Page 111 of The Truth About Love

Is this the point that I’m supposed to make a speech? Or, at the very least, say some long emotional goodbye to them in my head, tell them all the things that I’ll miss about them and thank them for everything they’ve given me in life?

Truth is, I can’t think of anything of note that they’ve given me. Sure, I have a trust fund and now half of a pretty hefty inheritance, but it was never money I wanted from them.

It was love.

But I haven’t seen them since I was eighteen and I have minimal memories from before then that evoke any kind of positive reaction within me. All I have are the scathing criticisms they’d throw at me across the dinner table and the emptiness that has always lingered inside me from being a child unworthy of her parents’ affection.

And though I am now twenty-five with friends, a career and a purpose, I am still very much that child who is desperate to be loved.

I cast a glance to Winter, who stands on the opposite side of the grave. Her eyes are closed, her brow furrowed. Looks like she’s having the same difficulty I am.

A hand slides into mine.

It’s soft, it’s warm, it’s familiar. As familiar to me as my own hand.

I blink into the sparkling blue depths of Auden’s eyes as he smiles down at me reassuringly. He’s here.In Islamorada. At my parents’ funeral. But why?

It doesn’t matter how much time passes between us, if you need me, I will always come for you.

They’re the words he’d spoken to me two years ago. I remember like it was yesterday. I didn’t really believe the truth in them back then, but I guess there’s no denying it now.

I didn’t even think he knew that my parents had died at all. It certainly wasn’t me who told him about their car accident.

I didn’t ask him to come, but he’s here anyway. Holding my hand and smiling as if to tell me that I’m strong enough to do this.

I hold his gaze as my fist opens and the dirt that I’d been clinging to falls six feet down to scatter across their coffin.

Even now, after everything that’s happened, it’s like he can sense what I need before I know myself. He tugs gently on my hand as he leads me away, through the graveyard to a wooden bench sitting quietly beneath the weeping branches of a willow tree.

“You’re here,” I whisper, sitting down and looking through the small gaps in the leaves to watch the end of my parents’ service, though I’m too far away to hear anything.

Auden shifts from foot to foot with his hands shoved into his pockets. “Winter called me.”

I roll my eyes. “Of course, she did.”

“Are you mad?”

“She needs to stop interfering, but no. I’m not mad.”

His shoulders visibly relax and he finally takes the seat beside me, but he doesn’t touch me again. He clasps his hands together between his legs as he leans forward and rests his elbows on his knees. The golden sunlight catches on his wedding band.

I look away.

“How are you coping with everything?” he asks, staring straight ahead.

I peek at him through the corner of my eyes, studying all the ways the years have changed him. He still has that boyish charm that makes him seem ageless, but there are creases in his skin and a lasting sadness to his features that weren’t there when he was eighteen. His eyes don’t sparkle like they used to either.

The changes are so subtle, I doubt anyone would notice them. But I do. I notice everything about him.

“I’m okay.”

He turns to me, brows raised sceptically. “It’s okay if you’re not, Summer-Raine.”

“No, I really am.” But even as I say it, my eyes sting and a single tear spills inexplicably down my cheek. I brush it away, sniffing. “I don’t know why I’m crying. It’s not like they were a huge part of my life. I didn’t even like them.”

More tears leak from my eyes and I bury my face in my hands as they fall. Auden sits silently beside me not speaking or touching, but comforting me just by being there.

“I don’t understand,” I sob. “Why am I sad?”

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