Page 24 of Tempt

“No.”

She brings me a cup of tea ten minutes later, anyway. She sets it on the bedside table and curls up next to me on the too-small bed. “Do you mind if I talk at you?”

I smile faintly. “No.”

“You and Luke are a lot alike.”

I growl, and she laughs.

“God, you’resoalike.”

I twist my head and look at her. Her face is soft, faint lines decorating her wide mouth and her tired eyes. She’s beautiful and kind, and my brother doesn’t deserve her. “What do you see in him?”

Her eyes go soft and sad at the same time. “I love him. I always have.”

“He’s an asshole.”

“So are you, and I love you, too. So shut up and listen to me, okay?”

I make a face.

“It’s time to talk to someone.”

“I’ve spent the last year talking to people. Lawyers, mediators.”

“A therapist. A real one, who can do trauma therapy around your childhood.”

That makes me snort. We were raised in wealth and privilege, as I was sharply reminded by the judge today. So much wealth and privilege I got to keep my fucked-up ass out of jail because I could buy my way out of it.

Grace doesn’t take the bait. She lets me laugh, then waits out my silence.

“No,” I finally said. “I don’t need a shrink. End of story.”

It’s notthe end of anything, of course. She lets it go, but picks it back up again a few days later. Then a week goes by. Another poke.

I stop shaving, and she tells me even mountain men need to talk about their feelings.

But it’s one day when I wander into her studio with takeout coffee that she finally says it another way.

“I think you were abused. Both you and Luke. And nothing will get better until you deal with it.”

I don’t know what I expected her to say, but it wasn’t that. “Fuck no. Nobody ever hit me.”

Her gaze doesn’t waver. “There’s more than one kind of abuse. Were you ever told you were loved? Ever hugged?”

The corners of her mouth curl down. “No.” She sighs. “I’m sorry for the little boy who didn’t get hugged enough.”

Enough? Try at all. Fuck. A roaring, tearing ball of rage surges inside me.

Don’t ignore me.

“You need to talk to someone.”

“I’m talking to you.”

“I’m not the right person to help.”

“Grace, I know you mean well, but believe me—nobody else but you will ever see me as any kind of victim here. Part of my restitution to society is explicitly not framing myself in that light, all right? Leave it be.”

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