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She didn’t stop in the kitchen. Her stomach was too raw and jittery to contemplate putting anything in it just yet. Instead, she ventured outside onto the porch and followed it around to the back, where a wooden swinging bench overlooked the forest.
She could breathe here.
Settling into the padded seat, she curled her legs under her and set it rocking, taking out her phone and staring at the blank screen as the bench swung back and forth as though by an invisible hand.
What was she meant to say to the people who had raised her, then grown to hate her for what she was? She couldn’t just blurt out her question and hang up, but she loved them despite all the pain they’d caused her.
If she didn’t hurry up, Saul would finish his business and come find her, stealing her opportunity to do this without a witness to her humiliation.
Bolstering her courage with a deep inhale, she unlocked the phone, brought up the contacts list, and scrolled down to a number she hadn’t used in…Jesus, she couldn’t recall the last time she’d spoken to her parents by phone. Even their last face to face interaction was blurry, but then, they’d hit her while she was down, repeatedly, and both the shock and pain of their betrayal had distorted nearly everything that happened that day.
Nauseous, Caera set the ball rolling with a tap of her finger on the screen.
“You’ve reached Samuel and Meredith Huxby! We’re not here right now, but please leave a message and we will get back to you when we get home.”
Her shoulders tensed at the sound of her mother’s voice. It was both a stranger’s and yet so familiar, bringing back memories of frozen yogurt, bedtime stories, and simmering anger.
The beep did its thing, and Caera managed to clear her throat. “Um, hi. I know it’s been a while. Um…” Why did she sound so inept? “I don’t want to bother you, but I need help. I—”
“Caera?” Her mom was breathless.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
“I don’t recognize the number you’re calling from. I can only hope you followed our advice and surrendered yourself to a facility. We told you before—we won’t help you if you continue refusing to help yourself.”
Same old Meredith, Caera thought as another chunk of her heart fell prey to her mother’s icy tone. Her number hadn’t changed since the last time they’d spoken. “That’s not why I’m calling.” There were no pleasantries, no asking how each other was doing or what they’d done during their time apart. No love. Yet Caera couldn’t help but offer an insight into her life. “I’m doing okay, by the way. I…I’m not fixed, but I’m better.”
“The only way you’ll ever be better is by getting the professional help you need. There’s something wrong with you, Caera. God knows your father and I tried to help, but until you acknowledge that a vital part of your brain is flawed, you’ll never live a normal life.”
Caera wheezed in a breath. Fuck, her mom hadn’t lost the ability to slice deep with her words. She struggled to absorb the shock, staunch the bleeding coming from her lacerated heart, but in a matter of seconds, Meredith had sent her stumbling back to being a teenager, lectured and belittled because her mother didn’t understand. “I-I…”
Flawed. It was just another word for defective, wasn’t it?
A shadow fell over her, and she glanced up, meeting Saul’s angry eyes with mortification. She handed over the phone when he wiggled his fingers, then burrowed into his side when he sat beside her and lifted his arm in invitation.
“…never could stand up for yourself. You always relied on us to be your voice, but when we told you to do something about this…condition, you stuck your head in the sand.” Meredith’s voice drifted from the phone when Saul switched it onto speakerphone. “You’ve never been able to think for yourself. Always relying on others to fix your messes.”
Saul lifted his chin, telling Caera to respond, but she couldn’t. She’d never been able to find her voice when her parents confronted her. Her brain spun streams of sentences, screaming them inside her skull, but her mouth wouldn’t work.
“No response? What a surprise. Didn’t grow out of that habit, did you?”
Caera reached out to end the call, too mired in pain to listen to anymore of her mother’s sly jibes, but Saul raised the phone out of her reach. Her heart tripped when he kissed her hair, a savage growl of displeasure reverberating in his chest.
“I suggest you mind your tone,” he said darkly.
Stunned silence. Caera felt Meredith’s shock—physically felt it. Her mother was not someone who was used to being chastised, particularly not by a stranger. It struck her suddenly that she was afraid of the people who had raised her—not because they’d hit her or abused her in a way that left visible marks, but because they had utilized all the words at their disposal to blackmail and manipulate her from being a child.
“Who the hell are you?”
“I am the one picking up the pieces of the woman you left to fend for herself when those she loved and needed the most abandoned her. I’m the one sitting here with the sweetest, most beautiful, most damaged young woman I’ve ever met.” The growl came again, rawer, throatier, angrier. “I’m beginning to understand where a lot of that damage stems from.”
“How dare—”
“Quiet,” he snapped, and the dominance in his tone cut Meredith off immediately. “Caera is going to ask you a question and you will give her an honest answer, then she’s done with you. She doesn’t need a toxic influence back in her life, and from what I’ve heard in the last couple of minutes, you are a vast pool of toxicity.”
Meredith spluttered, but he just plowed straight over the top of her, an unrelenting force of will. “If for one second I believe you are lying to her, I’ll make it my personal mission to dig so far back into your life—and your husband’s for good measure—that I’ll find out every dark and dirty little secret you’ve tried to hide. Do we understand each other?”
Caera winced, steeling herself against the inevitable tongue-lashing heading her way. Even the stroke of his hand down her arm couldn’t stop the shakes.
