."

"Not necessarily, I mean a trial date, it could take six weeks, six months, years even. Meanwhile he's out partying with his friends."

"That doesn't seem right at all."

"Ya think? And even if he does get a trial date, I mean, he's a Spaulding, they're not gonna convict him of anything. I mean he'll hire a good lawyer. He'll buy off a jury."

"Poor Emma. What a family to come from."

"Well this is Rafe's family too."

"I know. How did you deal with it? Living in that house?"

"I didn't let em push me around, and if they tried to I pushed back. How bout you?"

"Well I tried to, you know, talk to Alan nicely. Let him know what he could and couldn't do with Rafe, ya know."

"Yeah. How'd that work for ya?"

All she could do was make a face at that. Deciding she wanted to pay Phillip a visit herself, Natalia quickly came up with a plan. "Alright how about this, how about we split up and then maybe we can just think up some ideas."

"Alright, that's fine. Um, I'm gonna go down to the police station because I'm a gluten for punishment, they're useless."

"Alright, well I'll call Jane and then she can come sit with Emma."

"Sounds like a plan."

Olivia went to get up but Natalia stopped her with a hand to her arm. "We're gonna work it out." Bringing Olivia into a hug she squeezed her tight and then pulled back to give her a reassuring kiss. A kiss that spoke of both love and protection.