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“Nothing!” I exclaim, backing off with my hands raised in surrender. “I saw her standing in the middle of the road. She looked like she’d seen a ghost. So I acted on instinct and pushed her out of harm’s way.”
“You saved her?” she spits, voicing my actions like they’re pure evil.
“Yes.”
Cayden hinted that Hazel was a touch insane, but when she throws back her head and laughs maniacally, I think he may have gone a little light on her. “Oh my God,” she says between winded breaths. “How ironic that you were the one who saved her. No wonder Cayden never told me who it was. But that’s just like Cayden. Your forever protector.” Her comment highlights the fact she knows Cayden and I have a past.
I gulp, refusing to address her crack. I know Cayden and I have history. But when I grow a pair, that story will be his to tell, and not hers. “Ironic? How?” I am sick of her speaking to me in sentences that make no sense.
But what she says next has me wishing I’d been kept in the dark forever. She steps forward, invading all personal boundaries, when she snarls inches from my face, “Because, not so long ago, you were the one she needed saving from.”
“No.” I gasp, shaking my head, tears sticking to my lashes. “That’s…that’s not true.” Cayden warned me of Hazel’s poison, but this is just sick. What kind of a mother would use their daughter that way just to upset another?
But when I blink past my tears, I see it. Hazel is a mother scorned because I, Peyton Veronica Lane, hurt her only daughter, and Ellie is living proof that what she says is true. Ellie was standing frozen in the middle of the road because of me. I thought at the time it appeared as if she’d just seen a ghost, because she had.
Me.
Whatever I did…I did to Ellie.
White noise surrounds me, and flickers of the lake, of someone drowning, flash before my eyes. They are treading water, pleading for their life, but I…I do nothing. I simply watch them take their last breath before they sink to the bottom, forgotten to the world.
Hazel’s insults fill the air, but I can no longer focus on anything other than fleeing and never looking back. I can only look forward as there is no other choice. It’s time to strip away the guise and uncover the truth. Once and for all.
All plans of walking home were long forgotten. I hailed a cab and was thankful the driver wasn’t a talker. During the ride home, all I could think about is what Hazel had said.
“Because, not so long ago, you were the one she needed saving from.”
The thought is so heinous, but it explains so much. The way Ellie acted when she first saw me, down to Cayden’s protectiveness over her when I was involved. I not only hurt him, but I hurt his daughter as well. I knew I wasn’t in the running for sainthood, but this is just unfathomable. So many secrets color my past. No wonder my mind is in no hurry to remember. I can forget, but Cayden, he can’t.
Which is why I step from the cab, give the driver a fifty, and look toward finally putting an end to this ordeal. Cayden is most likely at work, but I’m done giving him space. I need to know everything, regardless of the fact that it’ll ruin me forever. I plan on changing, and then I intend to sit on his front steps until he comes home. I don’t care how long that takes; this has to happen, and it has to happen now.
However, my bravery is all in vain because when I turn around, I’m reminded of life’s sick sense of humor. “Please, let me talk.” My walls must be erected ten feet high because Calvin raises his hands in surrender.
“What are you doing here? How did you know where to find me?”
Calvin descends my porch steps while I stand my ground. “There is no other place you’d be,” he replies, which has me taking a deep breath.
“So it appears everyone is privy to my past but me.”
“Can we talk?” Calvin isn’t offering an olive branch. He simply wants a chance to explain. “I don’t like how we left things. Stella assured me you’d be happy to see me again, but she was clearly mistaken.”
“Yes, she was.” I fold my arms across my chest, an invisible barrier to keep out the pain. My feelings on the matter are clear. If he wants to talk, he can do so out here. I don’t want this conversation to taint my home.
“I stayed away because prior to your accident, you gave me back this.” As he reaches into the pocket of his beige chinos, I hold my breath. The sunlight catches the ridged edges, showcasing the beautiful diamond I once wore. “We were engaged for one year, but we’ve known one another since we were kids.”
I run a hand down my face because this is almost too much. “Why did I end our engagement?”
Sighing, it’s evident the pain Calvin wears is real. “Because of the reason you’re here.”
