"What stopped her?" "My foster brother Todd
Corey was dismissed and
Todd was immediately called. At seven o'clock at night, Noah drove him home while Todd got the call in his cell phone. He was out with his thirteen-year-old girlfriend.
Their relationship, it hadn't become sexual yet. Todd was no longer a virgin, but since sex caused him his biggest heartbreak, he thought that dating a younger girl might motivate him to abstain for a while. He was right. His younger girlfriend was still a virgin, and she wouldn't have sex with Todd until Todd saw that she was ready and asked her to. She didn't know what had happened to him, so she didn't know how long this moment would take to arrive. They were eating ice cream together at the world's most popular ice cream parlor chain, in a huge establishment near Altamonte Mall. Todd pulled his phone out of his pocket, lifted the flap and answered it. "Hello."
"Is this Mr. Todd Rumsfeld?"
Surprised, Todd answered, "Yes, it is."
"I'm calling from the Coral Gables Police Department regarding a sexual assault case against your foster brother, Corey Spears."
Todd was astonished. He thought that Corey would never speak up. He had no idea that Grace was in jail. "Yes, I know everything about that, and I'm ready and open for questioning any time that you want." Grace was the first woman in his life. He was the boy that Grace was cheating on Rob with. Grace had broken his heart and he was willing to make her pay. He would do whatever that he could to make sure that she paid her dues.
Smiling, Officer Trent said, "Very well, would you be here tomorrow first thing at eight thirty in the morning?"
"I certainly would. I don't want to tell you what you want to know by phone because I don't know who is listening to our conversation."
"Nobody's listening," said Officer Trent, "I know it when I'm talking to someone on an intervened phone."
"Oh, good," said Todd. "Still, I want to wait until
tomorrow to interview you because I don't know what you're doing right now and I don't want to ruin your fun."
"This wouldn't have ruined my fun. On the contrary, it would've made it more fun. Still I thank you for your consideration. I don't want my girlfriend to know about this," he whispered, "because she loves Corey and I don't want to make her worry."
"I understand," said Officer Trent. "I will see you tomorrow morning, Todd."
"I'll see you then," said Todd. "Bye," and hung up.
"What was that all about?" said the girl.
"It was about Corey." "What happened to
Corey?"
"Nothing, someone called to ask me questions about him." "Who did?"
"I have to tell you because I think that because of this matter your relationship with him has been affected."
"What happened?" Her curiosity exploded all of a sudden. "What did I do wrong?"
"You didn't do anything wrong. You couldn't have been nicer and sweeter to him. The reason why Corey has been rejecting your demonstrations of affection is because another woman, an older woman, she showed him demonstrations of affection that he didn't want."
Claire gasped. "Who was
it?"
"It was Grace, my
mother's best friend."
"It was Grace? She's been around my little brother, oh, my God! My little brother could've gotten raped!" She got up and placed the strap of her purse on her shoulder. Fortunately, she'd finished her ice cream, but Todd hadn't finished his. He took his ice cream, ran to the car, and they got in, simultaneously, closed the doors, fastened their seatbelts, and Todd started the car that he was driving with his learner's permit, and drove off in a matter of seconds.
Twenty minutes later, Todd and Claire arrived at Todd's house. Claire's little brother, Ray, he was in his room, watching a children's DVD. He was only six years old. Todd and Claire ran inside the house, ran the living room, and ran the hallway straight to his room. Without knocking, Todd opened the door and made his way in. "Ray," he said as he ran up to Ray and then placed both hands on Ray's shoulder and sat on the bed right behind him, "I need you to answer me a couple of questions man to man, ok?"
Ray turned around, looked at him and said, "Sure."
"Has a woman ever touched you in an inappropriate way?"
Claire was sitting on the bed, astonished, looking in Ray's eyes. "What do you mean?" said Ray.
"I'm asking you if a woman has touched you or kissed you even when you didn't want her to. I'm asking if a woman ever touched you even though you said no."
"Well," said Ray and got up and looked up straight at Todd, "she kissed me, but she said that there was nothing wrong with it. She said that this was the way that humans showed affection to each other."
"How did she kiss you?" "She kissed me in the
mouth and she kissed my neck, and she kissed me inside my pants."
Claire gasped and yelled, "Oh, my God!"
"Did she do anything
else?"
"No. She said it wasn't the
time to do anything else and that we would do what we were doing step by step."
"Did she ask you not to tell anyone, make you swear, or threaten to hurt you if you told anyone?"
"No, because if she had done that, I would've known that it was wrong, and I would've told my mom."
Todd looked back at Claire and asked her, "Didn't your dad or your mom ever tell Ray that this was wrong?"
"No," said Claire, crying. "She told me that he was too young for us to talk to him about sex, that we had to wait until he asked us about it." Todd went up to Claire, sat by her and gave her a hug as she cried bitterly in his arms. Ray joined them in the hug and cried with them.
Chapter 32
It wasn't time to report the crime yet. They didn't know that Grace was in jail, so to them, the danger of her resurging and doing harm to Ray was imminent. Even if they didn't want to, they had to keep quiet. Ray was scared. He knew that he was naive in thinking that excessive affectionate activity with an adult was wrong, and he didn't know how to fix it. His mom couldn't find out because if she did, she'd think that he wanted all of it and start looking at him as a pervert. He didn't want his mother to have to protect his baby sister from him. He was still in his bedroom, talking to Claire and Todd.
"What am I going to do?" "What do you have to do
anything about?"
"I have to figure out a way to solve this problem with Grace and my mom."
Caressing Ray's hair, Todd said, "You don't have to do anything about this situation. All that you have to do is speak up."
"Speak up?" said Ray, horrified. "I can't! She might kill me!"
in jail." jail?"