“That kiss was hopefully the start of more—” He sucked in a breath, but I put my hand onto his arm. I glanced up, saw his face had gone hopeful, and I felt a blip of panic. Then I thought about that black and white picture, the sonogram of the baby I’d lost, and I knew that I had to keep moving forward. “But no, I don’t want to talk about it.” His expression sobered.
“Instead, I’m going to tell you about my ex-husband.”
Eleven
Damon
I nearly dropped the pack of bacon.
But I did manage to recover enough to set it on the counter, to turn off both burners, take Eden’s hand, and tug her away from the hot stove.
She appeared to be warring with herself, one minute her face was open, the next it was filled with worry.
“It’s okay,” I assured. “You don’t have to tell me—”
Green eyes glanced up to mine. “I realized something this morning . . .” A sigh, words trailing off.
I waited, giving her time to find her words, not wanting to rush her, even though she’d just dropped a pretty big bomb. Ex-husband? Eden had just turned twenty-eight, and I’d known her for six years now. She’d begun modeling a few years before I’d photographed her, so—
“I see you’re doing mental math.”
“I’m—”
A warm palm on my cheek. “It’s okay.” She smiled, but it didn’t hide the pain in her eyes. “I—” A shake of her head. “When I was a little girl, I dreamed about New York, about bright lights and being onstage. I dreamed about high heels clacking on sidewalks bustling with people. I dreamed that because it was as far away from my childhood as I could imagine.” Her voice dropped. “And I dreamed it because I’d seen the show Sex and the City once at a friend’s house who had cable. Because it seemed so bright and colorful and different from reality.”
I carefully peeled her hand from my face then linked our fingers together. “What was reality?”
Eyes to her lap, shoulders lifting and falling on a breath.
Then she spoke, and it broke my heart.
“My parents were very religious,” she said. “Which was fine. Growing up, I loved going to church, loved we could be social, that I could see my friends. When someone grows up in a rural community, any bit of social outing is exciting.” Her lips curved up, but it wasn’t a true smile. “I grew up in a small farming community in Kentucky, had to catch the bus at six just to get to school on time because all of the pickups were so far apart. It was the sticks. Some of my neighbors didn’t have electricity or running water, though my house did. No TV though.” Here her eyes warmed. “Hence, Sex and the City being so exciting.”
I squeezed her hand lightly. “My sisters tell me it’s important to any woman’s education.”
Eden laughed. “Yes, it was that.”
Silence descended and I murmured, “You know you don’t have to tell me anything, right?”
“But I do.” She blinked rapidly. “I do because you need to understand why I feel the urge to retreat, why I’ve stopped any chance of some sort of deeper connection with a man before it ever had a chance to take root.” A beat. “Except it didn’t work with you. You wormed your way in, dug underneath my armor, and”—her lips tipped up—“generally made a nuisance of yourself.”
“Ah,” I teased lightly. “My mom’s favorite joke.”
She chuckled. “Have you always been a nuisance then?”
“Yup.”
“Trouble.” A squeeze of my fingers, her face growing serious once more. “I’m just going to blurt it out once and for all and be done with it.”
I nodded.
She sucked in a breath and then she went for it.
“So, church was the thing to do. Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday night services, youth ministry on Saturdays, Bible study group on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I spent almost more time there than my own home. I definitely spent more time with Tim than my parents.”
Tim.
Just hearing the way she said the name made my insides boil.
“Tim was a youth minister.” She swallowed. “He had all of us girls coming to the church as much as possible, was grooming us, from what I understand now. But I didn’t get it then. I just loved the attention, loved it when he focused it on me.” A quick breath. “But he was also twenty-seven years older than my twelve when he first touched me sexually.”
My jaw clenched convulsively.
Eden saw and lifted her palm, resting it there again. “It’s okay,” she said. “I’m okay now.”
I bit back the urge to say that she abso-fucking-lutely was not okay based on what I’d seen just weeks before, but I didn’t. This was her story, her time, her—
She noticed my inner war—of course she did—and her face softened.
“Oh, Damon.” Her fingers flexed. “This is why.”
“What is why?” I asked hoarsely, covered her hand.
“Because you care,” she said. “Even though it happened years ago, you care.”
“Of course, I care, baby,” I told her. “The idea of you being hurt, being touched by anyone, but most especially by someone who was so much older, had so much power over you . . . God. I wish he was alive so I could kill him.”
“Is it uncharitable for me to say I agree?”
“Fuck no, baby.”
She smiled. “This is also why.”
My heart skipped a beat, my stomach filled with butterflies. God, I loved this woman. I probably had for years, if I were being honest. Six years of staying in touch, six years of coaxing her to this moment.
Six long years that were worth it.
“I’m here,” I said.
“I know.” Another sigh. “So the last of it then, yeah?”
“If you want to share.”
A nod. “The last of it. As you might have guessed, things progressed. Pretty soon I was sleeping with him and not surprisingly, since he didn’t use protection, I got pregnant. I was thirteen. My parents freaked. The church freaked. I was freaked. But I loved Tim, or thought I did, anyway,” she said. “So when they asked if I wanted to marry him, I agreed. I didn’t want him to go to jail, like they said he would if I didn’t. I didn’t want to lose him.”
My jaw was so tight that it actually throbbed, but I didn’t interrupt.
“My parents consented, a local judge was paid off, and at thirteen . . . I was married.” She shook her head. “We moved, obviously. The congregation was horrified and . . . Tim wanted to get me away from my family and friends. He wanted to isolate me, to control me.” Her eyes closed. “And then he began hitting me. Often. For little things like not making his dinner taste good—no matter that I was thirteen and the most I’d ever cooked was pasta with butter or stovetop mac and cheese—or not folding his clothes correctly—I’d never even so much as turned on a washing machine. And for big things—like money being hard to come by and doctor’s appointments being expensive. It started with smacks, then got harder, until he was breaking bones instead of just bruising skin. And eventually . . . he hit me hard enough to make me lose my baby.”