Page 96 of Tell Me Something True

“She didn’t fight back. She never fought back. She just kept crying, saying how much she loved him and how she’d never steal from him. But even as a six-year-old, I knew she was lying. Even as a child, I knew what was about to happen to her. Mainly because I’d seen it so many times before. They were in the kitchen, right in front of my hiding spot, so I shut my eyes, and I covered my ears, but I could still hear everything. Mom crying. The sounds of her getting punched. Kicked. Her boyfriend… Todd or Tim or something starting with a T… screaming at her. Diesel, his German Shepherd, barking.”

“I shut my eyes,” she repeated, this time on a whisper, “and I kept my ears covered and I stayed hidden, just like I’d done all the other times. Until he threatened to kill her.”

Miles shifted again, this time scooting closer to the corner edge of the island.

Closer to her.

Close enough to gently press the side of his hip against hers.

“By the time I wiggled out of my hiding space, he was dragging her by the hair into the living room. I chased after them, crying for my mom, but I got too close, and Diesel snapped at me. Caught me on the chin.”

She once again lifted her fingers to her scar.

Todd or Tim or whatever the bastard’s name was had dragged the dog into the bedroom or it might have been much, much worse than a single bite.

“It wouldn’t stop bleeding,” she continued softly, so caught up in the memory, it was as if she could feel the sticky wetness of her blood between her trembling fingers. She lowered her hand. Tried to rub the sensation away on the top of her thigh. Up and down. Up and down.

Until Miles touched the back of her hand with his fingertips, stopping her.

They stayed that way for a moment. Hips touching, heads close and bent over, as they stared down at his hand on hers, his fingertips cool against her skin.

He slowly slid his fingers under her palm, giving her plenty of time to withdraw her hand.

She didn’t. Couldn’t have even if she’d wanted to.

She needed him.

More than that, she needed to be brave enough, strong enough to let him know that.

She turned her hand and curled her fingers around his palm.

And she held on tight.

“It wouldn’t stop bleeding,” she said again, steadier this time, “so Mom paid the woman across the hall to take me to the E.R. and say she’d been babysitting me.”

Head still bent, gaze still on their hands, he rubbed the pad of his thumb across her inner wrist. “Your mom didn’t want anyone to see her bruises.”

She nodded. “There would have been too many questions. She told me to tell anyone who asked that I fell and hit my chin on the corner of a coffee table. She said if I told them the truth, they’d kill Diesel, and that they’d take my mom away from me. It wasn’t until I was an adult and realized how manipulative she’d been that I recognized she’d chosen her words to make me feel responsible for what had happened. To let me know that by telling the truth, I’d be doing something wrong and would end up alone as punishment. So, I lied. I lied to the man who admitted me to the E.R. I lied to the nurse. I lied to the doctor who did my stitches. I lied to the social worker who visited me before I could leave. And I just… kept lying.” She paused. Stared at the top of his head. “Until now.”

Until you.

“What happened to the boyfriend?” he asked.

“When I got home from the E.R., both he and Diesel were gone. They never came back. My mother blamed me for it, but within a week, there was another loser boyfriend who took his place. And another after him. And another and another. So many men came in and out of my mom’s life and, because of that, mine.”

“What about your father?”

“Mom didn’t know who my father was. It was just her and me.”

Until it wasn’t.

But that was a story for another day.

“Tabitha,” Miles murmured, searching her eyes. “Why are you here? Why are you telling me this now?”

After everything she’d done, all the lies she’d told him, the secrets she’d kept from him, he had every right to ask her that. To be suspicious of her motives.

She knew that. She did.

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