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“He called me,” I cut in before she can ask, before the roll I’m on screeches to a halt. “He called. Showed up here demanding my attention, which isn’t the first time he’s tried since we broke up. Rex scared him off last night, but this pic suggests he never left.” I gesture to the phone still in her hand and exhale a hearty breath with a shaking snicker that lacks all of the humor. “I panicked, Fin was there. We hooked up, he took me back to dad’s.”
Aria’s eyes widen at my summary of the events.
“The festival’s been a real roller coaster,” I say on a forced chuckle and shake my head as I step up to my best friend.
“Do you know where he is now?”
My shoulders lift on a shrugging sigh. “I would assume his parent’s old trailer. I have no idea.” Hair falls around my shoulders when I shake my head. Resolve settles in around the ache in my chest and holds me together with the plan formulating in my mind. The visions of Jeremy losing body parts and screaming my name for the last fucking time make the corners of my mouth tip up. “But I am going to find out.”
Aria stares at me, her green eyes wide in what I presume is shock, and puffs out her cheeks. “We should call someone.”
“Like who?” I scoff and spin back to my chair that’s still filled with a passed out client. I snap on a fresh pair of gloves and nudge the participant that has managed to sleep through this whole endeavor that continues, even when I prod them with another set of needles.
It only takes a few more minutes of stunned silence to finish the piece and shake the client awake to pay. Once the chair is empty again, I meet Aria’s determined gaze.
“Ian. He can help.”
“Nah.” I finish the cleanup and toss the trash. “I just need to go talk to him. Set him straight before I let anyone go after him.”
“Cedar, you really think I’m going to let you go alone? To that same guy who used to abuse you?” Aria’s voice shakes behind me, her words slicing right down to my soul at the realization of their truth.
“I’m not the same girl I was then.”
Or even two nights ago.
But I don’t say that last part out loud. I don’t go into all the details of how my life has managed to change the moment that Fin rushed in and demanded I see him.
As if I didn’t already see the man that saved me once.
Fuck, does he know?
“I have to take care of it, Ari. Alone.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Cedar
Thethingaboutbraveryis that it’s also terrifying.
I pull up to the ransacked shack that used to be a decent place to hang out at on my Frankenstein of a motorcycle and heel down the kickstand.
My hands shake. My heart races faster than any other nightmare that’s woken me out of a dead sleep at the memories.
But my determination wins out over all of it as I step up onto the rotting porch for the first time in almost ten years.
The last time I was here, it was empty of people and for a therapy thing that Sara thought might help—go back to the scene, see that I get to walk away from it all in one piece, and replace the memories with stronger ones.
It worked for a while, but then the nightmares came right back.
Except I was older thanks to having seen the place as an adult and Jeremy was just as vicious as ever.
We’d gone on to try something else, but I’d already gotten to the point where I shared that I just wished he was dead. Gone. Never to be seen again in the light of day. That’s what I needed to get past the trauma. That’s what I needed to know that he was never coming back for me for sure.
But then the worst happened. He showed up again, coerced me into being with him again out of guilt with all of his mind tricks, and my stupid, immature heart agreed because maybe this time was different. Maybe this time he’d grown up and changed.
Maybe this time he would love me like I needed to be.
Except it was different.
