“Honey, I told you, nothing is there.”
“Please,” she whispers in a broken tone.
I don’t know what the hell is going on but it’s scaring the fuck out of me. I drive to her now empty apartment and tell her I’m not leaving her here like this.
She gets out of the truck, walking woodenly and I rush to her, cupping her face in my hands.
She pushes my hands away. “I need time to think.”
“Honey, just tell me what’s going on and I’ll make it better.”
“You can’t. This will never get better.”
I grip her arms. “Did someone hurt you?”
“Someone hurt you.”
“I don’t understand.”
“My grandfather is the one who placed you in the Home,” she says flatly, her voice emotionless. “When people started asking questions about what was going on there, he covered up the truth. He was hiding the fact that he took my sister Valentina from there when she was a baby and had someone falsify a birth certificate.”
I can’t grasp what she’s saying. “What?”
“It was either my family’s reputation suffer or you suffer. My grandfather chose to let you suffer.”
“I still don’t understand.”
She sucks in a shaky breath. “Every blow you took. Every blow your brothers took. All the horrors that went on, he knew but stayed silent so my siblings and I could grow up safe in our rich, perfect little world.”
I reel back a step from the words punching me. Pain grips my chest and I press my palm to it. I can’t speak. Can barely think.
“You should let me go. I’m sorry. So sorry.” Melody bows her head and quietly closes the apartment door. The lock slides into place.
I stand motionless for a second, unable to fathom this altered world, then I turn and walk outside.
I sit in my truck, not knowing how I got here. The rain pounds on the roof and the loudness of it fills the cab. I’ve wanted answers about my past for years, but not like this.
I lean my head back against the seat. I don’t want to think. I don’t want to feel.
Memories flash through my mind. Heavy ones. Painful ones. Fearful ones.
But good memories flash in too.
Fishing with Gavin. Frances sitting by the bed when I was sick. Gavin teaching me how to ride a horse. Frances defending me fiercely from anyone who dared say a negative word about my wild ways.
I remember four wheeling with my brothers. Fireworks on the Fourth of July. Lots of laughter. Football games on Thanksgiving after a big meal. I remember accidentally cracking the ranch truck’s windshield with a rock and all of my brothers claiming they were the ones who’d done it.
But the Richfords hadn’t fretted about that. They’d replaced the windshield without scolding any of us.
I was surrounded by so much love as day after day they rebuilt a broken little boy and raised him into a cowboy.
My past hurts, there’s no denying that. But I don’t want it to show up once again and rip away what matters to me. My sweet Melody. The woman I love is hurting for both of us. She’s feeling shame even though she didn’t have anything to do with what her grandfather did.
Her world was rocked tonight just like mine.
My past has given me enough pain. I won’t let it take her, too.
Reaching into the dash, I take out the furry handcuffs from when she and I first met and then head ack into her apartment building.
