Page 114 of Make Her Mine

“You went and talked to him?”

She takes a breath, and nods. “I did. I threatened to press charges. The only reason that I even considered not going to your father, or other law enforcement, was because Graham and Jefferson got you away from him.” She straightens and looks at me. “It was also too late to really prove anything by the time I found out. I was afraid he’d get a slap on the wrist, if even that. It would have killed your father to know what had happened and not be able to really do anything about it through the system. He might have…” She swallows. “He might have actually done something really out of line and ruined his career.”

Basically she’s saying if she’d told my father, he would have found Zach and beat the hell out of him. Or worse.

Adrianne reaches out and takes my mom’s hand. My mom smiles at her and goes on. “Thanks to Graham and Jefferson, you were okay. You had a hell of a hangover, but nothing worse happened. So…I decided to just let Zach know that I knew everything and hope that the threat that I could expose him at any time would keep him in line.” Her eyes get a little shiny. “And that it would keep him from doing that to you or anyone else again.”

I look at Jefferson. He’s staring at our mothers. I turn back to her. “But how did you really find out? How did you know I wasn’t just hung over from the beer?”

She looks at Adrianne again. “Graham was beside himself after he brought you home.”

I frown. “He left after he dropped me off.” I had gone upstairs to shower.

My mom shakes her head. “He did. He tried to. But he was so upset, he came back. He felt awful for not calling me the night before. There’s only a small window where the drugs are still present in your system and we were past that. You weren’t sexually assaulted?—”

I hear a rumble, almost a growl, from Jefferson and his arm comes around me and he pulls me closer.

“Thank God,” my mom adds. “But the drug would have still shown up in your urine for a few hours. It was too late by the time you got home.” She takes a deep breath. “Graham told me what happened and…I went to find Zach, but—” She looks at Jefferson. “Jefferson had already been there. Zach was in really bad shape.”

I suck in a breath and look up at Jefferson. His jaw is tense, and he doesn’t meet my eyes, but I feel his hand on my shoulder tighten.

“That actually helped me get my shit together,” my mom says. “Seeing there had already been some consequences for Zach’s behavior, knowing others knew what happened, helped me gather my emotions a little. He was a very stupid, selfish young guy. But Jefferson showed him that he couldn’t get away with everything. I realized that I wanted to scare him, hurt him, but…” She sighs. “Not ruin his whole life.” She looks at me with a small sad smile. “Trust me, if he had actually hurt you in any other way, I would’ve ruined him.”

“There wouldn’t have been anything left of him to ruin,” Jefferson says from beside me, his voice low and tight.

My mom looks at him again and nods.

“I told Zach that I was going to watch him. Keep tabs. That if he ever thought of making a woman do something she didn’t want to do, I would come forward with the story. Even if it was too late to do anything legally to him, I could ruin his reputation, ruin his family’s reputation here in town, make things very difficult for him.”

I nod, my thoughts spinning.

One thing about small towns like Sapphire Falls—people will have your back, but they’ll also hold you accountable.

My parents are upstanding parts of this community. People like them, respect them, and trust them. The town would have believed my mom if she’d made public what Zach had done.

Zach would have never been able to come back to Sapphire Falls if this story had gotten out. His dad’s heating and air conditioning business would have suffered. His mom’s job at the school would have been very difficult. Their friends would have thought of them differently. Their social connections and simply life as they knew it would have changed.

Sure, jail would have been a huge threat, but honestly? Upending his family’s happy, content life here in their hometown was a pretty big ultimatum to give him.

“As far as I know, he’s still been a jerk, but he didn’t mess around with drugs, not himself or with anyone else the entire time he was in college, and he had good relationships with the girls he dated.”

I nod, all of these revelations swirling.

“And I didn’t worry about you,” my mom says with a smile. “I knew you had the Riley boys looking out for you. And all your friends. And all of us.” She looks around the table again and all of the women nod.

I take a deep breath. “I…wow. I just…didn’t know that you knew.”

“I wanted you to tell me when you were ready. If you ever were.”

“I’m sorry I never did,” I say quietly. My mom is the best. Both of my parents are. I know I could have told them about this.

But I realize…I didn’t need to. I was okay. Even immediately following the incident. I was hurt by Zach. I was angry. I’d felt betrayed. But I’d always known I was okay. I’d felt supported and taken care of by Graham and my friends.

But I didn’t know that Jefferson was a part of it and that is what I regret more than anything.

I look at him now. “I had guardian angels I wasn’t even aware of, I guess.”

My mom smiles at Jefferson. “I was aware of them.”

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