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Perhaps when he said he knew all that mattered to him, he was being truthful. And well, in reality, if he couldn’t accept it, then wasn’t I better knowing now? Before he had the chance to break an even bigger part of my heart the longer I stayed? Because only one of two things was going to happen. He would either say that he didn’t care about my past crime, or he would ask me to leave.
Now the question was, would I be willing to risk it? Because if the only reason I wouldn’t marry him was because I didn’t want him to trap him. To allow him to enter into such a relationship without knowing who and what I had done. Then wasn’t dating him just the same thing? Foolishly allowing him to believe I was one thing, when I was in fact another?
So, I had to ask myself… what was the difference?
I was being deceitful either way and I could now make a choice. I could continue pretending to be who he wanted me to be, or I could confess to what I had done and hope that he chose being with me regardless.
Because Ryker could have done the same thing. He could have continued to hide who he truly was from me for fear that I would want to leave him. For fear that I wouldn’t accept the real him. But he hadn’t done that to me, and I knew that he deserved the same in return.
“Fuck it!” I groaned before running out of the room and down the golden hallway.
“Ryker! Ryker, please… please, don’t go… I’m sorry… I am not who you think I am!” I shouted the moment I saw him still walking back the way we came. He was near the center of the cave where the bed was and he froze as soon as I said this, now looking back at me over his shoulder.
“Do you love me?” he asked before turning to face me, making my shoulders slump before admitting with tears in my eyes,
“Yes… yes, I love you. Of course, I love you. How could I not, Ryker? Other than Arthur, you are the best thing to ever happen to me and despite everything that happened, all the running I did, in truth I was just scared. Scared because for the first time in my life, I knew what it was like to love and fear what it could do to me. Because honestly… I have loved you ever since our first kiss.” At this he closed his eyes, as if trying to deal with the rush of emotions my words brought him. As if this had meant the absolute world to him. Which was why when he started striding his long legs back to me, I put my hand up quickly to stop him.
“But there is more, Ryker.”
“And I told you once before, sweetheart, there is nothing that could change the way I…”
“I killed my mom.” I blurted it out on a desperate sob, making him pause his steps.
“What?” he whispered, and I bit my lip to try and stop it from quivering. But knowing that I had so much more to say, and while there was still distance between us, I rushed to carry on,
“I didn’t mean for it to happen, but he was hurting her again.”
“Who?” he gritted out venomously.
“M-my… my step-dad,” I answered on a stuttered whisper, making him look pained, closing his eyes for a few seconds before asking me firmly,
“What did he do, Evelyn?” His voice was as hard as granite when he said this, but I knew it wasn’t aimed at me.
“What he always did… he ruined everything!” At this I broke down and just as I was falling to my knees, Ryker was there to catch me. He lifted me into his arms, and I curled into his hold and sobbed.
I cried out all the years of pain. The shame and the heartbreak. I poured it all out like it would never stop. Because it never did. It never went away. Day by day it ate away at me, one small piece at a time.
“Ssshh, it’s okay… I’ve got you… I’ve got you now,” he soothed down at me as I sobbed my heart out, crying what felt like years of held in emotion. I had locked that night away for so long, that now it was free once more, it was like reliving the past all over again. I felt Ryker sit, knowing we had made it to the bed, and I was positioned onto his lap. He stroked back my hair from the side of my face as I soaked my tears into his shirt. But he just let me cry, knowing that I needed to get it all out. Only asking me for more details when I had calmed enough to speak again.
“Are you ready to tell me what happened, baby?” he asked tenderly, making me nod. So, I shifted off his lap next to him, and folded my legs up, hugging them to my chest.
“He had a drinking problem but even when he was sober, he was an asshole. Like he didn’t know how to be anything else, you know?” Ryker nodded and told me,
“Men like him don’t deserve to have a family, and they don’t deserve the love of a good woman.” I swallowed hard and nodded.
“No… no they don’t,” I agreed, rubbing my nose on the back of my hand because there was nothing else. Well, until Ryker suddenly tore some of the silk off the sheets, making me jump.
“You didn’t have to…” He gave me a pointed look and asked,
“What happened when he drank, Evelyn?”
“At best, he was verbally abusive, at his worst, he became violent,” I admitted, holding myself tighter as I remembered what he put us through. Ryker gritted his teeth and looked like he wanted to kill him all over again.
“I begged my mom to leave him, but she was terrified he would find us, and it would make it so much worse when he did. But she would always protect me, whenever he turned on me, she was always there, taking the hits, the punches. Then he would leave, and I would be there holding the ice packs to my mom’s face or cleaning up the blood, feeling guilty it was her and not me,” I told him, needing to wipe a fresh stream of tears.
“Baby, no, you were just a child,” he told me softly, pained by my admission.
“I know but at the time, I just wanted it all to stop, you know? I just thought if he went away, so would all the pain, all our problems. It would just be me and my mom again, dancing on Sunday mornings to the radio, eating pizza on Fridays watching gameshows together. All the stuff we used to do before he came into our lives,” I told him, trying so hard to hold onto those memories I had of her. The ones that didn’t have him tainting our lives.
