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with Don coming into the bed and fondling her and all that bleeding. Vonlee was concerned that she didn’t know Billie Jean and might have trusted her more than she should have. Vonlee was also asking herself a question: Why is Billie Jean so interested in me now, all of a sudden? Vonlee had not heard from her aunt in a decade, save for a phone call here and there. Why now, at this point, was Billie Jean so crazy to have Vonlee in her life?
    â€œI don’t want to go back there,” Vonlee told her other aunt.
    There was more to it than Billie Jean, Don and their marital and health issues. Vonlee still had that guy who’d signed over his house waiting for her. She wanted to end it completely with him, but she’d left without dissolving the relationship for good. So there were personal issues at stake here for Vonlee. She knew if she went back to Michigan, she’d be closer to Chicago and eventually go back to the penthouse and likely start dating the guy again. Temptation was the root of most evil, Vonlee knew. Seeing him might ultimately lead to her getting back into the escort service business and then the drinking and partying all night. She was exhausted just thinking about it. The way she saw it now: Out of sight, out of mind. Being back home felt good.
    Billie Jean wasn’t about to let Vonlee go, however. She actually came back into Maryville and tracked Vonlee down. Her son was doing better. Don was being a pain in the ass. Billie Jean pleaded with Vonlee that she needed her support.
    â€œCome back, please.”
    â€œI don’t know, Aunt Billie. . . .”
    â€œYou’ve got to come back with me, if not for nothing else but to settle things with [your man],” Billie Jean said. “You cannot just leave him hanging in the air, Vonlee. That ain’t right.”
    â€œBillie Jean had a fit over this,” Vonlee later recalled. She rode Vonlee, following her around Tennessee for a few days, until Vonlee caved in and agreed to go back to Michigan and stay with her and Don.
    Back now in Troy, Billie Jean, Don and Vonlee were once again a quasi-family. Billie Jean’s son was recovering, doing much better. Billie Jean was dragging Vonlee along to the casinos again. They were drinking and staying out all night.
    Just like that, Vonlee was back to square one.
    Vonlee still had not said anything to her aunt about Don fondling her breasts in bed that night. She thought Don did not even remember what happened. Yet, with Vonlee being back inside the Rogers household again, Don picked up his persistence that he and Vonlee get together. He became more aggressive and sexually explicit, according to Vonlee’s memory.
    â€œWe’d be eating dinner, Billie would walk out of the room and Don would play footsies with me under the table and make eyes with me,” Vonlee said later.
    The passes continued as the end of July came around. It wasn’t overbearing to the point where Vonlee couldn’t manage, but more of a nuisance. Don would say things and make gestures. He’d grope at Vonlee. He was harmless in the sense that Vonlee never felt threatened that he’d do something forcibly. But Vonlee was constantly asking herself what in the world was she doing in that house. Why was she there? What purpose did staying at their house, subjected to this type of behavior, serve? Was it simply for the partying?
    Vonlee sat her aunt down one day. “Billie Jean, listen to me, I have to leave. Don is becoming too much for me.” Vonlee explained to her aunt that she had awoken one night back when Billie Jean was in California to find Don fondling her breasts. It was too much. Vonlee said she thought maybe he was just drunk, but now she knew he was seriously making passes at her.
    Billie Jean’s face pinched. Anger arose.
    â€œHe plays footsies with me under the damn table, Billie . . . ,” Vonlee said again.
    No sooner had Vonlee got those words out, than Billie