Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 111860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 559(@200wpm)___ 447(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 559(@200wpm)___ 447(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
She took a sip of tea, too, and then set it down on a coaster on the side table next to her. “Me? No. Single and satisfied. But . . . I’m not opposed to marriage if the right man comes along.” And her mom and dad definitely weren’t opposed. Even if they weren’t pushy about it, she saw the flare of hope in their eyes every time she mentioned going on a date. And she knew it was solely because happiness had been ripped away from her and they wanted nothing more than for her to find it again. Because they loved her. Because they didn’t want her story to end in heartbreak. “I was engaged once,” she said. She immediately pressed her lips together, almost shocked by the admission. She hadn’t meant to say it, and certainly wasn’t in the habit of disclosing that fact to anyone, much less the hard-to-read FBI agent she’d so recently met.
When she looked over at Ambrose, she found him playing idly with the tag at the end of the tea bag and studying her. “What happened?”
Their eyes held, and something she had no idea how to describe moved between them. “I . . . he died,” she finally said.
“I’m sorry.”
She gave her head a small shake and was tempted to administer a few hard taps to her cheek, as though she’d temporarily gone into a fugue state and needed to be physically jolted out of it. She picked up her tea and took another sip just to stall. Once she’d placed it back down, she said, “It’s . . . thank you. It was a long time ago.” Thirteen years and three months and only yesterday. “And we were young.”
“Things that happen when we’re young have the most impact on our lives.”
She looked away. She had to. There was something in those eyes of his that she didn’t want to look into. She’d seen it before in the gazes of the victims she’d met. Hurt. And it embarrassed her because he was hurting for her and he didn’t need to. She didn’t want it. It was too much. She’d felt like a victim today. She still did, and she didn’t want to be reminded of another time when she’d felt like a victim too. “You’re full of wisdom, aren’t you?”
He gave her a small tilt of his lips, but his eyes remained serious. There had been sarcasm in her tone, and she’d said it to push back against the uncomfortable feelings he brought out in her. It wasn’t like her to do that, and it made her feel bad. “I’m sorry. No, you’re right. It was hard. It changed me. But, well, time heals all wounds, as they say.” She barely held back a cringe. She hated that saying, and it wasn’t even true. In fact, it couldn’t be further from the truth. Time buffed away the raw edges, yes, but underneath those edges were layers of what-ifs and what-could-have-beens, and they were as rough as sandpaper. If you rubbed against them too hard and too often, you would make yourself raw. You would bleed.
“How long ago did he die?” Ambrose asked.
“Thirteen years ago.” She sighed, still surprised by her own candor. “He was my high school boyfriend. He proposed to me the summer after we graduated. We were going to get married after college.” The whole future had stretched out before them, and when he died, that future had died along with him. She’d been adrift, with no idea where to go from there, the path that had once been so clear suddenly covered in dense fog. As dense as that which could swallow the entire city so that, from certain vantage points, you couldn’t see it at all. Entire buildings. Entire lives. Gone. Lost in the mist. “I was going to be a teacher,” she told him. “I hadn’t even decided exactly what kind. I wanted to teach kids to read, but I also wanted to teach art history, or maybe music.” She’d pictured it, her classroom, the way she’d decorate it in bright colors, the little faces that would gaze up at her with awe as she filled their minds with words and art and beauty. Not the most exciting of dreams, perhaps. But just the thought of it had warmed her heart and made her purpose feel so clear. “I’d completed a year toward my teaching degree. Tanner was majoring in criminal justice. The teacher and the inspector. What a beautifully simple life. And then . . . then it all blew up.”
“You switched majors?”
She nodded. “It seemed right at the time. I can’t even remember why it felt so right.” Maybe it’d just been something to do when, in every other way, she’d felt so utterly helpless. Devastated.