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I need to put the phone down to cook the rice, so I send one last quick text.
Me: Call me on your way home.
He should be home in a half an hour. Nerves stir in my belly the closer it gets to him getting home. Will he be able to look at me the same when I tell him everything? Does he love me enough to keep it in the past and move forward? I know he's not a man to take this lightly, so I hope he understands why I kept it from him.
Once I receive a text he’s headed this way, I have only fifteen minutes. I take in a deep breath and slowly exhale. Everything looks perfect and smells delicious. One last thing, light the candles. Since I forgot a lighter, I search through his kitchen drawers looking for either a lighter or matches.
“Seriously,” I say, frustrated that I’ve run out of drawers and found nothing to light a freaking candle. I glance at my watch and then around the room. Shit, I have only five minutes left. Dammit! The candles are important.
One last thought to where matches could be, I run to the bathroom and rummage through the drawers. The last one I open, takes my breath away, my knees weaken and I have to grip the counter to catch myself. My brows pinch in confusion as my fingers shake picking up a picture. It weighs nothing in my hands, yet it feels like I’m holding a nuclear bomb, seconds from destroying my world.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Kase
As soon as I open the door, I can feel the change in the air. It’s thick and suffocating. The second I see Ellie on the couch, staring down at a picture, I know the air is filled with my lies. It wraps around my neck like a noose, squeezing the life out of me. The life I thought I’d have with her.
Her eyes don’t move from the picture of us. When we were younger. Fuck.
“I can explain,” I say, taking long strides to get to her. She doesn’t look up as she drags her finger over our embraced bodies. I sink to my knees, nestling myself in between her legs. “Ellie, look at me.”
Her eyes fix on mine and her face twists. One tear escapes. No, don’t cry. It’s a small lie, an insignificant detail. It doesn’t change the love we have for each other. The panic builds each second she doesn’t talk and my mind scrambles for what to say. She holds up the picture and opens her mouth to say something, but snaps it shut. Her eyes flitter over the picture again.
“I don’t remember this.” Her voice is so soft, I barely hear her. “This is us.”
I nod. “It is.” My words come out slow.
“Why can’t I remember you? We had to be around sixteen.”
I sit back on my heels and blink. “Of course you can’t remember. You can't remember anything from back then because of amnesia.”
Her bitter laugh fills the heavy air. “Can’t remember? I wish I could forget.” She presses me back so she can stand. Her words send a sharp sting to my heart. How does she remember her past, but not recognize me? I am her past.
“Ellie, I don’t understand.”
“Kase.” Her voice breaks as she folds her arms around her waist. “I don’t remember you” —she swallows, looking away— “but I'll never forget my stepfather raping and beating me, then dropping me off on a dirt road to die.”
My mouth gapes open and I glance around looking for answers. What is happening right now?
“Ellie, you don’t have a stepfather,” I whisper.
She jerks her head in my direction and her face reddens. “Do you think I’m making this up?” Her voice rises and her eyes turn stormy grey. “That my nightmares about that sick fuck is all a figment of my imagination?”
I squeeze the bridge of my nose. “Let’s start over,” I say, trying to diffuse the situation. “That picture is us. You were… I mean are the love of my life and always have been. Since we were ten. When we were eighteen, I went away for boot camp and when I came back you had been in a car accident and couldn’t remember me. You had amnesia.”
Staring intently at me, she lets this all sink in. Her expression shifts to anger. She rushes to the kitchen and reaches for a butcher knife on the counter. “He hired you, didn’t he? He found me and sent you to get close? Did you work for him back then?” She points the knife at the picture on the couch and then back at me. “Get out!” she screams and I’m taken back that she’s kicking me out of my own place.
“Ellie, what are you talking about? Nobody sent me. Put the knife down.”
“No! He won’t hurt me again. Leave Kase, or I swear to god, I’ll stab you.”
I put my hands in the air in defeat. “Ellie, I won’t hurt you. Let’s calm down and talk–”
I duck just in time for a glass to go whizzing by my head. The sound of shattered glass echoes behind me. Goddamnit woman!
“Okay! I’m leaving. Only so you can calm down, but we still need to talk.”
She shakes her head as tears run down her face. My stomach knots knowing I caused this. I hesitate to leave her like this, but I need to find out what she’s talking about. When I reach the front door, I turn around before I open it. “I’m sorry Ellie, I never meant to lie to you.”
