Sixteen chapters.
***chapter contains rape***
"So he's not who he's pretended to be all these years?"
"I'm afraid not. After talking to NYPD we do have every reason to believe that sheriff Holmes is in fact, Harlan Lewis, wanted in Kentucky for a series of rape/murders" Chief Arlow explained
"And now kidnapping a police sergeant. I never did trust that sonofabitch!" Judge Smythe grumbled.
"We already have enough to haul him in for questioning but we need to be able to search that house. Sergeant Benson got free long enough to call one of her colleagues but then the line went dead after only a minute. We believe that Holmes – Lewis caught her making that call and if she is in hat house, we need to get to her"
"God help that poor woman!" he quickly jotted his signature on the warrant and handed it back to the police chief.
"Thank you sir. I just hope it pans out!"
"Shit, if it doesn't, just shoot the bastard!" Smythe joked in all seriousness.
.
At Harlan's home, in the room where he'd held Olivia for the last three months, he'd managed to pull himself across the floor leaving a trail of blood and he now lay propped against the door, pale as a ghost and holding his severed penis in his hand as he called for help.
"Bron…" he said her name partially, barely a whisper before the blood that was filling his chest cavity forced him into another coughing fit as it forced its way out of his mouth and down his chin, the agony of the pain that tore through his chest indescribable but he was dying.
"I'll kill ya, ya useless cunt!" he murmured when his coughing subsided then quickly gave in to unconsciousness again. He'd been lying here like this like this for almost two hours. How he hadn't already bled to death was a mystery but if someone didn't get here soon, it would be lights out for Harlan.
.
Sam sat nervously in the waiting room waiting to hear something about the woman he'd brought in, his mind racing with scenarios of what could have happened to her that drove her out onto the road in a torrential downpour barefoot and wearing nothing but a thin nightgown . If the horrible bruises that covered her face, arms and legs were any indication, he knew that someone had been hurting her but whom? Had she come from the house that sat just off the road? If so, why had nobody come after her? Or had they? What if whoever she had fled from was out there, coming after her but changed their mind when they saw his SUV pull up? What if they had been right there all along, watching from the trees? Four a.m. is very dark outside, someone could have been right there, perfectly obscured in the darkness.
"But it doesn't make sense" he said to himself "The sheriff's house is just off that part of the road" and if the woman had come from there wouldn't he had seen her before at some point? The whole town consisted of less than 2500 people and everybody knew everybody but he'd never seen the woman before so where did she come from? And if she had in fact come from Sheriff Holmes's house, why was she there? Why was she so terribly beaten and why had she fainted? Had the sheriff done this to her?
"God, please, let her be alright" Sam prayed then took his phone from his pocket deciding that maybe he should call the police to help this woman.
.
Down the hall in their bedroom, Bronwyn was still fast asleep having been thoroughly sexually satisfied and exhausted by her father/husband. She lay in bed flat on her back, dead to the world and snoring loudly. She never heard Harlan's initial screams when Olivia took his member off, just as she hadn't heard the taps from the bedroom door down the hall as Harlan lay bleeding almost to death and weakly calling for help.
It was only the fact that she would get out of bed to take a trip to the bathroom that she even noticed that Harlan was gone. Jealousy immediately filled her, knowing that he had only gone one place and that was down the hall to her! Even on a night as special as this one had been, the night he'd taken her virginity, truly made her a woman, his woman, all he wanted was to be with Olivia. It was like the woman had Harlan under a spell of some sort.
"What will it take to break her hold on you?" she wondered aloud as she reached to wipe herself and winced at the pain down there. She'd torn pretty badly when he'd breached her hymen; she was still bleeding and decided to take a hot bath to ease the ache, deciding that if Harlan wasn't in their bed where he belonged when she finished, she would march down the hall to that bedroom and lure him away from that temptress.
"Maybe I should help her get out of here…if only to get her away from my husband!"
... ... ...
A half hour later she was cleaned up and dressed in comfy pajamas and extremely disappointed to see that Harlan was still missing from their room.
"It's almost six a.m. and he'd rather spend the night down the hall than with his wife!" she was just about to make her way to Olivia's room when there was loud pounding on the downstairs door that caused the dogs to waken from their pens out back and begin barking viciously. Bronwyn hurried downstairs, not wanting to have the noise wake Harlan and decided that she would get rid of whoever was at the door, knowing it would only be one of Harlan's associates.
