The Body Reader (Detective Jude Fontaine Mysteries, #1)

by Anne Frasier

Maybe that’s why women often didn’t report abuse. Forget about their fear of retaliation or their fear of tomorrow or their fear of being alone or their love of their abuser. Once it was out there, once the facts were hung on the line for the world to see, that abuse robbed the victim of dignity and the victim suffered twice. Once at the hands of the abuser, and once at the hands of the world.

“I wonder why we always feel disdain for our old selves,” Uriah said. “We should feel thankful. We should appreciate the people we used to be rather than being ashamed of them.”

“Kindness is a weakness, especially today, especially for a cop,” he said, not answering her question. He was right. If she’d only been tougher, stronger . . . “But kindness is a trait we can’t lose.” She frowned, concentrating. “It might be one of the most important parts of being human. Maybe even more important than love.”

“I wonder how much of a person is simply fabricated by others,” she said. “And think about this: None of us see the same person in the exact same way. We bring ourselves into the equation. So an individual is never really an individual.”

She used to find it frustrating when victims refused to press charges against a person who deserved to be put away. Now she understood their thinking. Acknowledgment brought it back. It meant there was no walking away. No starting over.

Once any one of us has a homicide or two or three under our belts, aren’t we all existing and working with a new understanding of just what the world is capable of? And aren’t we all at least a little closer to a meltdown?