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In two strides, he's in front of me, his hands lifting to wrap around the back of my neck. His fingers splay into my hair, gripping me gently but firmly as his thumbs tilt my chin upwards, forcing me to meet his gaze.
“I can’t look at you differently,” he says, his voice low and intense. “To me, you’ll always be the same girl that walked into my tattoo studio ten years ago.”
His eyes search mine, as though seeking to reassure me of his words. His fingers shift, stroking my hair in a soothing gesture.
A tear leaks from the corner of my eye and lands on his hand. “Isn’t that the problem? I’m not her anymore.”
I see nothing but pain in his features before he dips his chin in understanding.
“Listen to me, okay?” he murmurs, a new urgency to his voice. “We’re going to get through this. Together. But right now, I need you to check if there are any photos missing. We need to know if they took anything.”
He seems to sense my inner turmoil. His arms tighten around me, a silent promise of his unwavering support. With a soft sigh, he pulls away, just enough to capture my hand in his.
His gaze is intense as he lifts my hand, pressing a warm, lingering kiss to my palm. “I’m right here,” he reassures, his voice a soothing murmur against my skin. His eyes never leave mine. “I’m right here, baby.”
It could be five minutes or an hour, but he keeps his word and remains at my side. Silent, but a pillar of support I lean against.
This is what it has come down to.
Ten years in a journal. That’s all that’s left.
The corners aren’t charred like I expected. There’s no damage. It’s exactly how I left it. This couldn’t have been in the house when it burned down.
My gaze darts from the journal in my hands to the box it came in. It’s filled with old scrapbooks, mostly of Hannah’s. Her first steps, her first words, her toothless baby smiles—all captured and carefully preserved in these books. She’s going to love them.
“Beth?” I don’t realize there’s tears streaming down my cheeks until Logan wipes one away with his thumb.
I don’t want him to see more. Stepping away from him, I peel back the pages with trembling hands.
All color drains from my face as I see what's inside.
Pictures, so many pictures of a person I barely recognize. A woman battered and bruised, her spirit beaten out of her by the man who had vowed to love and cherish her. Each photo a stark reminder of a past I desperately want to forget. I stifle a sob with my hand as I continue to flip through the pages, my mind a whirl of emotions.
They’re all there. But it's not the pictures or the words written in my shaky handwriting that truly terrify me. It's the red ink, the scarlet letters scrawled across some of the pages. Like a paper graded by a teacher, each page bears a mark of judgement.
“Whore,” one page reads. The word is sharp, a brutal reminder of the cruelty I endured.
“Slut,” it screams at me.
Page after page, each one tarnished with a vile word. “Worthless.” “Useless.” “Failure.”
But I didn’t write those words. They were added long after I was done with it.
They’rehiswords.
With a gasp, I drop the journal as if it's on fire. The echoes of those words continue to bounce around my mind, but now they're muffled, muted by the deafening silence in the room.
Each breath is like inhaling broken glass, my chest tightening with a pain that doesn't have a physical origin. “He's dead,” I echo, my own voice sounding distant to my ears, a hollow whisper that seems to reverberate around the room. “He's dead...”
Firm hands cradle my face, and Logan's intense eyes capture mine, grounding me, anchoring me to the present. “He's dead. You're safe.”
The implications hit me like a freight train, staggering me back as the room spins, my hand reaching out blindly for support. My knees buckle, and I collapse against the counter, my heart thundering like a wild animal trapped in a cage. “Oh, God,” I gasp, the reality too much, too painful, too raw.
Logan is there, a constant presence, a soothing balm against the storm of my emotions. “You need to talk to me.”
The images haunt me, taunt me. The memory of Rob taking Hannah. The fire. His death. A tidal wave of guilt washes over me, threatening to pull me under with its relentless pull.
“He saw it,” I whisper, each word a dagger to my heart. “He saw all the pictures.”
