Aiden cleared his throat and looked at Christina, who gave him a quick nod.
“Arabella, I’m speaking to you as one of Hunter’s best friends. When you tell him, you need to have someone there with you.”
Christina nodded in agreement.
“Like Abby?” I asked.
Aiden shook his head. “No, like me or Kyle or Bishop…or all three of us.”
“It might also be nice to have Abby there with you,” Christina added with a soft smile.
“Why do you want me to have you guys there?” I asked.
Aiden rubbed at the back of his neck as he exhaled. “The only way I can explain this is to use Willa as an example. If Willa came to me and told me she’d been raped, no matter how long ago it had been, the rage I’d feel would be…extremely strong. A part of me is going to guess that somewhere deep inside, Hunter knows you were raped, or at least that something very bad happened to you. That’s going to make him upset, knowing he thought it but never acted on that thought. Or that he couldn’t have prevented it.”
A sick feeling hit me so hard, I covered my mouth with my hand.
“Let me add, I wouldn’t be upset or angry at Willa,” Aiden quickly explained. “But I would want to kill the man who touched her—and I promise you, Arabella, that will be exactly how Hunter feels.”
Christina spoke next. “He’s also going to experience his own grief and guilt for what happened to you.”
“What do you mean?” I asked in confusion.
“I agree with Aiden. It has likely crossed Hunter’s mind that you may have been raped, even though he probably won’t allow himself to go there. No one wants to think that someone they love has been violated in that way. Hunter is going to go through his own phases. Anger, sadness, guilt. He’s going to question how he didn’t know or couldn’t tell that you’d been raped.”
“I pushed him away for all those years, so he wouldn’t be able to tell.”
Christina nodded. “I would also hazard a guess that at some point over the last ten years, most likely right when you broke up with him, he may have thought you cheated on him and you simply felt too guilty to admit it.”
I frowned. Hunter would think that, given how I’d ended things. Suddenly, the conversation we had at The Coffee Pot came back to me. “Oh no,” I whispered.
“What?” Aiden and Christina asked at once.
“Um, when we met for lunch, things got heated between me and Hunter, and I got up to leave before either of us said something we’d regret. Hunter told me he’d tried to hate me. We exchanged some words, and I know he’s going to feel guilty for some of the things he said. I know him.”
Aiden scrubbed a hand down his face. He knew Hunter as well as I did. He would torment himself for saying what he’d said, then would most likely feel guilty for not seeing what had happened, even though I’d pushed him away.
“Okay,” Christina said. “Aiden, it might not be a bad idea for Hunter to come and talk to me. Or you, if he doesn’t want to talk to me or Mitch about this. But I definitely think he’s going to need to talk to someone. If we could do a couple’s therapy session, I think that would also be very helpful.”
Aiden nodded. Mitch was the co-founder of the clinic and another ex-Navy SEAL. “Yeah, I know.” Turning back to me, he smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You’ll wait to talk to him until me or Kyle and Bishop can be there with you both?”
“I promise—I won’t tell him without at least one of you guys there.”
Christina gave me a soft smile. “Arabella, the sooner you tell Hunter, the faster you’ll be able to work at healing and moving on with your life. Both of you. And don’t be surprised that if after you tell him, your intimacy grows stronger. Just you telling him, getting it out in the open, is going to take down that wall, and you’ll truly be able to see he isn’t going to leave.”
Swallowing hard, I looked at Aiden. “He’s coming over for dinner tonight. They should be back from ice fishing by now.”
I could see it written all over Aiden’s face. He knew exactly how Hunter would react.
“You don’t think he’ll hate me, do you?” My question was directed at Christina, even though I kept staring at Aiden.
Christina reached for my hand and squeezed it slightly. “No, he is not going to hate you, Arabella. He is not going to blame you, look at you differently, or love you any less. It was not your fault. And once he knows the real reason you pushed him away, he’ll be able to help you heal. I also suggest you tell your parents. The more you hide this from the people who love you and continue to carry the truth with you, the more it will weigh you down.”
Chewing on my lip, I nodded and exhaled. “I feel like such a coward for hiding for so long.”
Aiden dropped to his knees in front of me. “Don’t. What happened to you was a nightmare, and no one could blame you for wanting to hide it away. A lot of people do. It’s your body’s and mind’s way of coping with the trauma.”
“Trauma,” I repeated the word. I had never truly thought of it as a trauma before, but it had been.
“Trust me, Arabella. I know all about pushing things to the back of my mind and trying to pretend everything is okay. You need to know that we’re here for you. All of us. No matter what, we’re here for you.”
I reached out and hugged Aiden. “Thank you, Aiden. Thank you so much.”
He hugged me back and kissed my forehead, then stood up again. “Do you want me there tonight?”
Standing, I reached for my coat and fumbled with it before Aiden helped me slip it on. “If you don’t mind.”
“What time is he supposed to come over?”
“He said around seven.”
“I’ll be there at six. And if you want, I can call Kyle or Bishop.”
“Please. I’d appreciate it. I’ll call Abby.”
Christina stood and gave me a sweet smile. “Before you leave, Arabella, let’s make an appointment for you to come back and talk to me again, okay?”
“Yes, okay.”
After making an appointment to talk to Christina next week, I drove home in a fog. My mind raced. I had no idea how Hunter would react, but I was preparing myself for what Aiden and Christina guessed might happen.
I turned off the car, looked at my folks’ place, and closed my eyes. “Deep breaths, Bella. Deep breaths.”
Opening my eyes, I stared at the two-story farmhouse I had grown up in. I left my purse and keys in my car, opened the door, and walked up the front steps.
When I stepped inside, I could hear my folks laughing at something in the kitchen. I slowly made my way toward them—and froze at the sight before me. My father was dancing my mother around the island. I placed my fingers to my lips and smiled.
They both noticed me at the same time and stopped dancing.
“Arabella, sweetheart.” Mom’s smile faded as she looked at me. “What’s wrong?”
My father walked over and looked down at me. “You’ve been crying. What’s the matter?” He wrapped his arm around me and guided me over to the small table in the corner. I sat down and a glass of water appeared in front of me before my parents sat down next to me.