She wished she could clean out her mind so thoroughly.
She stood there, back against the door, her hands pressing hard against her aching breasts.
The memories were so vivid. It could have been just yesterday. Or ten minutes ago. Or right now, this very moment.
She lifted the back of her hand to her mouth, stifling the hard, hard breath she drew.
The feel of him. Moving inside her. Filling her.
Oh, the way he tasted her.
Touched her.
Drove her.
There hadn’t been an inch of her body that he hadn’t explored. An inch of his that she hadn’t known.
She wrenched away from the door, her toothbrush and toothpaste clattering in the sink as she slapped the water faucet. She barely had the presence of mind to yank off her sweater so she didn’t soak it right through with the water she threw over her face, trying to douse the memories that were flooding her mind. Filling her veins.
Eventually, thankfully, she found some control again.
Though she felt exhausted, like she’d just run a marathon.
She used the toilet. Then back at the sink where her sleep-creased face looked back at her through the water running down the cracked mirror. She used way too many paper towels mopping up. Not just her face and arms, but the floor and the mirror and the sopping front of her thin camisole pajama top.
She should have thought to bring in fresh clothes from her bag. But it was too late now.
She brushed her teeth. Twice. And raked her hair into yet another braid that she had no way to fasten.
Sunlight began slanting through the little window high up on the wall. She’d spent too much time in there. Adam would be wondering what was taking her so long.
She couldn’t very well explain, either.
Their relationship was in the past.
Before different paths.
Before life and everything else that had resulted in her leaving her own baby.
Didn’t matter that—at the moment—what she and Adam had shared all those years ago felt exquisitely, excruciatingly alive.
She blew out an unsteady breath and reached for her cardigan. The slant of light shined brightly over the scars on her wrist.
Her vision pinpointed and her mind suddenly felt like it was exploding.
She barely had time to reach the toilet before she retched. And retched. And retched.
After, she sank down on the floor, feeling too weak to do anything else.
She didn’t know how long she sat there before Adam came looking for her. Just as she’d known he would. Because that was the man he was.
Concern was in his voice as he sharply rattled the locked knob. “Laurel. You in there?”
He didn’t deserve any of this. He shouldn’t need to come looking for her. To rescue her. She was a grown woman.
It still took everything she possessed to get herself off the floor. To her feet. Her legs felt like unraveling cotton. Her feet felt like blocks of wood.
It took two tries to unlock the door and she pulled it open. “Where else would I be?” She squeezed toothpaste for the third time that morning onto her toothbrush and turned on the faucet again.
“What’s wrong?”
Toothbrush in mouth, she shook her head. Tears still managed to squeeze out of her closed eyes. She was a basket case. That was what was wrong. And if he had a lick of sense, he’d stay far away from her.
She held her unraveling braid behind her neck and continued trying to brush the enamel right off her teeth.
Adam finally muttered an oath and took the toothbrush out of her hand. “Laurel.”
She leaned over, splashing water on her face all over again. It trickled down her cheeks, her neck, wetting her already damp camisole.
And still the tears burned, but no more so than the realization still charring her mind.
He grabbed her shoulders, forcing her to look at him. His eyebrows were nearly fused over his nose and lines creased his cheek where his dimple usually hid. He slid his hands around her wet face. “What’s wrong?”
“She killed herself. My mother. I remember it now.” She could no more hold in the thick admission than she could stop her tears. She lifted her wrist between them. Her wrist that was scarred so similarly to her mother’s. “She tried the first time when I was in grade school. A-and the second time before I started college. She was so vain you’d think she’d have preferred pills. But it was always her wrists.”
“Oh, baby.” He pressed his forehead to hers. “I’m sorry. So sorry.”
She swallowed hard against another wave of nausea and wrenched away from him. He was comfort. And safety.
And she didn’t deserve it.
“I’d visited them last fall. It was the first time in years. I was pregnant but I wasn’t really showing much. I intended to tell them, but—” She swallowed hard. “We argued. We always argued. About my friends. My hairstyle, my clothes. You name it. But this time it was my work. Mother was okay if she could brag about me working at some museum in Europe, but she went ballistic when I mentioned a modern gallery in Vancouver that was interested in me. Even though I’d thought I could stay with them for a while, I just...couldn’t. If I’d have stayed, I would have lost myself all over again and I walked out the front door and didn’t look back.” She closed her hands over the sides of the sink and pulled in a shuddering breath. “You know what they say about the third time. When my father called after Christmas to tell me she’d finally succeeded, he made sure to remind me that mother had been upset about Vancouver.” She shook her head, even though there was no denying the truth. “Every time.” Her throat felt raw. “Every time she tried hurting herself, it was because of me.”
“You are not at fault.” His voice was adamant. Immediate. “I don’t know much, Laurel, but I do know that.”
She
