Page 57 of Falcon

“It was a long time ago. It’s okay.” He runs his hand over my hip, letting his thumb trace my scars.

“What happened to you, Faith?”

This isn’t something I want to talk about or something I relish talking about in the least.

“Falcon...”

“You don’t have to tell me. I can see by the way you’re trying to look anywhere but my face; it’s something that is hard for you. I just want to know you, Faith. Your story.”

I lean forward and bury my face in his chest before turning my cheek over his heart. I will need that steady sound as my talisman to keep my feet firmly on the ground as I tell this story.

My brain is screaming at me, telling me not to say anything. That this doesn’t matter.

It didn’t really happen.

Move on.

Move on.

Don’t relive it.

But I feel his gentle caress of my back, and I hear the steady thump of his heart, and I know I trust him.

“It was my sophomore year of college up in Nashville. Football season, of course, was a huge event there, so any time we had a game, there was a big party afterward, win or lose. Losing just meant everyone was angrier and drunker.”

“Ah yes,” he says now sliding his nails over my spine gently. “The dreaded losing team depression. Been there.” He presses a kiss to the top of my head.

“Haven’t we all?” I ask, trying so hard to force a smile, to force levity into the situation before I continue. “Anyway, I was at this post-game party at a fraternity house on campus. I’d been to many of them before. They were normally very controlled and fun. I guess this time some fraternity brothers who had graduated years ago were in town. They stopped by…and the party got significantly more out of hand.”

I can tell by the way his muscles tense, he may have an idea of where this story is going.

“This guy…I don’t remember his name…I don’t even know if I ever knew it, really, he was nice to me. We talked and danced. I shouldn’t have. I was so young, barely twenty years old, but I had been drinking.” I shrug as if that is a good enough reason for any decision.

He doesn’t interrupt me. He doesn’t speak. He simply lets me word vomit all of this out. Purging the story like it burns me.

“I don’t remember much after my third beer. It’s very hazy, but I have flashes of memories.” I swallow, closing my eyes as I continue. “A bed that smelled like cigarettes and this man on top of me. He was holding my hips so tightly that his nails broke the skin. There were deep, awful gashes from his nails, at least that’s what the doctor told me.”

His hands completely still now. He’s frozen.

“I was weak. I think I tried to push him off, but he hit me.” I touch my jaw where I remember his slap landing. “He raped me.”

As soon as the words leave my lips, Falcon unwinds his body from mine and rolls away, climbing from the bed with his hands fisted into balls at his side.

I reach out to touch him, to pull him back, to beg him to not let this ruin the night we are having, but he pulls back, leaving me with the familiar sting of rejection.

“Don’t.”

That single word from his lips makes my heart ache deep in my chest.

I pull the sheet up over my breasts, suddenly feeling so exposed and so embarrassed. I move to the opposite side of the bed and sit along the edge with my feet touching the floor and my back to him.

I close my eyes, gathering up the courage to tell him to just go, but I don’t get a chance. Before the words can form in my throat, I hear his loud, thudding walk around the bed and he drops to his knees before me, wrapping his arms around my torso, and dropping his forehead right on my stomach.

“Faith, I’m so sorry that happened to you. I’m so fucking sorry.”

“What? I thought…I thought you were angry, like you were grossed out by me,” I say, my hands still clutching the sheet at my chest.

He lifts his face to mine and is looking at me like I’ve sprouted an extra nose. “What?”

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