"Let's follow Dr. Callahan, shall we?"
Lisl said nothing. She felt cold and sick as she sat with her arms folded across her chest while Rafe followed Brian through town.
"Dr. Callahan has a heavy foot," Rafe said.
Lisl remembered Brian's love of fast driving. A trip across town with him was an invitation to whiplash.
"You're not exactly a turtle yourself."
"Just trying to keep up with the good doctor."
They followed him through the black section at the southern end of town—"Downtown Browntown" as the students called it—and then into a development of luxury custom homes. The sign at the entrance read Rolling Oaks.
"What on earth is a Rolling Oak?" Rafe said.
Brian's car zipped into a short asphalt driveway and screeched to a halt before a two-car garage attached to a new two-story colonial. The garage door opened automatically and he eased his car inside.
"Nice house," Rafe said. "A 'starter home,' if you plan to be wealthy. Could have been yours."
"I don't want anything of his. I told you that."
"He's got a custom home, you've got a garden apartment."
Lisl realized she was angry—very angry. But somehow admitting that would allow Brian another victory. So she said nothing.
Rafe looked at her a long time, then said, "Doesn't seem fair, does it?"
"Life isn't fair, Rafe. If you expect fairness from life you'll go crazy long before you die."
"Excellent!" he said. "Couldn't have said it better myself. Fairness is a human construct. Life doesn't supply it—we do. That's why I brought you here. Now that we know where Dr. Brian Callahan lives, we are going to create a little fairness in his neck of the woods."
Rafe's smile frightened Lisl as he chirped the tires and roared past Brian's closing garage door.
They had a light dinner, and Rafe asked her to stay over. They had just removed the last of their clothing when Rafe pulled a black leather belt out of the drawer and handed it to her.
"What's this for?" Lisl asked.
She uncoiled it in her hands. It was long, close to four feet in length, and two inches wide.
"I want you to use it on me." -,.:
Lisl felt a sudden tightening inside.
"What do you mean, 'use it'?"
"I want you to hit me with it."
Her stomach turned. "This is sick."
"What's sick?"
"Look, I love you, Rafe, but I can't get with this masochism thing of yours."
His eyes suddenly blazed.
"My masochism thing? Lisl, you are the masochist! You've let people put you down, grind you down, chain you down until you've come to accept it as your state of being, your lot in life. Day-to-day life is a masochistic event for you, Lisl. You should be on top of the world yet you're content to live under its heel!"
"I don't want to hurt anyone, Rafe."
He stepped up and gently slipped his arms around her.
"I know you don't, Lisl. That's because you're a good person. But there's so much anger in you it's frightening. You seethe with it."
She knew he was right. She'd never been aware of her anger before. But she could not deny its existence now. She had discovered it since meeting Rafe—a boiling rage deep down inside her. And with each passing week she could feel it bubbling closer to the surface.
"I can't help that."
"Oh, but you can. And you will. You've got to let that anger go before you can be the new Lisl."
"I don't know if I want to be the new Lisl."
"Do you like the old Lisl?"
"No." God, no!
"Then don't be afraid to change."
His words were so soft, so soothing, the touch of his bare skin against hers was so warm. She floated on the sound of his voice.
"That's why I've led you through these little faceless crimes. They're symbolic. They let you bleed off the anger in tiny, harmless doses, and that brings you closer to the new Lisl. The same is true with the belt."
"No, I—"
"Listen to me, listen to me," he said softly, almost cooing in her ear. "It's a symbolic act. I don't want you to really hurt me. Believe me, I'm into pleasure, not pain. Just think of it as comparable to our little thefts—no one was really hurt. This will be much the same. You won't strike me with any force. You'll just lay the strap across my back arid pretend I'm Brian."
"Rafe, please…" She was beginning to feel sick.
"Where's the harm? You won't be hurting me and you won't be hurting Brian. You'll only be helping yourself. This is symbolic, remember? Symbolic."
"Okay," she said finally. "Symbolic."
She didn't want to do this, but if Rafe thought it was so important, she'd give it a try. And if it did release some of this anger in her—although she didn't see how it could—that would be to the good. And if nothing else, once she got through it they could make love. That was what she really wanted to do.
Rafe lay across the bed, facedown, the smooth skin of his bare back awaiting the belt.
"All right," he said. "Twenty strokes. Just think of me as Brian and slap it across my back."
Feeling silly, Lisl raised the belt and let its length fall onto Rafe's back.
He laughed. "Come on, Lisl. That was wimpy. This is Brian here. The guy you loved, the guy you trusted enough to marry."
Lisl swung again and put just a little more into it.
"Is that the best you can do? Lisl, this is the guy who was probably cheating on you during your engagement. And you know from the divorce hearings that he was putting the moves on his female fellow med students the week you got back from your honeymoon."
She swung harder this time.
"There you go. Just imagine I'm the guy who let you work for him all day to help earn his tuition, and then while you were out taking a night course would sneak a little chippy into your apartment and fuck her right in your own bed."
Lisl remembered the savage look on Brian's face when he'd told her that. The belt made a loud slap against Rafe's back when she swung this time. She swung again, even harder.
Slap!
"Good! Here's the guy who took you in marriage not as his wife but as his beast of burden, his meal ticket."
Slap!
"And when he didn't need you anymore, he tossed you away like an old newspaper."
"Damn you!" Lisl heard herself say. Rage suffused her, clouded her vision as she swung the belt with everything she had. And again, over and over, until she saw red… on Rafe's back.
Blood. There was a deep gash across his back.
"Oh, my God!"
Suddenly the rage retreated, leaving her cold and sick and weak.
Did I do that? What's happening? This isn't me!
She dropped to her knees beside the bed.
"Oh, Rafe, I'm so sorry!"
He turned toward her. "Are you kidding? It's just a scratch. Come here."
He pulled her onto the bed beside him. She could see that he was excited. He began kissing her, warming her, chasing the cold and dread and doubt, building the heat within her until it burst into flame.
Afterward he held her close and stroked her hair.
"There. Don't you feel better?"
Lisl knew what he was referring to but didn't feel like talking about it.
"I always feel good after we make love."
"I meant with the belt. Didn't that leave you feeling a bit cleaner, refreshed?"
"No! How could I possibly feel good about hurting you like that?"
"Don't be silly. You didn't hurt me."
"You were bleeding!"
"A scratch."
"That was no scratch. Turn over and I'll show you."
Rafe rolled onto his stomach and presented his back to her.