Chapter 2 - The Three Days Nobody Was Supposed to Visit
Police separated everyone.
A paramedic checked Blythe first.
Her blood pressure was elevated. She was sore and weak, but there was no serious head injury. Arlo was examined carefully and showed no sign of harm.
Ellis stayed close enough that Blythe could see him.
He never touched Damon again.
Damon kept saying the same thing.
“I lost control.”
Then:
“I haven’t slept.”
Then:
“She grabbed me first.”
Blythe listened from the bed while a paramedic checked Arlo’s breathing.
Three different explanations.
None matched.
Damon was taken from the house while officers continued gathering statements. What would happen with charges would be decided through the normal process, they told Blythe.
Nobody promised her an instant outcome.
Ellis drove Blythe and Arlo to Northwestern Medicine Central DuPage Hospital for a fuller postpartum evaluation.
Only after Arlo was sleeping beside her did Blythe ask the question she had been carrying since the bedroom.
“How did you know to come?”
Ellis looked at his hands.
“Loretta called me.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
Blythe stared at him.
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“She asked me not to.”
“Why?”
“She said Damon was watching your phone.”
Blythe’s mouth went dry.
Damon had been handling her phone frequently since they came home.
He said she needed rest.
He answered texts for her.
He told visitors she was sleeping.
He canceled her friend Kara’s plan to bring dinner.
He told Ellis not to come until the weekend.
Blythe had been grateful.
Or she had tried to be.
She was exhausted, bleeding, sore, learning to nurse, and terrified she was already failing at motherhood.
Damon had made decisions because she could barely make them herself.
Ellis leaned closer.
“Loretta said I needed to see you in person.”
“What exactly did she report?”
“I don’t know all of it.”
“You told Damon she reported his abuse.”
“She did.”
“To who?”
“A hospital social worker. And she contacted the police afterward.”
Blythe stared at the sleeping baby.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
Ellis hesitated.
That frightened her.
“Dad.”
“Because Loretta said Damon had already been telling people you weren’t mentally well.”
Blythe stopped breathing for a second.
“What?”
“He told her you were having some kind of postpartum breakdown.”
“I’ve been home three days.”
“I know.”
“I haven’t even had time to have a breakdown.”
Ellis almost smiled.
Almost.
Then his expression tightened.
“He started saying it before Arlo was born.”
Blythe looked at him.
May you like
And suddenly Damon’s obsession with keeping visitors away no longer felt like concern for a tired new mother.
It felt like control of the witnesses.
