Hudson Home for Nursing and Rehabilitation.
Thisis what’s been tearing my life apart since everything that happened with Alayna. My mother’s early-onset dementia.
When the doctors diagnosed her with Alzheimer’s, helplessness devoured me like a vulture eating a carcass.
No amount of money or murder can fix dementia.
There’s no such thing as getting used to my mom’s illness. There’s no such thing as accepting it and moving on. She forgets me a little more every day, and there’s nothing I can do.
There’s only the silent, excruciating struggle.
I hate myself for resenting the nurses and doctors. But I can’t help myself.
They can do something I can’t. No matter how much I want to help, despite the fact that I’d go anywhere, do anything,hurtanyone necessary to take my mother’s pain away, to ease my own…I can’t.
And that one small fact is a dark night with no dawn.
The anguish never disappears completely. When it hits me, I sometimes zone out until I’m standing in front of the nursing home.
Helplessness leads to more helplessness, or however the saying goes.
If there even is a saying.
Turning in a small circle, I’m desperate to look at something—anything—on this street other than this looming building.
My eyes catch on a shop I’ve never noticed before.
Mind on overload, I jog across the street and duck inside.
Chapter 20
Kiara
I have to say, for a professional kidnapping operation, the Kings have really nice bathrooms. The water pressure in this shower is everything.
Especially after the day I’ve had.
Getting woken up at the crack of dawn after a crazy night of…firsts.
I shake my head as water sinks into my hair and douses my face. Just thinking about last night with Rory sets me off inside like a sparkler.
I’m the only one you come for?
Just you…
I melt down to a self-conscious squat in the shower, hugging myself tight.
What surprised me most about last night was howintimateeverything felt. I don’t know what I expected. Something more clinical? Or instructive?
Definitely not smothering his face with the force of my orgasm after we sixty-nined.
Ohgod.I can’t tell whether I want to hide from him for the rest of my days or…
The sensations of his mouth and hands all over me return to my mind in vivid, visceral detail.
The heat that’s been lodged inside me ever since his hands touched me hasn’t subsided for a moment. Not even a little bit.
Even stumbling after Rory through the labyrinth at dawn this morning didn’t dim the fire he set inside me last night.
