For the first time in her life she wasn't hungry. Every male that she passed on the street didn't fill her with the urge to drink from them. She no longer wanted to make them pay or make them suffer for what had happened to her. For the most part, she simply didn't care what happened to them. All she wanted was for them to just let her be.
She rounded the curve on the sidewalk that she was following and branched off it into the park. The day was sunny and she wanted to be alone. Her thoughts needed to be sorted out. It was time to move on.
She walked to the pond and sat down along the shoreline admiring the ducks that swam across it. This had been one of her and Jack's favor places to sit.
She glanced across the pond. Her mind traveled back in time to that summer, when they'd first fallen in love.
"Come on Danielle," teased Jack, twisting her hair between his fingers. "I kept my promise now you have to keep yours." His eyes sparkled with mischief.
"No way, Jack," Danielle remembered saying.
"There's no way I'm going to swim in the duck pond nude. It's a public place by the way." She tossed a yellow dandelion onto his chest and he picked it up twirling it between his fingers instead of her hair.
"A promise is a promise, Danielle," he whispered with a snicker. "You'd not want me to think you don't keep yours?" The yellow dandelion's head popped off and he brushed it off his chest. It landed on the ground beside him.
"Come on, Jack," she'd whispered in extreme embracement. "You've got to be joking."
She looked away trying to pretend she'd never heard him.
"Danielle," his deepening voice had whispered as he got up off the grass and tried to push her into the pond.
"Jack!" She'd screamed, as the edge looked dangerously near. He'd laughed and pulled her back toward the grass.
"Chicken!" he sang out as he picked up his shirt and pulled it back over his head hiding his blooming hairy chest from her eyes.
"Danielle," said a voice near her. "Danielle?" she heard it again, but she ignored it.
"Danielle," it's too cold out here to sit on the ground." Danny reached down and tried to get her to stand up. "I didn't mean to frighten you or make you drop back to those unhappy days. I know how difficult it is to be raped."
His fingers pressed into the fat of her arm and she stood. "How would you know?" she asked as she pushed her hair away from her face.
Danny didn't answer right away. Instead, he looked at her. She felt as if his eyes could look into her mind. He seemed to want to be part of her, and she didn't want that invasion. She didn't want to hurt him. She looked away in confusion.
"Danielle," he tried again, "please give us a chance." He stood beside her, unmoving. It was so cool out that his breath came out in steam. She looked at them like little voice bubbles in comic strips. They lasted just a few seconds and then vanished. They made Danielle think of little messages of desire.
"We've taken Josie in for questioning." He said. "The chances are looking pretty big that she is the sheriff's killer."
Danielle looked at Danny, and for the first time, she felt regret. "Why?" she asked.
"They were having an affair, "said Danny. "She liked nice things and her paycheck just didn't go that far," he replied. He held his hands together and blew into them for warmth.
"The neighbors heard them fighting a few nights before this happened. She wanted more money to sleep with him, and he said he just couldn't afford her prices." He glanced back up at her. A mist seemed to be forming over his eyes. "You know he was my uncle?"
"Your uncle?" she said, surprised.
"Yes," he replied, "that's why I said I'd take the case. Normally, they don't allow family members to get this close. But, in this case they allowed it. Only because I was working in a nearby town and knew most of the territory."
