I took it, feeling relieved to have something to do with my hands.
“Now sit.” He nodded to the couch.
Again, I obeyed. The firm tone of his voice was something to hold on to. Even through the hammering of my heart.
My lips parted in surprise when he sat too. On the same couch. Granted, it was on the other end, but he could’ve sat in the armchair, creating more distance.
He didn’t.
I shouldn’t have read into that. Shouldn’t have read into anything with Beau.
“Tell me.” Beau’s tone was soft, inviting. He was treating me with exquisite care—I could feel it in his tone, the way he looked at me, the positioning of his body. Though his eyes kept dropping down to the spot on my arm that was still faintly pulsing.
I blinked at him, my hands warm around the mug of hot cocoa. I slowly took a sip, killing time, and because my body felt frozen to the couch.
The cocoa was rich, the perfect blend of bitter and sweet. A touch of cinnamon. Trust Beau not to just use something boxed and easy. He’d taken care when preparing this.
Not because of me, I told myself. Because that was Beau.
I’d been thinking about this conversation all night. Planning what I would tell him. Technically, I didn’t have to tell him anything. It was my private life. I didn’t owe him anything. He employed me to take care of his daughter, nothing more, nothing less.
Except my personal life had brought Waylon to his door. And I couldn’t be sure how long Waylon would be in town. If he’d follow me while I was watching Clara. If he’d scare her, endanger her.
I didn’t think Waylon would ever hurt a child, but I wasn’t going to risk that theory. Not with Clara.
I’d clumsily put together what I’d say to Beau in my mind. But right then, sinking into the couch with a mug of hot cocoa,watching Beau sit at the other end, eyes on me, I blurted out everything.
Well, obviously not everything. I didn’t need to set the stage with my terrible childhood—though that did serve to help explain why I’d married Waylon in the first place, why I’d let him treat me so poorly.
But Beau didn’t need to know that, he didn’t need to know me. He didn’t need to think the best of me. He didn’t need to pity me. I didn’t trust Beau enough to expose all those soft, vulnerable parts of myself.
Aside from Cole, no one knew about my upbringing. Lori knew pieces. I held that close to my chest, as if I were trying to staunch a wound.
I only let that out if I could trust the person in front of me to see the blood and not run away or look at me differently.
I didn’t trust Beau, not entirely. Even if I liked him too much. If I gave him all these parts of me, it would hurt more when I left. When it became apparent exactly what this relationship wasn’t.
“We got married young,” I dove in. “Before my prefrontal cortex was fully formed. Not something I’d recommend.” I smiled weakly.
Beau’s mouth was a flat, grim line. He obviously didn’t find it funny.
“I was in nursing school, working, trying to get my degree,” I continued. “He kept losing jobs, drinking our money away. It was … not a good situation.” That was putting it lightly.
I opened my mouth to skirt over the rest, skip to the end. But Beau wouldn’t let me.
“What do you mean?” he asked, quietly, softly. He was all but shaking with rage, but he was forcing himself to speak gently. For me. Because somehow, he could see beyond my fake smile, maybe heard the shake in my voice.
“Did he hit you?”
Even spoken in the most benevolent of tones, the words were jarring, confronting.
“Only once.” I sipped my cocoa. “Before that, it was a lot of breaking things. Yelling. Name-calling. Locking me out of the house. Slashing my tires after a fight.”
I listed all of those things mechanically, trying to sound lackadaisical, healed.
Beau’s hands were fists on his thighs. “Onlyonce,” he repeated, tone strange, empty and flat but his eyes were pools of fury. He took a visible breath, looked down, then took another. He looked up at me, his hands relaxing.
“It is notonlyanything when a man lays hands on you, Hannah.” He uttered the words slowly, forcibly, his body unnaturally still. “It isn’tonlyanything when he scares you, insults you. And it sure as fuck isn’t your fault for getting married young, for not leaving sooner, or whatever the fuck you tell yourself.”
