Page 47 of Honey Bun
She stopped. “I can’t stay.”
I let her go, but my gut tightened. “Why? My mother will call. What happened that you’re shutting me out?”
She turned, wiping tears from her eyes. “I’m… afraid of trusting.”
I swallowed. “What happened to you?”
She massaged her forehead and then passed me and headed into my private sitting room. I followed her, and she took a seat on the couch we’d made love on earlier. This time, she sat on her legs and waited till I sat beside her. Then she said, “I… when we met, I was homeless, really. I had no place to go, and that’s why I decided I’d have to brave out my mother’s house.”
This wasn’t new, but I hadn’t heard her talk much about her story. My heart thumped. “You have a job and a place to live and can follow your dreams now.”
She shook her head and glanced at me like I was the fool. “It’s hard to believe or trust that this will last, even if I want it to.”
My pulse raced. I had no idea how to help her believe in herself, but if I held back now, she might shut me out forever. “Why? I need to know, Maddie.”
Her face turned bright red, and she stared at the area rug at her feet. The minutes passed, and I wondered if she would stay silent. Then she said, as she hugged herself, “My husband, Bob, was abusive. He used to laugh and say I deserved the nightly beating because I wasn’t pure or good. He told me… that God put me there, and he was teaching me piety.”
My shoulders tensed. I wanted to protect her and strike anyone who hurt her. The pain in her eyes as she relived her old life struck me hard. I leaned closer. “That’s nonsense.”
She let out a laugh. “It’s easy for you to say. You’re not… broken.”
I lowered my head. The abuse she’d suffered had been obvious, but she’d never spoken about it. “I know tons of Christians, and they are good people. I’m quite sure Joel doesn’t do anything but love his wife.”
She let out a long sigh and dropped her shoulders. Then she stared at me. “All my life, I believed I deserved what I got because I was more bad than good.”
“That doesn’t make sense. You’re amazing.”
She shook her head like I’d insulted her and sat straighter. “What do I do that’s so amazing? Throw a party for you?”
I would have to show her how she helped make people better without being a jerk about it. I kept my voice low. “I made two deals that are over twenty million dollars apiece that night because of your party.”
She stood and headed back to the bedroom and grabbed her pants from the bathroom, and I followed. As she dressed on the bed, she said, “For you. It’s not for me or for the greater good. I’ve done nothing to get what I really want out of life.”
Her desires mattered. Maybe I hadn’t understood that before. “What’s that?”
She stood up and stared at me. Her eyes were big and sad at the same time. “I want a family like yours. I love your mother. I love how you and your brothers all work as a team even now, when you all live different lives, but I need to belong.”
My body heated as I approached her and whispered, “You do. You can have that.”
She turned away from me and stared out a window that faced the New York skyline. “No. All I do is take from you, and you don’t even know. We moved out when he left our trailer.” She jumped up and stared out the window. “I didn’t even tell you I lived in a trailer because you’d never understand what being broke or hurt or denied is like.”
My heart beat faster, and I placed my hand on her shoulder. “You’ll never experience that again.”
Her face held pain as she pressed her hands to her chest. “It’s part of who I am. I’m not… good.”
Only she would have the power to see that she was far more than her past. “You are. I have faith in you.”
Her brow wrinkled like I’d spoken to her in a different language. “To do what?”
Part of me didn’t understand why she felt bad about herself. When something bad happened in my life, I didn’t let it affect me personally. Mistakes were part of life. But she was right that our lives had been different.
I felt jumpy and alive as I said, “To be whoever you want to be and change so you can leave that mess behind. You already started. You’re divorced, living here, starting over.”
Her lips thinned. “I don’t know.”
I brushed her cheek. She was sweet and wonderful, and she needed to see that. “And I get now why you don’t want a relationship yet, but I have to have hope too.”
She pressed her hands on me. “What do you hope for?”