When she reached the door she went to reach for the locks and she immediately froze; none of them were locked. The door was shut but the locks were all undone and suddenly her mind began racing as the pounding continued on the door. Had Harlan done this? Had he been so drunk that he foolishly left the door un-secured? She would have to figure it out later; right now she had to get rid of whoever was outside but was utterly shocked to open the door and see more than a dozen police officers outside.
"Officers…this is unexpected. What can I do for you?"
"We're looking for Sheriff Lucius Holmes" the head officer said
"And you are?"
"Chief Peter Arlow, Lancaster Police department."
"I'm Mrs. Holmes"
"Good. We need to take your husband in for questioning and we have a warrant to search these premises he said as he and his team entered the house, handing her a copy of the warrant as they did.
"Questioning…Search… evidence for what?" Bronwyn asked nervously
"What we're looking for. Tell me ma'am, have you seen this woman? Arlow asked Bronwyn as he showed her Olivia's picture. "and if I were you, I'd think long and hard about what we might already know before I answered."
"My husband isn't here and I think I should call my attorney" Bronwyn said after a long pause
"Good. And while you're at it, you might wanna call one for your husband too! Koper, Feldman, why don't the two of you keep the misses company while we do our job. Do not let her out of your sights for even a moment!" the chief ordered
"Yes sir!" the two men answered in unison
"Okay fellas, I want half of you to follow me upstairs, two of you take the basement and the rest of you, start on this floor, you find even the tiniest thing, I wanna know about it!"
"Yes sir" sergeant Booth answered while Bronwyn, suddenly feeling sick, took a seat on the sofa, her face now ashen knowing exactly what they would find upstairs – at least she thought she knew what they'd find, she had no idea that Olivia was long since gone or the bloody horror that she left in her wake.
.
At the Lancaster police department, Fin had just pulled up and parked his car in front of the building, the rain still coming down in sheets. He was about to exit the car when his phone rang.
"Yeah Nick?"
"Are you there yet? Did you find her?" he couldn't hide the pained urgency in his voice. Ever since Fin told him that he'd talked to her, Nick felt like tearing down the world. Nothing mattered except getting to her.
"I just got to the police department, I'm not inside yet though. How far behind are you and Amanda?"
"We're about 45 minutes away" Amanda answered "But with the way this rain is comin down we might have to pull over and wait for it to let up; can't see a damn thing!"
"I'll call the minute I know anything, y'all be safe"
"Screw the weather! I'm gonna rely on a Hail Mary and hit the gas, we are not stoppin this car!" Nick said after ending the call.
"What if this all amounts to a dead end?" Amanda asked. "I know I've been the cheerleader all this time but I'm scared to death!"
"Considerin none of us are exactly cleared to be out of our jurisdiction or chasing a closed case…let's hope it doesn't."
"Liv's lucky" Amanda said wistfully. Nick, not understanding what she meant, turned and gave her a questioning look
"Oh God!" she exclaimed, mortified at realizing what it must look like she was alluding to "Not the…all of this. I just mean that she's lucky to have 3 men in her life who love her the way you all do"
"You love her too"
"I do. But you Fin and Brian…watchin you three these last few months it's been more than just us all freakin over her bein gone. It's like each of you lost a limb; the pain I just…I think it's beautiful to be able to love someone so deep. I can't even begin to imagine where she's been or what she's been through all these months but I do know that no matter what, it's that love that's gonna get her through it"
Nick had a pensive look about him as he fought the tears in his eyes.
"If she lets us… Buckle up. I'm either gonna get us there in 30 or die tryin!" he said as they sped down the road, siren blaring.
.
In the E.R. Sam was now pacing the room, still waiting to hear news about Jane Doe. He'd already called the police who'd informed him that they were short-staffed at the moment and that since this wasn't technically an emergency, they would send someone to the hospital as soon as they could. Sam was just about to go grab coffee when the doctor appeared.
"You're still here?" she said, surprised to see him
"I didn't feel right leaving her alone. Is she awake?"
"Not yet. But she's stable and we've moved her to a private room. is there anything more you can tell us that'll maybe help with finding out who she is?"
"Nothing that I haven't already told the police…I'm sorry"
"You talked to the police?"
"I called them a little while ago, they don't seem to be in much of a rush to get here though"
"I think I can speed things up, I'm gonna need to insist that they get down here" The doctor said
"Good; I mean you saw yourself the condition she's in; someone needs to answer for doing that to her…is she gonna be okay?"
