Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 128980 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 645(@200wpm)___ 516(@250wpm)___ 430(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128980 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 645(@200wpm)___ 516(@250wpm)___ 430(@300wpm)
“In the bluebell woods?”
“At your house,” I correct him. I’d happily remain right in this exact spot forever, but that would be a silly dream. My actual request isn’t silly. There’s no reason why we can’t just hide here forever; just me and him.
He looks off into the distance as if considering my request. “We have things to deal with,” he says, but more to himself than to me.
Nevertheless, I still answer him. “We don’t have to deal with them.” I sound sure of that, but Jake’s fleeting look of sympathy tells me I shouldn’t be. He’s looking down at me, seeming torn. “No one knows we’re here. They don’t have to,” I say quietly.
“You want to live with unfinished business threatening to catch up with you?”
“It’s finished,” I retort, more snappily than I meant. If I never see my father again, it’ll be too soon. Mum can visit me here. Or I’ll Skype her. And I can’t help but imagine Heather and me poring over our designs at Jake’s huge kitchen table, or maybe even converting one of the outbuildings into a work studio. It would be perfect. So perfect. London is only a couple of hours away. It’s doable.
Jake sighs, heavily and despondently. “The police are looking for me, Cami. I don’t want anything to hold us back. I want a clear path, angel. I want you to pursue your career. I want us to be together. I want us to be happy. No holding back.”
“What if the path is never clear?” My father is a relentless bastard. I know him. He doesn’t know how to lose.
“It will be.” He sounds adamant, but it doesn’t lessen my trepidation. I might be suggesting the most cowardly option, but it’s also the easiest. “It’s going to be okay.”
Jake doesn’t sound so resolute this time. He averts his eyes from mine, only emphasizing it.
I feel incredibly protected here, but catching these occasional signs of uncertainty in him, seeing him have these internal battles, makes me question my peace. It makes me feel very unprotected. I fall into thought. I realize the situation with my father isn’t cause for us to be dancing on the ceiling, but why do I think there’s something else? Something more.
My mind is quickly bombarded with flashbacks of that silver picture frame and Jake’s happy face. “Who is she?”
He doesn’t ask me what on earth I’m talking about, despite my question being vague. I start chewing my lip nervously.
He stiffens above me, his face remaining straight, but his dark eyes darken. He shakes his head.
“Jake, who is she?” I repeat, ignoring all the signs that are telling me to drop it.
He’s up and off me in the blink of an eye, leaving me bare and now chilly on the woodland ground. “Everything isn’t always as it seems, Cami,” he says through a tight jaw. “Don’t believe everything you see.” He paces over to his pile of clothes and yanks his jeans up, pulling them on aggressively.
Sitting up, I wrap my arms around my legs, feeling small and stupid. I watch warily as he wrenches and yanks at the buttons of his fly, trying to fasten them. His hands are shaking. “Then tell me what to believe,” I plead tentatively.
He breathes in deeply and turns to me. “I’m not ready to share that part of me with you.”
Hurt slices me, and I drop my gaze to the ground, not wanting him to see it. So there’s something to tell, but he doesn’t want to tell me? He knows everything there is to know about me. It doesn’t seem fair. He knows what Sebastian did to me. I confided in him when I’d never breathed a word of Sebastian’s violent outbursts to anyone except Heather. No one could know I’d been that weak. Never.
I could get up and walk away from Jake. I could demand to know and refuse to let it rest until he tells me.
I could.
But I won’t.
Perhaps my subconscious is telling me I actually don’t want to know. It’s painful to him, therefore it means something. Anyone who’s caused him to behave so hurt and damaged hurts me also. Not because Jake feels that way but, selfishly, because someone else had that power over him. Someone else had that effect on him, and they still have.
“Angel?”
I show him my face. It’s not streaming with tears, nor is it hurt or slighted. It’s just me. “I understand,” I tell him, even though I don’t.
But my reasons for not wanting to know go way deeper than Jake could ever comprehend. I don’t want to believe he ever existed before I found him—that he was a soldier or, most significantly, that he was someone else’s. I want to believe that he was just a shadow. Or that he’s always been mine.