Page 74 of The Girls of Pearl Harbor
Grace was numb as she stood, her eyes glued to the scene in front of her, feeling as if she were floating above it all watching from somewhere else. She should have cried at Teddy to stop, or maybe she should have run, but she didn’t. She couldn’t.
And then it was over.
‘Grace?’ Teddy called, stumbling toward her, away from Peter’s unmoving body.
There was a cut above his eye, and his hands, open and hanging at his sides, were dripping with blood that she wasn’t even sure was his own. Grace sobbed and wrapped her arms tight around herself, not wanting Teddy to see her like this. She shut her eyes, not even wanting to look at him.
‘Grace?’ he whispered, and when she was brave enough to open her eyes, she found him standing in front of her.
Only his eyes were nothing like Peter’s. Teddy’s were soft and warm; Teddy’s were filled with worry as he lifted his arms and slowly enveloped her, drawing her against him.
She collapsed into Teddy, his arms the only thing stopping her from slipping to the ground, clinging to him as guttural noises escaped her lips. Teddy didn’t say anything, didn’t move; he just held her as she cried her eyes out, terrified of what could have happened.
A few seconds later and she would have been raped. Her virginity stolen from her without a second thought by her attacker. A few minutes later? Would he have found her covered in blood in the dirt? Would Peter have kept on attacking her or left her for dead? Discarded her like rubbish and not bothered to look back? Or would he have helped her up and pretended like nothing had happened?
She shuddered deeper into Teddy.
‘I’m going to take you back,’ he whispered, his lips against her hair as she refused to let go. ‘We need to get out of here.’
She peeked past Teddy, her cheek to his shoulder, and saw Peter twitching, his arms moving as he moaned. More tears slid down her cheeks.
‘I ... I ... ,’ she stammered. ‘I can’t.’
She wanted to run, but her legs were like lead, so heavy she couldn’t seem to move, her knees knocking.
‘Here,’ he said, unbuttoning his jacket. He quickly took it off and wrapped it around her. She clung to the front of it and tried to button it, but her fingers fumbled, and he took over, gently moving her hands away and doing up each button for her.
She wanted to say thank you, but the words never came.
‘Come here,’ Teddy muttered, pulling her closer and bending slightly. ‘I’m going to pick you up, okay? Don’t be scared.’
She nodded and let him scoop her up as if she were a child. This would be the second time he’d carried her to safety, the second time he’d put her before everything else to save her.
‘I’m not going to hurt you,’ he said. ‘I promise I won’t hurt you.’
She wanted to tell him that she knew that—that the only man she was scared of was lying on the ground behind him—but she didn’t. Instead she tucked her face into his chest and cried as he strode away from what had started out as the best night of her life and ended as one of her worst.
‘Grace,’ Teddy whispered.
She blinked, her eyes sticky from all the tears, realizing she’d been asleep.
‘Grace,’ he whispered again. ‘I need you to tell me which one is your tent.’
She cleared her throat, the words like glue as she peered around her, clinging to Teddy’s shirt. She was disorientated as she looked around in the dark, the moon the only light. Grace saw the toilet block then and lifted one hand to point.
‘There,’ she croaked. ‘Last tent, down the end.’
Teddy started walking again, and she shut her eyes, feeling every movement of his body. Her eyes flew open then as she saw Peter’s face, as she felt the painful grip of his fingers into her skin, his hot breath as he tried to push inside of her.
‘Stop,’ she whispered.
Teddy kept walking, his arms tightening around her. Had she been muttering in her sleep? Did he know that she didn’t mean for him to stop walking?
After another few minutes, the heavy thump of his boots on the dry, packed earth stopped, and she inhaled, her nose congested from all the crying. Teddy gently set her down, his hand lingering on her arm as if he wasn’t sure she’d be able to stand on her own.
‘I don’t know what to say,’ she said, eyes downcast, not wanting to look at him now that the enormity of what had happened, what he’d seen, hit her. She was drowning in the embarrassment, mortified at what had happened.
‘Look at me,’ he said, taking a step closer. He hooked his thumb beneath her chin to force her to raise her eyes.