"Looks likeit. I'm hoping she wakes up soon so that she can help us find this monster. As badly as she's been beaten for so long… I need to go and make that phone call; excuse me.
"Doctor wait…I heard you say earlier that she might be pregnant, is her baby gonna be okay?"
"I'm really not at liberty to discuss any of this. Please excuse me." the doctor said before rushing off.
.
"Of course, Doctor. We're short-staffed right now but we'll send someone right out… You're welcome." Said the desk sergeant of the Lancaster police department before hanging up the phone and turning his attention back to Fin "The chief is out now with the squad searching Holmes' property as we speak" he informed him.
"When do we know if they find her?"
"These things take time, it could be a while. Hell, in this weather, who knows if they've even gotten to Earl yet? But if you wanna make yourself useful…"
"Doin…?"
"We just got a call from the hospital, doc at Lancaster Memorial is insisting we send somebody over right away. She's a ball-buster, that one! They got a Jane Doe…" Fin's heart began racing "unconscious, badly beaten. Doc examined her and it looks like she's been raped." He could feel his stomach tying itself in knots as his blood began to boil, he didn't know why but he knew; everything inside him was screaming, telling him that Jane Doe was Olivia and suddenly he was flooded with a million emotions all at once and trying to keep them under control. This could easily pan out to be just some random woman or girl but his heart knew, even as it was breaking, it knew!
"Right now all we got is a rookie to send over and he wouldn't know what the hell he's doing. You work sex crimes, maybe you could help him out, make sure he doesn't screw anything up."
"Let's go!" Fin said without second thought or hesitation.
.
Out at Harlan's place, while searching the upstairs rooms, Chief Arlow's radio came alive.
"Chief, it's Sweeney. I'm in the basement and I think you might wanna get down here" the officer said
"Have you found Benson?" Arlow asked
"You could say that"
"On my way" Arlow then turned to the other officers "finish up here" he said before turning to go downstairs.
... ... ...
Down in the basement, the two officers stood in a small room that had been locked and obscured by a false wall. Inside were several monitors that fed from cameras that covered the outside property and the rooms inside the house, but that wasn't what they found to be so disturbing. What turned the stomachs of the seasoned officers was the bookshelf that was filled with DVD recordings, all of them labeled "Olivia…" randomly, officer Sweeney took one from the shelf, the one labeled "Olivia, Group Therapy 1" and it literally made he and his partner physically ill to see the woman they were looking for pleading incessantly with Sheriff Holmes while he beat and dragged her across the room then stripped her of the nightgown she wore before throwing her onto a bed around which a group of no less than ten men stood waiting and immediately pounced on her, giving no concern to her screams and cries, all while Harlan encouraged that they "Fuck the shit out of her however they want, for as long as they want."
Chief Arlow hadn't even been in the basement a minute and had already ordered that the video be stopped when his radio went live again with the voice of one of the officers he'd just left upstairs.
"Yeah Chaney?" he answered
"Boss, you ain't gonna believe this" the man said disbelievingly
"She up there?" Arlow asked
"No, but he is...and I think he's dead!" Chaney answered, turned pallid at the macabre sight before he and his fellow officers; Sheriff Holmes, white as a sheet in a pool of his own blood with his severed penis gripped in his hand.
"Get CSU out here" Arlow ordered.
.
"Yeah, we'll meet you there. We're close… okay" Nick waited anxiously for Amanda to tell him what the phone call had been about
"They find her?"
"He dun know for sure but he wants us to go straight to Lancaster Memorial hospital. They got a Jane Doe, unconscious but he thinks it might be her, he's on his way there now."
"Unconscious? What the hell did that maniac do to her?"
"We really wanna ask that question? I didn't wanna give him false hope but I think it's time to call Cassidy. He needs to be here for Liv. She's gonna need all of us!"
.
"Harlan… oh dear god, please don't take him away!" Bronwyn screamed as she leaned over her husband's body, so distraught that she'd forgotten the ruse and openly called him by his real name.
"Ma'am the paramedics cannot do their job with you in the way!" Arlow warned as he and two of his officers pulled her away so that the paramedics could get Harlan out of the house and into the ambulance while Bronwyn continued screaming.
"I want that room swept for evidence! Get every one of those videos and every minute of footage that those cameras recorded and down to the station, and I want every last man in them identified and arrested. We clear?"
