- Sebastian -
er eyes filled with tears, and she covered her nose and mouth with one hand, her face twisting underneath.
“Your turn.”
“Did you mean that?” she asked, her glassy eyes searching mine. “When you said that to her?”
“I don’t say things I don’t mean.”
She pursed her lips.
“At the time, I meant it with everything.”
“At the time,” she repeated.
“Your turn.”
She took a deep breath.
What could possibly have her this anxious after what she’d just unloaded?
“Pillow of trust?”
I looked around. “There are no pillows in here.” I reached for the photo on the desk and angled it so it faced us both better. “Labrador of trust.”
Her eyes smiled. “Is that a thing?”
“Of course,” I said. “Besides, this is a doctor’s office. Confidentiality is built into the walls.”
“So whatever I say stays between us?”
“And my dad, apparently.”
“No,” she said. “Just us. And the Lab.”
“You’re really freaking me out now, Lil.”
“Sorry.”
“Just tell me what he said already.”
She glanced down at her lap and then up at me and then at the stupid dog picture and then back at me. “He said he never told anyone my secret. He said he would take it to his grave.”
My mind scrambled. “Wait—” I shook my head. “My dad knew you were an escort?”
The whites of her eyes grew. “No. God, no. I’d really like him to never know that. He would be so disappointed in me.”
“Then what the hell was he talking about? What does he know that—?”
“Please calm down.”
“I’m all out of calm, Lil.”
“Your dad knows why I left.”
I furrowed my brow. “What?”
“He was there the night my dad died.”
“I know. He ran over when he heard the shots while my Mom called for help.”
“No. I mean, he knows what happened.”
“You’re going to have to spell it out for me because I’m about to lose my shi—”
“I killed my dad, Sebastian. It was me. I fired those shots.”
My lungs collapsed until I felt heavy all over, and I waited for her to take it back, but she just sat there, stewing in the dark whispers she’d spilled between us. “You couldn’t have.”
She shrugged. “The fact that everyone believed that—the fact that your dad made them believe it—saved my life.”
I blinked at her.
“I’d be in jail if it weren’t for him,” she said. “And who knows where Paige would be.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. Why the hell would you do that?”
“Because I was tired of the abuse, Sebastian. Because I’d been tired of it for years.”
The abuse?!
“And when he started touching Paige in the ways he’d tired of touching me, I snapped.”
“When you say touching…?”
She cast her eyes down, and the truth hit me like a truck. I lunged for the wastebasket beside the desk and retched into it, throwing up the contents of my stomach and not nearly enough of the black hatred stewing inside me. When there was nothing left, I set the lid back on and rinsed my mouth out in the sink in the corner, spitting until I couldn’t taste anything but water. Then I washed my hands, dried them with some paper towels, and sat back down across from her, exhausted.
Her pale face was resigned.
“I’m so sorry.” My head spun with the inadequacy of the words. “Not just about that,” I said, waving towards the corner. “But about—”
She nodded. “I know.”
I took a deep breath and glanced back at the garbage can.
“I didn’t mean to kill him,” she said, wringing her hands. “That was never my intention. I just wanted him to get away from her. But when I finally got him to leave her alone, he came after me, and I was afraid of what he might do if—” Her own gasp cut her off.
I clenched my fists.
“So I pulled the trigger. Because I was afraid. And in that moment, it didn’t occur to me that there might be anything scarier than what he would’ve done if I’d let him take the gun from me.”
My mouth turned to sandpaper, and I dug my nails into my palms.
“By the time your dad charged through the door, it was too late.”
“What did he do?”
“He asked me what happened, and I told him. And I told him why I did it. I don’t remember exactly what I said. All I remember is being surprised that he believed me, that he didn’t even raise his voice.” She wiped the wet streaks from her cheeks. “Then he told me to be brave, and he told me a new story about what happened.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“A story about the man he saw running from the house when he was on his way over, about the argument he heard happening between two men. He told me I’d stayed in my room because I heard the yelling, too, but I didn’t know what was said because both men were drunk.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. My dad was the law. This could’ve destroyed his career, his reputation. The fact that he did this for her was too much for me to process.
“Then he made me repeat the new story back to him, and he made me promise I’d stick to it. Made me understand that my life depended on it.” Her eyes darted around like she was seeing the scene right in front of her. “And the whole time he was wiping down the gun. I can’t remember what he did with it.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, my voice cracking.
“Which part?”
“That he was hurting you.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. Because he said he’d kill me if I told anyone? Because he said it was what God wanted? What my mother wanted? Because he called me names I didn’t want to remember, much less speak out loud. Why does anyone put up with any kind of abuse?”
“But the pain you endured on your own. I could’ve helped. I could’ve…at least not touched you when it was probably the last thing you needed.”
“No.” She leaned forward and laid a hand on my knee. “Please don’t apologize. You were my strength, Sebastian. You were the reason I knew that what he did to me wasn’t love. Your touch was never anything but healing and good and kind and wanted.”
My throat closed up.
“Don’t you see? If it weren’t for your love, he would’ve broken me. Your love is why I’m a survivor today instead of a statistic. Really. If you only take one thing away from this conversation, please let it be the understanding that you are the best thing that ever happened to me.”