Page 14 of Under His Protection

The truth, a jagged shard of glass, slices through the fragile fabric of my life. My heart hammers against my ribs. It’s as if a dam has broken inside me, unleashing a torrent of emotions that threaten to drown me. I see it all with brutal clarity: Alexander, the man I love, the man who swore to protect me, was driving the car, the car that took my parents from me.

The phone feels like a lifeline in the churning sea of my emotions. I punch in his number, each digit a sharp, insistent echo of the betrayal I feel. When it finally rasps through the receiver, his voice is a gruff murmur.

“Ava,” he says.

My voice shakes a thin thread of sound against the roar of the emotions inside me. “The accident,” I whisper. “I know about the accident.”

“What are you talking about?” he asks, his tone wary.

I can practically feel his resistance through the phone, the wall of secrets he’s built around his past. “I know about your family, about the crash. About Michelle and you driving the car,” I choke out, each word a struggle against the lump in my throat. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

The silence that follows feels like an eternity, a void filled with the unspoken truths that have shattered my world.

“Alexander,” I say, my voice rising. “How could you keep this from me? You knew about my parents’ death, about the accident; you were driving the fuckin’ car, and you never said a word. You killed them.”

Silence. A silence broken only by the sound of my breathing. The silence is deafening. I can hear his heavy breathing on the other end of the line. It’s shallow and uneven, a sound of struggle and restraint. He doesn’t say a word. He doesn’t even try to explain.

“You — you— you—killed my parents,” I sob.

I hang up the phone, my hands shaking.

There’s a deep emptiness taking hold inside of me. The man I love, the man I trust, the man I thought I knew, has been lying to me. He knows about my parents’ death, about the accident, and he hadn’t said a word. He’d watched me mourn, watched me grieve, and he hadn’t said a word. He was driving the fuckin’ car.

My fingers clench around the phone, digging into the cold plastic as I press the green button to make a call.

“Harvey,” I say, “It’s Ava.”

He answers with a gruff, “Ava, what’s going on? It’s late.”

“It’s about Alexander,” I say, my voice tight. “About the accident. You need to tell me everything you know.”

Silence hangs heavy on the line, then a sigh. “Ava, I—” he begins, his voice hesitant.

“Just tell me, Harvey,” I plead, my voice cracking. “Please.”

“Ava, I’ve wanted to tell you for a long time.”

“Then why didn’t you?!” I demand.

Is there a conspiracy to keep me in the dark?

He hesitates, a sigh escaping him, “I was afraid— afraid to hurt you. You were doing well, and I thought—”

“Well, I get to decide that, don’t I?” I interrupt, my voice cold.

“You’re right. I’m sorry,” he says, with a wave of exhaustion. “It didn’t matter for justice, though. There was no evidence that it was more than a tragic accident.”

“Tragic accident?” I scoff, the word tasting like bitter lemon on my tongue. “My life was shattered, Harvey. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t live after they were gone. It took me years to even reach the surface of the ocean I was drowning in.”

“I know, Ava, and I’m so sorry,” he says.

“Are you?”

I hang up before I say something I’ll regret, the red button flashing its finality. My mind races and Harvey’s words echo in my head: “There is no evidence.”

I don’t care about evidence right now. It doesn’t matter. The truth is out there, and I’m broken like a melody, now distorted, the notes of my life forever altered. The man I loved, the man I trusted, killed my parents.

I sink to the floor, my back against the wall, my body wracked with sobs. I knew his life was on the edge. But I hadn’t realized how dangerous, how deadly. Will I end up dead next? By Alexander’s next mistake? And was it a mistake?

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