But as I eat, I keep glancing at her like she’s a dog I just broke. Still wondering if she’ll bite... or if she’s planning to run.
To ruin me for good.
Chapter 35
Charlotte
My nerves are shot, I’ve lost weight, I can’t sleep well, and I always feel like shit!
Like right now. I sit on the ambulance, the back doors open, and my whole body is on edge. The instructor just wandered off to another group, but the three of us are prepping for their return.
Matt stretches out his tattooed arm, the ink curling up from his wrist and disappearing beneath his sleeve as he hands me a sterile compress. I take it, open it, but I’m not focused on our primary survey or secondary injuries. I’m not even thinking about the backboard we’re supposed to prep for Ashleigh, who’s playing the trauma victim.
“Charlotte?” Matt nudges my forearm, his gloved hand cool on my skin.
“Oh, sorry!” I snap out of it. “Lost my train of thought.”
He chuckles. “Yeah, you’ve been spacey all week.”
Ashleigh, tiny on the gurney with her platinum pixie and fake contusion makeup, smirks. “It’s a guy, isn’t it? Always is.”
I sigh, hating that people are noticing.
I love Grayson. Ireallydo. But—
Whenever I think about him, I go to dark places. Like that video.
Why did I watch it? I was so stupid. Now all I see is his cruel heart, those evil hands, that look in his eyes, andthem. Together.
Ashleigh snaps her fingers. “Earth to Charlotte?”
I slump forward, elbows on my thighs, wrung out and tired of keeping this secret. I might as well have a palm tree growing out of my lungs. If I open my mouth, palm fawns will burst out. But the truth tickles the back of my throat, and although I try to stop them, the words tumble forward.
“My boyfriend is controlling.”
Gosh, that feels good!
Ashleigh sits up fast. “Controlling how?”
Matt takes over the compress application, working on Ashleigh’s “abdomen wound,” but he’s focused on me, nodding me on gently.
If it felt good to say the truth once, maybe twice will feel even better.
“Last week...” My voice cracks. “He said if I didn’t do what he said, or if I asked him to leave, he’d go sleep with his ex.” I lower my voice and mumble, “and he’d make me watch.”
Silence.
I look up.
Ashleigh’s whole face hardens.
Matt and Ashleigh exchange side-glances. His fingers run through his brown hair and he says with a hint of hesitation, “Uh, that’s blackmail.”
Ashleigh crosses her arms. “That’s psychologicalabuse.Why are you still with him?”
The words hit like blunt trauma — not fatal, but enough to stagger.
It is freeing to open up, but the fact they disapprove so quickly just firms up my doubts about Grayson. My love story is crumbling around me. And if I am being honest with myself, I am falling out of love with him. Not completely, just a little each day. Although, every bit of love that dies and breaks off, feels like a piece of me dying, too.
