“Okay, baby.”  She kept massaging my back, her touch reaching my soul.

“Thank you,” I whispered.

She nodded and waited for me to continue, her hand never leaving me.

“Merrick and I came up with a plan to deal with Leroy.  I’d known Merrick since I was about fourteen.  He’d been recruited by Leroy to sell drugs as well, and he’d had enough of all the shit we were involved in.  I killed Leroy, and we split his organisation in half.  One of the other gang members took the drugs, and we took the women.  We shut the brothels down, but then we had the problem that they needed to earn money, and most of them were junkies by that point and all they knew was prostitution.  Merrick found a clothing manufacturing business for sale so we bought that with the profit Leroy had made, and the women worked there instead.”

I paused and she asked, “So that’s what you do?”

I realised I’d never spoken about my work with her.  “It’s not my main business.  We don’t make any profit on that side of our organisation.  In fact, that business runs at a loss because we employ more women in it than we actually need. Some of the women who’ve been with us since we split from Leroy now spend their time helping prostitutes, and if any of them want out of the game, we take them on and help them change their lives.  We put a lot of money into rehab because most of them are addicted to drugs when they come to us.”

“How do you make money, then?” she asked, looking puzzled.

“Construction.  When we pulled the girls from the brothels, I discovered they were living in shit conditions, so we bought a rundown building and renovated it for them to live in.  After we took care of Leroy, some of the gang members came with us, and I put all of us to work on the renovation because we couldn’t afford to hire someone to do it.  Merrick and I saw an opportunity there; we had the manpower to do that kind of work so we started off small and we’ve worked our way up in the construction industry.  We now employ hundreds of guys and have multiple jobs going at once.  It’s a dirty industry, though, and we deal with a lot of shit.”

I poured us both a drink.  I’d need it for the next part of the story.

Layla drank it silently and waited for me to continue.

After I drank mine, I said, “Ashley helped me become a better man.  She helped us push all those changes through and she helped the women change their lives.  We moved in together and were planning our wedding when she was murdered.”  The pain sliced through my heart, but I pushed on.  “She was out with friends one night and her drink was spiked, and . . . they took her.  Fucking gang raped her and slit her throat.”

I fought to catch my breath again and forced the rising bile back down. Layla kept massaging my back, soothing me with her touch, but this pain couldn’t be soothed away completely.  Not when it was my fault.

I stared at her, preparing to tell her the worst part.

“What else?” she whispered, knowing there was more.

“She tried to call me that night.  Her message said she needed a lift home. I didn’t take her call, though, because I was angry at her.  We’d been fighting on and off all week and had a huge argument before she went out.  It was over fucking trivial shit, but I was a stubborn bastard and didn’t want to talk to her when she rang.  She was supposed to be staying at a friend’s house after they finished at the club.  I didn’t know she wanted me to come and get her . . . didn’t know she’d walk the streets trying to find a fucking taxi . . . ”

“Oh god,” she said, her eyes wide.  “I’m so sorry, baby, no wonder you were upset last night.”

I rested my hands on the edge of the kitchen counter, curled my fingers under the edge of it and squeezed hard.  I tried to squeeze the agony out of me.  It was fucking torture, and after living with it for years, I just wanted it gone.  I craved silence in my mind.

I pushed off from the counter.  “Fuck!” I yelled into the silence of the night.  My body screamed at me, and the anger coursing through me took over.  I turned and punched the wall behind me.  And then I doubled over, my arms going around my body.  I clawed at myself as the emotions tangled together in one big mess.

I can’t do this any longer.

I’m going insane.

And then Layla turned me back around to face her, and wrapped me in her arms.  She held tight and didn’t let me go.  My arms went around her, and I clung to her.

“Shhh, it’s okay to let it out.  Don’t fight it anymore.  Holding onto it is hurting you more.”

I took her words in and tried to process them, but after years of fighting this, I knew no other way.

“It’s not your fault, Donovan,” she whispered in my ear.

I stilled and tightened my hold on her, but remained silent.

“We all say and do shit in life we wish we could take back.  But what people choose to do with that stuff is up to them.  We can’t control their actions, and we sure as shit can’t foresee the future.  We also can’t control what other people are going to do to the people we love.  You didn’t cause those men to do what they did to Ashley.  That’s on them, not you.  Baby, you’ve spent long enough beating yourself up for this.  It’s time to forgive yourself for whatever you think you’ve done wrong.  It’s time to move out of the shadows of the past and start living your life again.”