Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 129207 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 646(@200wpm)___ 517(@250wpm)___ 431(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129207 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 646(@200wpm)___ 517(@250wpm)___ 431(@300wpm)
Ezra catches my hands, holding them too tight as he captures my stare, shaking his head in confusion. “What are you talking about?” he says, refusing to let me pull my hands free. “Who’s him? What happened to you, Rae?”
I shake my head, my heart breaking at the look in his eyes. “Don’t,” I cry, desperately trying to pull away. “Don’t make me say it.”
“Raleigh, please,” he begs, his voice breaking as he pulls on my hands and brings me closer, his warmth swallowing me whole. “I can’t take it anymore. Please, let me help you.”
I sob against his chest as his thumbs brush back and forth across my knuckles. “Rae,” he pleads in a soft whisper that shatters my soul, his broken heart just as torn as mine.
Lifting my gaze, I meet his haunted stare, and as tears pool in my eyes and race down my cheeks, my bottom lip quivers. It’s now or never. I need to tell him, need to get it out in the open or I’ll never have a chance to finally move past it. I need that chance to heal, and I won’t ever do it if I don’t have him.
“My father,” I finally say, feeling the weight of the words crush me. “You and Axel . . . You were my protectors, and you left me to the vile hands of my father.”
His hands go slack, and I instinctively pull away from him as he holds my stare, putting the rest of the pieces together himself. “No,” he breathes, horror in his dark eyes. “No.” But he sees the truth in my stare, sees the pain, the anguish, the fear. The nights I would scream in agony, the days I would stare at the kitchen knives and contemplate slicing the serrated blade across my wrists.
He sees it all.
He reaches for me again, but I pull away from his touch. “Rae.”
“Don’t,” I cry. “I . . . I can’t. Not yet.”
“Okay,” he says slowly.
“Just . . . I need to be alone.”
He shakes his head, stepping toward me, but I hastily back up again, my back against the closet shelves. “Rae.”
“Please, Ezra.” I sob, breaking down again. “Please, just leave. I can’t talk about it yet. I can’t . . . breathe. I can’t—”
“Okay,” he finally says, crouching down. He reaches out and cups the side of my face, and I instantly lean into his touch. “I’m sorry. I never should have pushed you like that. You’re safe. I got you, Rae.”
I nod and he stands to his full height before finally backing out of the small room, and the moment he’s gone, I allow myself to break, falling to pieces on the floor of Axel’s closet.
27
Raleigh
By the time I’m able to peel myself off the floor of Axel’s closet, darkness is flooding the house, and I pad through the long hallways, trying to remember how to find my way back downstairs.
I need to find Ezra. It’s time we talk.
I can’t drop a bomb like that and expect him to be okay with it. He’s probably halfway through a bottle of whiskey by now and considering washing it down with a cocktail of drugs.
I’ve avoided telling him for so long, not because I believe he would look at me any differently, but because I know he would shoulder the blame, just as I unfairly have done over the years, and that’s not a burden I want him to bear.
Making my way downstairs, I find nothing but a sea of darkness. Moonlight shines in through the big windows, and I search the walls for the light switches while wondering if I’m wasting my time. A home like this probably has a control pad on a device for the lights, not cheap light switches like we mere mortals are so used to.
Making my way to the kitchen, I pause when I find a familiar silhouette on the couch in the living room. He’s hunched over, his elbows braced against his knees with his head hanging low between his shoulders, and the sight breaks my heart.
Moving toward the living room, I lean against the wall, gazing in at him. “I thought you’d left,” I murmur, keeping my tone low.
Ezra lifts his head, his broken stare coming to mine. “I’m never leaving you again, Rae.”
He holds my stare before patting the empty space on the couch beside him, and I don’t hesitate to stride into the living room and curl up next to him. I pull my knees up to my chest and lean into him as he wraps me in his arms, but deciding it’s not enough, he lifts me right into his lap until I’m straddled over him.
I curl into his chest, resting my head against his shoulder as I breathe him in while he simply rubs his hand up and down my back in soothing circles. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.