Of Devils & Angels

Aftermath

1:30 a.m.

Meryl's suite

By now Leslee had called in with the details of the hospital they were supposed to go to, an obscure little place with good ratings though. They couldn't let this get out, they'd sue the hotel later. The police had been notified and would meet them there in plain clothes of course. It would be a police case alright, but a hush hush one.

They'd have to leave very discreetly and Leslee had made sure of all that.

As much as it hurt Brigitte to tell Meryl she had to tell her to not take a bath because they'd have to do the rape kit on her at the hospital. She asked her to put on a fresh pair of clothes and leave behind the ones she had worn to be bagged for evidence. There were already officers ready to cordon off the room as a crime scene by the time they were leaving.

Wrapping a scarf around herself and disguising herself in a large hat Meryl and Brigitte left in the inconspicuous car arranged for them in the wee hours of the night, the woman still shivering from the aftermath.

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At the hospital only a small group had been let on in who this mystery patient was. Meryl was doing things almost in a haze now....changing into the paper gown she emerged from behind the curtain to be confronted by Brigitte and two other women, one being the doctor. The other woman was a pretty looking middle aged woman, probably a German, and she spoke up in her heavily accented English

"Mrs. Gummer I'm here to collect a statement from you and take photos."Meryl almost felt her bile rise up, she felt like a scientific specimen, constructed only to be studied and then discarded, never feeling more degraded.

The woman sensing her shame, went towards her "Okay I'm going to hold your hand now" saying it aloud to caution the woman before taking hold of her hand, "I know it's the worst thing I can ask you do, but it needs to be done because we need to find this man and punish him. If you want your friend to stay she can or it can just be you and I." the woman said sincerely.

"I understand...just you and me is fine." not wanting Brigitte to see the horror that was her body."Call me Meryl..please." Something in the soothing voice of this woman made her feel safe in her company.

"Well then, I'm Maria." she smiled sadly and then turned to the other two women and gestured for them to leave. Brigitte left a little unwillingly after telling the woman "Please stop if she asks you to."

The woman nodded and closed the door on them. As she turned to Meryl again she saw the woman had fresh tears in her eyes. Maria slowly guided her to the bed and decided to not offer any false platitudes but get to the point directly.

"Generally I take the evidence first and then the photos, would you be okay with that?" Meryl only nodded.

"Okay, so I'll have to switch on the tape recorder and ask you a few questions, think you can manage that?" she again nodded slowly and opened her mouth to say something, but closed it again.

"What is it Meryl?"

"Can you hold my hand. I just..I.." and before she could finish her sentence, Maria had taken off her work gloves and was holding her hand. It was against work protocol to be friendly with the victim but there was something so vulnerable and devastating in the other woman's eyes that Maria couldn't resist.

As the woman switched on the tape recorder, she saw a shift in the air and saw Meryl change from the vulnerable woman to the actress narrating a story as if it had happened to someone else, her voice infused with something similar to empathy, sorrow and other things but not pity. However all the while as she explained the gory details of her attack the endless stream of tears did not cease for a moment, she wondered how one person could hold so much sorrow. By only just listening to it Maria had goose bumps, she shuddered at how bad it actually must have been.

She stopped the recorder once Meryl had stopped talking and then freely reached out to wipe off the tears on the beautiful woman's face with her hand.

"You know I heard you were here, I wanted to go see you but I never imagined I'd have to see you like this." Maria said not being able to contain her feelings.

Meryl smiled sadly, "Yes, yes, who knew." and looked towards the ground.

"Meryl, you will have to take off your gown now." Maria said without missing a beat but softly caressed the other woman's hand not wanting to scare her as she looked terrified even at the suggestion.

"Hey look, I'm not going to hurt you, I just need to take a few pictures for evidence, and I'll try to get done as quickly as possible. I'm sorry; I hope you didn't have to do this." Maria said feeling hollow at the shallowness of her words.

Meryl simply took off her gown without a word and sat back in only her black bra and panties. Maria almost visibly shuddered at the mutilation on her body but beyond all that was probably the most beautiful naked female form she'd ever come across.

Her black underwear contrasted with the lily white of her skin marked at places by the blue, black and red of bruises and cuts. Her bra covered full breasts which were marred by finger prints turning blue-black. Her swan like smooth neck and collarbones were covered by the imprints of a full hand. Below it her beautifully shaped hour glass midsection was mostly unmarked except for a thin trail of congealed blood which ran down the length of her firm torso from below her breasts to her navel. Maria hadn't seen more sculpted legs and thighs in her life on a woman in her 60's and she almost cursed herself for having thoughts of being envious of it when the poor woman had faced such a predicament, but her vision soon fell to her inner thighs which were severely bruised and she had to tear her eyes away fearing she'd retch. They were badly bruised and had trails of dried blood on them, a tell-tale signal of everything that had happened.

She wondered that it could only be a monster who could do this to someone as wonderful as her, how could someone have the audacity to mar such perfection? She suddenly felt an immensely strong wave of protection for this fragile looking woman and she promised to herself that she would somehow make sure the man who had the courage to even touch this Goddess would get his due.

She decides to push her feelings back and do her job instead and quickly starts taking pictures of the injuries. Once she's done, she keeps her camera back and stupidly says "All done." and looks up to the woman's face.

Meryl is looking at the ground with downcast eyes and sitting with her arms wrapped around her body now that the photos are taken. Maria senses some form of shame in the position she's sitting in.

She moves towards the woman again and turns up her chin with her hands softly. Meryl's eyes are still brimming with tears and she can't seem to look into Maria's eyes.

"You're beautiful Meryl, don't forget that." And as soon as Maria says it Meryl closes her eyes as the tears roll down the elegant slope of her cheekbones.

"You are."

"I can still feel him on my skin." Meryl sobs.

"I know sweetheart and whatever you do will not make that feeling go away, initially, so don't scrub your skin raw even if you want to. Give it time, time will heal everything, I promise. And love, I've heard you have a lot of it in your life. Meryl you're a survivor and he can't break you, you can't allow him to break you. You can't let him win. Say with me, 'I'm beautiful'". Maria encourages.

Meryl hesitates for a moment, wipes her tears and says in her still broken but somewhat strong voice, 'I'm beautiful.'

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TBC

Not so proud of this chapter but tried to get it up as soon as I could

Also I have a question to ask which is also some sort of a spoiler-In the next chapter the doctor runs some tests and finds out a medically impossible (almost) detail about her for a woman her age. Get the hint? Adding it would make the fic a little less believable but then all of this is make believe. So do you think I should have her be preggers haha? The baby is of course Don's.

Thanks for voting and commenting!!