Page 183 of Capturing You
But even as he voiced the questions, he remembered. She’d had a new boyfriend, a secret older boyfriend.
“I didn’t know.” Tears filled her eyes, and she lowered her head, hiding her face with her hair. “I swear, Forbes, I didn’t know.”
Leo had cheated on his wife. He’d been in his mid-twenties. Married too young. Apparently, not ready to be tied down.
The rumors had been that he’d cheated with a younger woman.
“You were having an affair with Leo Taggart.”
“I was so stupid. I knew he was married, but he said he wasn’t happy, and their marriage wasn’t going to last. He said he loved me.”
Hot fury had Forbes’s heart monitor beeping double-time.
Of course that snake had told Rosie he loved her.
Forbes was ready to hunt him down and kill him. Except…
“You shot him.”
“Yes.”
“Did you know it was him?”
“Back then? I had no idea. It’s only in retrospect that I realize he’s probably the one who let me go.”
“But last night?”
“I saw him leaving the house, carrying a gas can. I didn’t know who it was until the flames lit his face.”
It was too much for Forbes to process. He couldn’t imagine how she felt.
“I’m sorry you had to shoot him.”
“I’m just sorry I didn’t figure it out twenty-five years ago.”
“Where did you go?”
“I called Gran.” She smiled across his bed at their grandmother, who’d listened to the story with her eyes closed.
She didn’t open them now.
“She was worried they’d come after me,” Rosie said, “and worried that, if they did, they’d harm you. So she arranged for me to meet with a lawyer, who got me set up with a new identity. I moved south. With Gran’s help, I got into Duke. Without you and Mom and Dad, I felt totally alone. But midway through my freshman year, I met a friend. She learned my parents had been killed. She and her family took me in and basically became my new family. I call her sister. I call them Mom and Dad. It’s not the same, but it’s family, you know?”
He nodded, though he didn’t know. He’d only ever had Gran. “All these years, you never reached out to me.”
Again, Rosie flicked a gaze to Grandmother. “She didn’t think it would be safe.”
The old woman didn’t defend herself. She didn’t say a word, though her shoulders shook.
He’d never seen Gran cry.
Brooklynn crouched beside her and wrapped her arm around her shoulders. She didn’t say anything, just comforted her with her presence.
Forbes didn’t know how to feel. Angry at Gran for lying to him for all those years—that was there.
But he was so grateful that Rosie was alive and well, and that was because of Gran too. They’d come through it, and now they were together again.
“Tell me about this.” Forbes gave his sister’s left hand a pointed look, focused on the wedding ring.
