"I'll never hurt you." He lightly kissed my jaw.
I let my head fall back, surrendering myself to this moment. I could let go of the past if the present felt this good.
"You can trust me." He kissed the side of my neck and his body seemed to tense.
Damn it. I shifted away from him and put my hand over my neck. No, no, no.
He was staring at my hand. "Sadie, what happened to your neck? That's..."
"It's nothing." I pulled my hoodie up higher to hide it. How had I forgotten? How had I let him see? I couldn't let him know.
"They look like choke
marks." He wasn't looking at me like he normally did. He was looking at me like I was something damaged. Like he finally saw me for the first time. He looked horrified.
I could feel the air leaving my lungs. I could feel his fingers clamping down around my throat. I closed my eyes. "No, it's nothing."
"It's not nothing. Someone hurt you."
"That's not...it's not what it looks like."
"Sadie." He touched my knee.
It burned. "Stop."
"Tell me what happened." His hand was on my thigh. He was moving closer to me.
"Don't touch me!" I pushed myself away from him on the bed. I felt terror gripping at me.
He put his hands up to show that he wouldn't touch me. "I'm not going to hurt you, Sadie. I would never hurt you. But you need to tell me who did that."
"No one. It was an accident."
"Sadie."
I could tell that my lies hurt him. I could see it all over his face. He wanted to help me. But I didn't need help anymore. I needed to think of something that would explain this away. "I can't talk about it. Please don't make me talk about it."
"Is that why you were upset today?" His voice was getting loud like he was angry.
"No." It felt like I was gasping for air. He sees me. He knows.
"You can talk to me."
"I can't." Tears were streaming down my face.
"Please talk to me." He looked angry.
Did he feel my pain? Or was he angry with me? Don't hurt me. "Please don't be mad at me. I'm sorry." I hugged my knees to my chest. "I'm sorry."
"Sadie, I'm not mad at you." He ran his hands down his face. "I'm mad that someone did that to you. I'm mad that I didn't protect you from it."
It's not your fault. "It was an accident."
"It doesn't look like an accident to me. We should go to the cops. If someone is hurting you..."
"No. I can't..."
"How am I supposed to protect you if you won't tell me what happened?"