And I did that for days, weeks, months. I did it until juvie, and I read that letter over and over again.
Burying emotions took time, practice, effort, and training.
I buried that emotion so deep I could barely access it.
I hoped I would never have to again.
“Izzy.”She shook the paper in front of the phone again, but this time there were tears in her eyes. “Tell me who wrote this to you right now.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I whispered. My therapist told me over and over that I should talk with someone whom I trusted about what I’d been through. The secret was between my therapist and me alone. I didn’t want to get anyone in trouble, even if Vincent was gone, even if I didn’t talk to any of those people anymore.
Now, I struggled with the embarrassment that I’d been taken advantage of, that I’d fallen for so much when I should have been smarter.
My therapist said I needed to share this with my family. But why? For them to worry even more, to be even more disappointed? My therapist had told me over and over that I’d been young, drugs were involved, I shouldn’t blame myself.
I still did.
“It does matter!” she screamed, and Cade took that moment to stop staring at his laptop.
When I hustled out of the room and down the hall to our bedroom, the man followed. His stupid sharp eyes behind his stupid hot eyeglasses read my every move as he leaned on the doorframe, watching us both like he was ready for the destruction.
The man loved to see people uncomfortable—I knew that about him now. “Get out.” I motioned for him to leave.
He shook his head no, but the look of concern on his face caught me off guard. He should have been smiling, should have relished my sister unearthing my secret.
“Izzy, I’ll make Dante call Cade and have him send you home right now if you don’t tell me. This is... this is a suicide note from someone! Izzy, who wrote this?”
“It doesn’t matter,” I whispered, but I remembered the words and, although I hadn’t read it in maybe a year, they flashed before me now. The hand that held my phone shook as I thought of her rummaging through my things. “You shouldn’t have been looking through my stuff. Put it back now.”
“I was looking for your damn cat, and I came across the box.”
“You didn’t have to look in it.” I raised my voice and then took a breath before I tried to rush past Cade into the living room.
He stopped me with a hand on my arm and took the phone from me.
Lilah gasped and stuttered, “Are you two working?”
“Something like that. Put her stuff away, and she’ll call you back.”
“Cade, this is serious.”
“Do as you’re told.” He hung up and stared at me.
Curling up and crying in the bathroom was what I wanted to do, but instead I stood there with my chin raised. “You already know part of the story from the campfire. The rest is I was involved with a guy before juvie. I loved him, and he was too old for me.”
I waited for his recoil, for him to frown upon my actions, but there was none whatsoever from him. He waited, like he wanted the whole story.
I took a deep breath, turning the bracelet that I wondered if he would want me to keep after I admitted this. “It was wrong and stupid and reckless. But he was my first love. He’d have been charged with statutory rape had anyone found out about us. I was sixteen and now I know he’d probably preyed upon me, groomed me, and changed me.” I shrugged, trying to shake away the heat of embarrassment I felt rising to my cheeks. “Therapy taught me all that. Yet, even still, a heart can break quickly and soundly. Mine shattered when I realized he chose to leave me, that he didn’t love me like I thought I loved him. I was embarrassed and in pain. It broke me, was big enough to destroy me.”
Cade tsked. “You haven’t been destroyed yet, baby doll.”
I let out a small laugh that held no joy. “Cade, I’ve hidden this for a long time. It’s embarrassing and wrong and... heartbreak and embarrassment hurt. That pain wrenches at your soul. Shakes you awake with the weight of the reminders and the pain. I couldn’t handle it at first and used drugs as a crutch. It’s how I know that love broke me, that I’m wrecked for all others.”
“Why would it wreck you for others?”
“I try to find...” I hesitated, looking for the right words. Cade was messy, my boss, and my weakness. Falling for him was like jumping out of a damn airplane, not knowing if the parachute would open. “I try to find love that won’t hurt, that’s safe and comfortable at best. That way, if I lose someone like I did him, I won’t go back to what I did then.”
He studied me for a moment before asking, “What did his letter say?”