I waited for Bree to follow, but she didn’t. I found her rooted to the same spot in my foyer, exactly where she’d been when I’d spewed my disgust at her. I didn’t want to look at her, knowing her indignation would set me off when I only wanted it all to go away. I wanted to take her to her car, drop her off, and then never see her again. But with one glance, one small and brief catch of her eyes, everything came crashing down. Her shoulders might’ve been squared and her lips set in a firm line, but the glistening layer that covered those wolf eyes gave away her true emotions.
“I didn’t ruin anyone’s life,” she cried out with a broken voice. And then her hard exterior crumbled. Keeping her tears in, she dropped her arms to her sides, holding her clothes in her balled fists. “I didn’t force you to fall in love with me. I never asked you to set your sights on me. Maybe you’ve forgotten, but I fought against your need to protect me. You’re the one that pushed. You wouldn’t leave me alone. I only came back to you because you left me the CD on my porch. I only pushed for our relationship because you made it clear it’s what we both wanted. As in…you wanted it, too. So don’t blame me.” The raw desperation in her tone made it clear that I’d missed something.
I stepped into the open doorway, pressed my palms on either side, and leaned in. My head tilted in confusion as I asked, “What in the hell are you talking about, Bree?”
“You’re trying to blame me for ruining your life.”
“Because you did!” I roared, using my arms to keep me close to her without getting in her face, causing her to flinch. “Loving you isn’t what ruined me. Trusting you is what did that. I trusted you, Aubrey. And you betrayed me.”
Her brow creased as she examined me, the confusion evident on her face. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Axel. I never betrayed you.” Her voice had gone whisper-soft, filled with bewilderment and surprise.
My head grew fuzzy, probably a mixture of no sleep and the unexpected return of the one woman capable of flipping my world on its axis. I felt like we were talking in circles, neither of us comprehending the other. I dropped my chin to my chest and pulled in a full, cleansing breath of morning air.
Lifting my head back up to meet her narrowed gaze, I calmly said, “You told the school about us. You took what we had and gave them information that could’ve marked me as criminal.”
She shook her head vigorously, shuddering with each pass. “No. That’s not true.”
“How did they know about the times we spent in my back yard? Huh?” I slapped my palm hard against the wooden doorjamb, ignoring the way it caused her to wince and pull away. “How did they know about the phone? There’s no way they’d have known about any of that if you hadn’t told them. Because I know I never said a damn word to anyone!”
Her shoulders fell as her gaze landed on the floor by my feet. I didn’t need her words of admission to know I’d been right. Her posture said it all. And even though she claimed to harbor no regret over it, I could tell by the dismal expression on her face that somewhere deep inside, she felt it.
I pushed myself off the doorframe and started to turn around, but was stopped by her meek voice as she said, “I didn’t do it.”
I froze, stunned and unsure of how to react. Fury boiled in my veins over her pathetic attempt to lie, but then there was something else. Sympathy? I wasn’t sure what it was that settled into me, slightly calming the rage, but it was triggered by her intensely sorrowful tone.
“If that’s what you think happened…if that’s what you’ve thought for the last six and half years, then you’re wrong.”
I spun around, needing to see if her expression matched her tone. But what I found gutted me. A lone tear slipped past her lower lashes and cascaded down her cheek. Her normally bright eyes dimmed, appearing more golden than yellow, the light behind them burnt out.
The fight I’d carried inside of me for six years, and the anger that once kept me from going after her, vanished. But the pain…the pain over losing her, over the thought of spending my life without her, spread through me, weighing me down, suffocating me. I glanced down to her left hand, realizing that it was no longer simply a thought—it’d become my reality. I would spend the rest of my life without her. I had believed the worst of her, and lost her forever.
And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it.
“I don’t believe you,” I said, keeping my tone deep and even. It was a lie, though. I might not have fully believed her, but she managed to offer enough doubt in my mind that I no longer knew what to think.
She shrugged and then sniffled, taking a step toward me. “You know, you’re not the only one who feels angry and cheated over the whole thing. It took some time, but I was able to forgive you for abandoning me. For promising to get me out of my mom’s house, but instead, leaving me there. I understood enough to put myself in your shoes, to feel the panic you must’ve felt when everyone found out. I managed to let it go and accept that sometimes, shitty things happen. But now…hearing you admit that you turned your back on me because you thought I’d been the one that went to the school about us? I take it all back. You don’t deserve my forgiveness.”
“Then how did they know all that?”
“I found out after you left that Jill was the one who went to the principal about it. She said she was at the dollar store…remember when we stopped to pick up bandages and stuff? Well, you kissed me before you went inside. Apparently, she was in the parking lot and saw it. I never saw her, I didn’t even know she was there. But she’s the one who sparked the investigation.
“They called me into the office. I walked into a room and found the principal, two counselors, a teacher, and my mom. I had no idea what it was about…why I was there. I thought maybe you had called the cops again, or reported to the school what my mom did to me. But then they started asking questions about us. They kept talking to me like I was some kind of victim.” Her voice shook as she spoke, that day obviously just as clear to her as it was to me, even after all this time.
“So you just told them everything?”
“No,” she argued softly. “I didn’t tell them anything until they said someone had seen us. They wouldn’t tell me when or where, so I didn’t know how to explain it. I told them that we were neighbors and would sometimes see each other in the neighborhood. That’s when my mom said something about the trees in the back yard, saying she’d caught me back there a lot and thought I’d been sneaking out to meet a boy. I never told them about that—my mom did.”
The doubt that had crept in before began to build. “What else?”
“They asked if we had any other communication, and before I could say anything, my mom said she could get ahold of your phone records. I was scared, so I told them about the cell phone you gave me. I knew we never sent any texts that would hurt you, so I thought it was okay. I didn’t want to lie and then have my mom find out. That would only make us look guilty. I didn’t want you to look bad.”
“And what did you say was the reason I gave it to you?” I wanted to know that she’d told them about her mom. The one fear that had weighed on me for so long, that eventually sank me to the bottom of a liquor bottle, was over what had happened with her mother after I left. Because it didn’t matter which way I looked at it, I’d allowed my feelings of betrayal to leave her in a house with an abusive mother after swearing I’d protect her.
“I told them about the time I had to walk home in the rain and slept outside, and you wanted me to have a way of getting ahold of someone in the event I was ever locked out of my house again.”