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"You can always start over," he replied. "I did it. I spent a lifetime making shitty decisions and dangerous choices, and now, I’ve got you."
He smiled at me, planting a kiss on my forehead. I couldn’t help but smile too. When he talked to me like that, as though I was the most precious thing he could imagine, it lit up my chest in a way nothing else ever had before. To have someone look at me and see everything I had been through, everything I had done, and not view me as less-than as a result? It felt like the kind of gift I would never have imagined I would be worthy of.
"We’ll figure everything out, with your family," he told me. "If it’s money you’re worried about …"
"It’s everything," I sighed. "Money’s just a part of it."
"You need to focus on yourself now, anyway," he reminded me. "Everyone else comes afterwards. Okay?"
"Okay," I breathed back. Sometimes, I needed to hear that—needed to hear that I was worth this work all on my own terms, even when it was tough for me to trust in.
"Come on, let’s get something to eat," he told me, propping himself up. "And we can start looking at those college applications for you."
I squeezed his hand a little tighter.
"You mind if we stay in bed a little longer?" I asked him playfully. "Those applications don’t close until midday …"
He grinned.
"I guess I could see my way to that," he murmured back, drawing me in close for a kiss. I knew there was a whole world outside of this bedroom I needed to think about, but right now, he was the only person I cared for. And I wanted to lose myself to him for a little longer yet.
Chapter Twenty – Paulo
I glanced around the cafe as I waited for Elena to arrive; I wasn’t sure if she was even going to turn up, but this had been the only way I could think of to start building the bridges that Selina needed to take her recovery to the next level.
She had no idea I was meeting with her mother today, and that was how I wanted to keep it; I wasn’t sure how this was going to go, and I didn’t want to put any pressure on her to feel like she had to make that first step until I’d got a feel for what the groundwork was looking like. I had tracked down her family, living halfway across the state now, and reached out to her mother in private, telling her that I had information about her daughter and wanted to meet with her. Though she had been doubtful at first, once I had sent her a couple of pictures of Selina and I together, she had agreed for me to fly out and meet her.
She had to have her doubts about me, and I knew that. The last she had heard of her daughter, she had been dancing at a strip club, and no doubt she thought that I was just another in a long line of men who had gotten her to perform in some way for their back pocket. I wouldn’t have blamed her for refusing to come anywhere near me, but I hoped she would at least give me the chance to prove that I had Selina’s best interests at heart.
I’d chosen this cafe, far from the mansion we were still living at, to make sure Selina didn’t have to run into her. I knew how vulnerable she still was, even as she started getting her life back on track. She had been putting in applications all over the city for college courses, to finish up her GED and start studying psychology; she wanted to help other women who had been through what she had survived, she told me, and I couldn’t have been more proud of her for wanting to use what she had been through for good. It couldn’t have been easy, but that was the kind of woman she was—willing to take on the hard stuff when she knew there was a chance to help someone else in the process.
The bell over the door jingled, and I looked up to see Elena, Selina’s mother, walking in; I recognized her at once, the same green eyes gazing around the room, beneath a coif of gray hair. When she saw me, she stopped in her tracks for a moment, swallowed hard, and then came over to sit down opposite me.
"Paulo?" she asked me. Her voice was tight, taut, as though she hardly dared to hope for what I might have to offer her. I nodded.
"That’s me," I replied. "Thank you for coming here today, Elena. I know it can’t have been easy."
"Easier since you paid for first class," she shot back, managing a small smile. I chuckled. They had moved away from Bianco after what had happened to Selina, unsurprisingly, and I wanted her to travel in style when she came back.
"Well, I’m glad you’re here, either way," I replied. She crossed her arms over her chest, and I could see how drawn her face looked – hope mixed with doubt in her eyes. She wanted to trust that I had the answers she had been looking for all this time, but she just wasn’t sure.
"What can you tell me about my daughter?" she asked me finally. That was what she was here for, no doubt about it. She wanted to know what was happening with her little girl, and I could see the strain of being kept from her for so long written all over her face. I took a deep breath. I had been preparing how to answer this question for a long time, not wanting to reveal too much, but needing her family to understand the extent of what she had been through.
"The most important thing for you to know right now is that she’s safe," I assured her upfront. "She’s living comfortably, she’s applying for college, and she’s looking for a job. Physically, she’s in good health. Mentally, it might take her more time to get there."
"What happened to her?" Elena asked, her voice cracking. I grimaced. I wished I didn’t have to give her any of the details, but she needed some explanation as to what had happened these last few years.
I filled her in on the barest outline of it, that she had worked as a dancer for a while, and then moved into other work, dealing with substance abuse along the way. That she had gotten into it to support her family, and that she had never stopped thinking about them or sending money back to them. That she was safe now, and the man who had abused her would never trouble her again.
I could tell how much it hurt her, hearing those words come out of my mouth; I couldn’t even imagine it. It was hard enough for me to be aware of what Selina had gone through, and I had only known her a couple of months; for her mother, the woman who had brought her into this world and raised her, it must have been a million times harder.
"Oh, God," Elena muttered when I was done. Her face was pale, and her hands shaky as she clasped them on the table in front of her.
"I know how hard this must be for you to hear," I told her. "But if there’s one thing I want you to take from this, she’s safe now. She’s working on herself, she’s getting better, she’s leaving all of that behind her.”
Her mother nodded, brushing a hand over her hair and patting it back into place, gathering herself.
"I never thought …," she murmured, shaking her head. "I knew she had gotten involved with some … sleazy stuff, but I had no idea … If I’d known …"
