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It was clear that Claire felt uncomfortable in the small space, with Paige and David both staring at her, nor did Claire want David to be a part of this. “No. We’re not going to go sit down, and whatever you have to say can be said with David present,” Paige said. “So, start talking. You have five minutes.”
“That’s not—”
“Isn’t that what you gave me? The day I came to talk to you?”
“Yes.” The word was filled with shame. “And I’m so sorry for what happened.”
Paige frowned at her, the apology not even landing. “You’re sorry for what ‘happened’? You mean throwing me out of your house like garbage?”
“Yes. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you, and I’m even more sorry I didn’t believe you. It’s one of the biggest mistakes of my life.”
These apologies didn’t land, either. “Is that your way of saying you believe me now?”
“Yes.”
Paige didn’t say anything for several moments. Her mother’s admission didn’t really change anything, other than to make Paige wonder at the turnaround. “Why is that?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, why do you believe me now? What made you change your mind after all this time?”
Claire looked extremely nervous as she cleared her throat. “I was the executor of Carter’s estate after he … died. So, it fell to me to settle everything. To go through his possessions and sell what could be sold, like his cars and his house—”
“I know what it means to be the executor of an estate, so get to the point,” Paige told her rudely. “I don’t give a shit about his house, or his cars.”
“I came across a safe deposit box about a couple of weeks ago—the yearly premium was due and got mailed to me. All of his mail has been coming to me for the past year, otherwise I wouldn’t have found out about it, because it wasn’t at his main bank, and he didn’t have any paperwork on it—”
“I don’t give a shit about his safety deposit box, either. Get to the goddamn point.”
Claire took a deep breath, then exhaled heavily, before saying softly, “I found pictures in it. Taken with one of those instant Polaroid cameras.”
David stared at Claire, who was clearly trying to hold back tears, her skin starting to take on a red, splotchy cast. His stomach churning with nausea, David put his arms around Paige and held her from behind, as he comprehended the underlying ugliness of Claire’s revelation. Pictures.
“I assume they were pornographic pictures of me?” Paige asked, her voice low and flat.
Claire nodded, losing the fight not to cry, and tears rolled silently down her cheeks.
“Well, that’s not very surprising. It actually explains why I’ve never liked having my picture taken—for any reason,” Paige said, looking at Claire pointedly, and saw the moment she made the connection to Paige’s aversion to being in pictures, and the moment Claire realized she’d been seeing symptoms of the abuse years ago. “Did you look through them?”
Claire wiped her hands across her face before answering. “Yes.”
“Were there a lot?”
“Yes. They spanned several years. Some were taken when you were … very young.”
“How young?”
“Paige …”
“I want to know. How young?”
“When you were around eight years old.”
Upon hearing that revolting and monstrous bit of information, David’s arms tightened around Paige even more, barely hearing Claire say the majority of the pictures were of Paige as a teenager.
“Hmm,” Paige mused, her voice still low and flat. “So Carter had a stash of Paige-porn he could bust out and look at whenever he wanted. Get turned on and probably jerk off to—”
“Don’t,” Claire choked out.