"Crystal, chief!" Sweeney answered
"And find Benson!" He yelled, his anger and disgust at the situation that happened right under their noses bubbling over.
"She did this! My Harlan was right, she's an evil whore!"
"Bronwyn Holmes, you are under arrest for conspiracy to kidnap, concealing a crime and aiding and abetting a wanted fugitive." Arlow seethed as he began cuffing her
"What?" She is the criminal here; look at what she did to my husband!" Bronwyn cried but Arlow paid no mind and went about arresting her as he hauled her out of the house
"You have the right to remain silent…"
.
At the hospital Sam had fallen asleep while waiting for news on the woman. He was determined that he wouldn't leave until he knew for sure that she would be alright. The silence of the empty waiting room was suddenly disturbed when his phone began ringing, jarring him from his half-sleep as he quickly reached into his pocket to retrieve the offending device, groggily staring at the display screen before answering.
"Yeah dad?"
"We haven't heard from you all night, your mother and I have been worried sick!" his father complained
"Oh, God…dad I'm sorry, I should have called. I've been preoccupied" Sam apologized as he ran his hand over his face and sat up straighter in his chair. "I kinda had a crazy night"
"Son are you alright?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. I just…" he noticed the uniformed officer enter with an older detective and head over to the desk "Dad, the police are here, I gotta go"
"Wait, the police? Samuel, what the hell is goin on?"
"A woman was hurt I brought her to the hospital and called the cops. I'll fill you in I promise but I need to go talk to them right now."
"You always were a good boy, Sammie!" his father said proudly
"That's because I learned from a good man, sir." Sam smiled, equally proud and hung up.
... ... ...
At his parent's home, his father looked at the phone receiver in his hand before he put it back on the cradle.
"We raised a wonderful son!" he said to himself as he snapped his rainbow suspenders into place before heading downstairs to breakfast.
... ... ...
"Are you guys here about Jane Doe?" Sam asked the officers upon approaching them while they waited to be helped at the empty station
"Who are you?" Fin asked as he looked the tall, stocky young man up and down.
"My name's Sam, I'm the one who found her and brought her in"
"I'm Detective Tutuola, this is officer…"
"Logan"
"Logan" Fin repeated. Sam, can you tell me if this is the woman you found?" he asked, showing a picture of Olivia on his phone
"She was unconscious so I can't say for certain, but it sure looks like her"
... ... ...
Upstairs in Olivia's room, she opened her eyes, disoriented and afraid, not recognizing her surroundings. She turned her head to see a woman sitting in the chair beside her bed.
"You're awake" the doctor said in her gentlest voice as she stood but Olivia cowered away, her eyes darting wildly around the room as she began breathing in shaky breaths.
"Am I safe?" she asked in a frightened whisper as tears filled her eyes "Where am I?" she shook as she gripped the covers, holding them tight to her.
"Yes, I promise, no one can hurt you. You're in a hospital"
"H-hospital? I don't…" she couldn't seem to stop shaking as the tears hat filled her eyes involuntarily began pouring down her face.
"Are you in pain?" The doctor asked
"I don't know" She sobbed in sad honestly. She was in such a state of shock and confusion, nothing was clear.
"It's okay. I'm Dr. Aimes but you can call me Carrie. Can you tell me yours? Do you remember?"
"I… my name is Olivia Benson" she wept "Did Fin find me, did he bring me here? Where is he?"
"Is Fin the man who hurt you, Olivia?"
"No. he's…"
"Doctor" The Nurse interrupted upon entering "I'm sorry but the police are here" she continued as the Officers entered the room behind her
"Fin!" Olivia cried weakly, unsure that her mind wasn't playing a cruel trick on her but when he rushed over to her and sat beside her, pulling her into his arms, she broke hard, wretched, guttural sobs that bordered on screams ripping out of her as she clung tight to him, tighter than she even realized she could and Fin held her just as tight, unable to believe that after all this time, she was here and she was safe, he had her in his arms.
"I got you baby girl!" he soothed as he rocked her, his own tears falling freely as her broken sobs continued. "It's okay now, I got you!" he promised. They seemed lost in each other, the rest of the world seemingly shut out. When the door opened again and Nick and Amanda stepped inside, they were both heartbroken to see her in such a state but it was joy and relief that had their own faces flooded with tears and Nick barely able to stand, seeing her there, alive and in front of him and in that moment he he felt more love for her than he ever thought possible.
.
TBC...