“He hit me the first time on our honeymoon. He was very sorry, but I’d insulted him, upset him by flaunting myself on the beach. And men had been ogling me.”
“So the abuse started at the beginning of your marriage and continued. Escalated.”
“Yes. It doesn’t matter now. It’s over now, isn’t it? I just want to forget.”
“You’re not going to.” Eve said it flatly. “On the night you were attacked. You came upstairs with Strazza. Was he pleased with you?”
“No.” She brushed away a tear. “No, he wasn’t. People had stayed too long, and I had failed to be a good hostess. A good hostess knows how to end an evening. He gripped my arm so hard, and I knew he would hurt me, but the devil was in the room.
“Please don’t make me say all that again.”
“Kyle Knightly, disguised as a devil, struck Strazza, assaulted you. Is this correct?”
“I don’t know who it was. But if you say that’s who it was … Yes. Please. I don’t want to think about it.”
“You remember more than you did. You lied to me when I asked you yesterday. If you lie it’s going to eat at you and eat at you. You won’t forget, and you won’t have a prayer of moving on. Knightly restrained you, then your husband. Is this correct?”
“Yes, but he let me go again when my husband was tied up, after he struck him in the face. He let me go, he held a knife—no, it’s not a knife, it’s smaller and silver and sharp—to my husband’s throat and told me he’d slit it unless I took off my clothes. Slow, he said. Take them off slow. I didn’t want to. I wanted to run, but Anthony said: ‘You stupid bitch.’ And I did. I took off my clothes, and I laid back in bed because the devil said to. He tied me again, and he slapped me, hard, hard, and he raped me. The lights were red, and there was smoke. I think.
“He said it was hell. Fire and brimstone, sulfur and smoke. He cut me and he hit me, and he raped me, and he laughed. He left us after he hurt my husband again, after Anthony told him the combinations to the safes.”
“What happened when he was gone? When it was just you and Strazza.”
“My husband raged at me. I was a whore, a weak, filthy whore. I’d let the devil have sex with me. I’d said it was the best I’d ever had. I tried to tell my husband the devil forced me, had said he’d kill me if I didn’t say it, but my husband was so angry. There was blood on his face, his face was red and black, like the devil. Then he came back, the devil came back and he hurt Anthony again, and he raped me again. He took a pill, and raped me again, and choked me. He’d choke me, like my husband would, and I’d go away, and I’d come back and he’d rape me again. My husband, the devil. Again. Why doesn’t he kill me, why isn’t it over? And he went away again. I think. I think. It’s mixed up.”
Her eyes brimmed over. “It’s mixed up.”
“What do you remember? He went away again. Then?”
“He went away, and my husband was like a madman. He broke the chair, he beat and beat and the chair broke. His face, red and black, and he was standing in that red light, and I thought, Help me. Help me. It hurt, my throat, when I tried to talk, but I said: ‘Help me, Anthony. Hurry. He’ll come back.’”
“Did he help you?”
“He was on top of me. My husband. The devil. His face. My husband.”
Pale as ice, Daphne pressed her hands to her temples. “Now my husband’s the devil, and he’s choking me, hitting me. He said he’d kill me for this. Kill the whore. Worthless whore. I was going away, finally going away. This time I wouldn’t come back. He’d end it this time. But he jumped away. And the devils, they fought. I saw in the light, through the smoke, the one struck the other with the vase, and the lilies scattered.”
Her eyes, glassy now, stared through Eve.
“I hate the smell of them. I had to have lilies because my husband said, and I hated the smell. They were scattered on the floor and the devil—no, no, my husband was on the floor. Blood, so much blood. Then the other, he laughed, and he came back. He raped me again. It didn’t matter. It just didn’t matter. I couldn’t feel it. I couldn’t feel anymore.
“Then it was quiet. So quiet. Dark and quiet, and I got up. It must have been a terrible dream. I didn’t feel anything. But I could smell the lilies and the blood, and he was on the floor. I had to help him because he’s my husband. Anthony? He got up. Blood on his face. He hit me.”