“We all make bad dating choices, Grace.”
“Jimmy raped me,” Grace quietly admitted.
“I’m going to kill him,” Sage said, so much fury in her voice.
“That’s not the worst of it, Sage. While I was drugged and unconscious, he took pictures of me—bad pictures. Then he used those to blackmail me for a couple of years. I told my mother about it, but she reamed me up one side and down the other. She said I would disgrace the family if I ever said anything.”
Grace stopped, hating to admit this ugliness to her best friend.
“That wasn’t your fault, Grace. And that woman you call ‘Mother’ doesn’t deserve that title. She never has. How dare she shame you!” Sage looked as if she wanted to punch something.
“After I found him in bed with my mother, I stopped paying him the money. If she could sleep with a man who had done what he’d done with me, I was no longer worried about shaming her. He was too much of a coward to keep coming after me when I refused to pay him anymore, but as if one or two mistakes weren’t enough, then I met Vince.”
She stopped again, hating to confess her shame even more.
“I remember you speaking about him. But you never said anything bad,” Sage said. They were still driving as the sun dropped from the sky, and soon they entered Billings. The car stopped but neither of them moved.
“Your life was so good. It seemed that everyone’s lives but mine were good, so I glamorized it all, made it sound like I had this amazing hot Italian lover who rocked my world, but in reality he was demeaning, demanding, and horrible to me. It took me a year to get away from him. I just always make the wrong choices, it seems. I don’t want to keep doing that. I want to be stronger.”
“Ah, honey, you are so much stronger than you think. Don’t continue to berate yourself for trusting people or protecting people who should love you unconditionally. And always remember that I love you no matter what,” Sage told her as she reached across the seats and pulled Grace close for a hug.
“I love you, too, Sage. Thanks for listening to me. It does feel better to get some of this off my chest,” Grace said.
“One more piece of advice,” Sage added before pausing. “Don’t push Cam away. For years I’ve watched you push people away for fear of getting hurt. Don’t do it with Cam. He really is one of the good guys.”
“I don’t know if I’m qualified to tell who the good guys are anymore,” Grace said.
“You will know if you search your heart. But I won’t keep preaching at you about it,” Sage told her.
She didn’t say anything more, just got out of the car and waited for Grace to join her. Grace didn’t know what she was going to do next. But it was much too late to push Cam from her life, because no matter what she told anyone, she knew that she really did love him.
Grace used to love watching movies, because they allowed her to sink into a world of make-believe and live, if only for a couple of hours, anywhere but in the here and now. She was suddenly the heroine of the story, traveling through space and time, or having a man do that all for her, just to be with her. Real life wasn’t nearly that simple or nearly that happy. If only it were.
She was home. Finally. And she loved her place, a nice cottage-style home nestled in the trees and only steps away from the slow-flowing creek that she loved so much. The place was only about two thousand square feet, but it was an open floor plan with wonderful views of the hills, the water, and the forest all around her.
The spacious kitchen boasted an island and a built-in oven where she might actually find some enjoyment in cooking. The living room was off the kitchen and she’d lovingly picked out deep-chocolate-colored leather furniture that was both beautiful and comfortable and had already hung colorful splashes of artwork on her walls, making the interior feel welcoming.
Her favorite part of the home was the large master bedroom with a king-sized bed, deep-purple bedding, and, again, large windows she could open up and listen to the birds sing through. It wasn’t the size of Cam’s place, and she’d certainly love to own his bathroom, but she hadn’t wanted to be extravagant and remind herself of the home she’d grown up in.
She was more than willing to give up some luxuries to have peace of mind. And that was exactly what she should have been feeling. Unfortunately, she wasn’t.
A full week had now passed since she’d last spoken with Cam, and she was beginning to think he’d given up on her, but that morning a bouquet of flowers had arrived with a simple note attached: Call me when you’re ready.
The words were simple, and she’d read them a thousand times over, trying to inject meaning into them, but the bottom line was that she couldn’t find fault with them. He wasn’t suddenly trying to make her do something she didn’t want to do. He was leaving any decision up to her.
And she didn’t know what to do with that. She didn’t know how to handle this new way he was choosing to communicate with her. So she’d sat at home and watched movies since noon. Along with her movies, she’d eaten a few bowls of heavily buttered popcorn and drunk a little too much wine. Talk about a glamorous Friday night.
And still, unlike the endings of the movies she had chosen to watch, she was feeling distinctly unhappy. During the course of the evening, she’d grabbed her phone about two dozen times and tried desperately to work up the courage to call Cam, to tell him she was ready to talk. But each time she put the phone down without dialing.
Finally, her eyes were drifting shut, when there was a knock on her door. Jumping up, she glanced at the clock, noting it was nearly midnight. Who in the world would be knocking on her door at that hour?