Why hadn't he considered another possibility?
“They raped you,” he said, the words tasting bitter in his mouth.
Teresa’s gaze moved slowly back to his. “You didn't know?”
“Hell no! If I’d known, I never would have left.”
It was clear from her expression that she didn't quite believe him, and he couldn’t fault her for that.
She’d needed him and he hadn't been there. Not only that, but he’d blocked any way she had of contacting him, and he’d never even opened the letter.
The letter.
Did she tell him everything in it? If he’d just not been a coward and opened it all those years ago, could he have avoided more than a decade of pain for both of them?
“Simon,” he growled as another piece of the puzzle clicked. That’s why she’d been so freaked out at the possibility that he mentioned Simon when he went with her to visit her mom and Arthur.
“Drug money,” she said softly.
So many emotions swelled inside him. Rage, unlike anything he had ever felt before was directed toward her heartless brother. How could Simon have pimped out his own sister for drug money? And how could he be so ruthless at just fifteen years of age?
The rage wasn't just directed at her brother, though.
A large portion of it was directed at himself. He’d thought the worst when he saw Teresa and those boys that night, he could have stopped her assault, could have saved her at least some of the pain she must have suffered. He could have been there beside her every step of the way, holding her hand, cradling her in his arms while she cried, and reminding her every day how strong she was. Been there with her during the court case because he knew her brother had been charged, convicted, and imprisoned for his crimes.
It was cold comfort to know that she had her mom and brother, because he knew Teresa would have done everything she could to downplay her own trauma so as not to be a burden.
No wonder she hated him, no wonder she’d been so angry with him.
How was he ever supposed to make this up to her?
How was he ever supposed to make things right?
CHAPTER 9
May1st
2:39 P.M.
As badly asshe wanted to believe this wasn’t happening, she couldn’t.
Because it was.
Everything was horrifyingly real.
Teresa felt like she was trapped in some sort of dream state. Around her, everything was kind of hazy. Her emotions were there, bubbling beneath the surface, but they’d also been dulled. She recognized them, she felt them, but they were distant, and she was glad for that.
With the bustle going on about her there was no emotional space inside her to feel the full assault of emotions brought on by her talk with Micah.
He hadn't known.
But he’d been there.
The dichotomy of that was enough in and of itself to send her into a tailspin. Then add in all her fears about being kidnapped and her impending surgery, and it was all just too much.
Never before in her life had she checked out just because things were hard. She’d always been the kind of person to embrace the hard and make the best of it. When her dad died and her mom had needed her to step up, she’d done it, she hadn't complained about wanting to continue her previously carefree childhood. She’d done what needed to be done.
Same thing after her assault. She’d managed to salvage as many of her pieces as she could and put them back together. They hadn't fit the way they had before, but she was still her, just a slightly harder version of her old self.
