“It’s gonna be okay he won’t get near you again.” No he won’t, because I’m gonna kill his ass first chance I get. I cleaned her up and got her back to her feet before taking her out to the car.
Once she was safe inside I finally looked at my phone as realization begun to dawn. I looked through the car window at her before climbing into the driver’s seat.
“No fuck that, come up here with me.” I got out and let her out again, leading her to the passenger seat and strapping her in. I wanted to question the shit out of her but she didn’t look like she could handle it.
I should call the cops and have him picked up, or at the very least give her manager a heads-up, but I wanted to take care of him myself.
I sped back to the beach house making sure that we weren’t being followed and once there made sure the coast was clear.
I didn’t question her, just ran her a bath, made dinner while she soaked and put her to bed after she took two bites of her food.
I’d forgotten to ask her his name, plus I didn’t want her to know what I was up to, so I went back through her file while she slept.
She’d said she worked with him when she first came here so I went all the way back. I used Google to match names with faces until I found him.
“Timothy Aldridge; dead man walking.” The asshole had been out of the country working on a couple movies in Europe for the past year and a half and just got back a few months ago.
There were a few nibbles here and there, but no one had come right out and said that he was a sexual predator. It was easy for anyone looking to figure that shit out.
By the time she woke up I knew everything I needed to about him. Including why he never got collared for his shit.
Big shot movie director/producer who knew all the right people and had probably pulled this fuckery on more than just the innocent young girl upstairs.
“How’re you feeling love?” She rolled onto her side, buried her face in my hip; and broke down in deep soul wracking sobs. I slid down the mattress so I could hold her and let her cry it out, with my heart breaking with every second that passed.
I’ve never been so torn. Part of me was already out there hunting this motherfucker down, and the other knew I had to be here with her.
She wound down after ten minutes and I really tried to give her time to tell me the whole story, but in the end that shit didn’t fly. I let her keep her head hidden in my chest where she kept it because she seemed to know me well enough to know what comes next.
“Tell me how it happened. You don’t have to go into detail about the assault if you’re not comfortable with that, but tell me the rest.”
She wiped her snotty nose in my shirt without a care and somehow that innocent act helped to calm me down a little.
“It was my first movie. I’d only been here three months when I got a callback. I was so excited, I couldn’t believe how lucky I was. Everyone knew he was one of the best. Some of the top names worked with him in the past and they all went on to make it big here.”
I ran my hand soothingly up and down her back and tried to imagine it. “He was really nice at first, kinda like an uncle. I didn’t see anything wrong with the late night calls and no one ever said anything. I mean he’s been in the business for over twenty years and no one even gave me a hint. It was only after…after, that I started hearing the whispers.”
“We were in the middle of shooting. We were on location in Seattle, away from everyone and everything I knew. It had been a good day on set, everything just seemed to be going really well. Everyone got together at the end of the night since we weren’t working the next day.”
“People were drinking, I think some were doing drugs, but I didn’t.” She rushed to tell me that last part like I didn’t already know. “He offered me a soda when I said I didn’t drink. Even joked about it, about how young and innocent I was. Said he hoped this town didn’t change me once I became a star.”
She sniffed into my shirt and I knew the horror was coming by the way she shook. I hugged her closer, trying my damnedest to give her some of my strength and gritted my teeth so I didn’t say any of what was going through my head.