Page 100 of Only the Small Bones
“What about you? What did Dr. Stein think?”
“She thinks it’s long overdue, and so do I.”
“So why are your shoulders so tense?”
“I didn’t say it would be easy, or that I’m not nervous. Just that it’s overdue.” I dropped my forehead to his.
“You know I’ll be in a bad mood later,” he warned.
“I know.” I sank my hands into his hair. Pushing himself past a limit always resulted in a bad mood, with him dwelling on the past and how it affected his present life. Dealing with his anger came with the territory of loving him, just like dealing with my guilt came with loving me. We were a work in progress.
“So I’m saying sorry in advance.”
“You don’t have to say sorry at all, Asher. Are you done here?”
“Yeah,” he sighed. “Just let me grab my backpack from Leland’s office.”
“Okay. I’m double-parked, so meet me in the car.” I held onto his fingers when he backed away, only letting go when he smiled at me. “I love you.”
“I love you more.” He turned, disappearing through a side door.
Leland and Franky were locked in a heated kiss at the bar, so I headed straight outside. Asher joined me a few minutes later. We linked hands across the center console before I pulled off. We didn’t speak during the drive into Brooklyn, but we squeezed each other’s hand when our thoughts allowed us a moment’s peace.
“We’re here,” I whispered, stating the obvious. We’d already been sitting in front of the park I was abducted from for a while. Asher hadn’t rushed me either. He’d just stared at the entrance right along with me. Getting out of the car, he came around and took my hand again.
It wasn’t an urban park, but when compared to the size of other neighborhood parks, this one was on a much grander scale. There were several entrances, and plenty of areas where one could go unseen. Areas perfect for kidnapping.
“This is where I saw her.” I pointed to the bench the woman responsible for my disappearance had sat on. It was close to the entryway we’d parked at. It had been simple to make a grab-and-run. “They never found her,” I murmured. I wondered where she was now. I looked around as if maybe she was here with us, strolling the grounds for her next victim.
I hadn’t stepped foot in a park since that day, and walking around now with Asher felt both light and heavy. Like reliving the pain while also shedding it. Asher remained a supportive presence at my side.
Kids played without a care in the world while their parents kept an eye on their surroundings. I’d once been innocent like them, believing a stranger taking interest in my pursuits was a good thing. Now I had more in common with the adults who knew the horrors that lurked nearby. Hopefully their children wouldn’t have to learn their hard lessons by living them like I did.
“How do you feel?” Asher asked once we’d exited park.
I inhaled the cool spring breeze, exhaling while I considered his question. “I feel free.” I leaned back against the passenger side door, pulling him with me and wrapping my arms around his waist. “I mean, I’m not suddenly ready to run the Central Park Marathon, but they can’t hurt me anymore.” I shrugged. “They didn’t win.”
“That’s right,” Asher said, rubbing a thumb over my cheek. “And anyone who wants to hurt you now has to go through me first.”
I gripped his ass, pressing his lower body into mine and stole a kiss. “Are you ready?”
“Yeah, let’s do this.”
I lifted my gaze to the gray clouds rolling in. “Like storm clouds on a rainy day,” I said, reminding him of what his mother used to tell him.
“I wish I could remember that.”
“Who knows. Maybe you will once we get there.” I opened his door, shutting it once he settled inside.
We arrived at the cemetery, following the instructions given to Isabella’s gravesite. His grandmother was buried beside her, but while Asher remembered a few things about his mother, he had no recollection of his nonna. If it weren’t for me, he wouldn’t have even known he called her that.
We’d stopped to buy flowers, and I knelt at their graves with him, helping to lay them below their tombstones. The clouds parted then, sunshine returning.
“They know we’re here,” he said before turning his smile to the warm rays of the sun. “It feels like I should’ve been here sooner.”
“It happened right on time.” I reminded him of something we learned in one of our sessions. Breakthroughs didn’t happen late, they happened when they were supposed to.
We spent the next hour chatting with the two people he once loved most. I filled them in on all the hard work he’d been doing to obtain his high school equivalency diploma, and he told them about my plans to bring Gargantuan to the big screen.
