PRESENT DAY
“So now you know,” I whisper, averting my gaze.
He’s been quiet the entire time I related everything that happened at the hacienda, becoming tenser and tenser the closer I got to the night of the fire.
From the corner of my eye, I can see his hands clenching and unclenching.
“What happened after?”
I turn, frowning.
“After?”
“Cisco found you,” Raf says, watching me intently.
I nod slowly, a sad smile pulling at my lips.
“He realized something was wrong when I called earlier, so he came as soon as he could. Unfortunately, by then the house was burned to the ground and I was more dead than alive.”
“But you survived,” he notes, emphasizing the last word.
“If I’m honest, I don’t know how I did it.” I shrug. “My body was broken beyond belief, my mind even more so.” I give him half a smile. “The last thing I remember was watching you get shot. In my mind, I thought I’d lost you, too, so I had no more reason to stay alive—no reason at all to fight. But my brother wouldn’t give up on me. He saved my body first, then he tried to heal my mind. Unfortunately…” I trail off.
“What happened at the asylum?” He further probes.
Since I’ve already decided to be an open book to him, I tell him everything, not sparing any morbid detail. I recount how I’d been so desperate to end my life and join him and our child that I’d tried everything I could. When I’d been unable to die, the only other recourse had been to simply… forget. I’d wiped my own memory of everything that hurt, and in the process, I’d reshaped some of my memories to suit the new narrative I built for myself.
“It was the only way I could survive,” I tell him. “It was either that, or death. But since I wasn’t given the option of death, I had to reinvent myself—build a version that hadn’t lost everything including the will to live.”
He nods slowly, but he doesn’t say anything.
The distance between us is more prominent than ever. Although he’s only a couple of feet away, it feels like we’re an ocean apart. I cannot tell what he’s thinking anymore, and I cannot gauge his feelings either.
It’s almost like we’re two strangers thrown together by circumstance.
But I refuse to let that be the case.
“We should get ready to hunt for dinner. It will get dark soon and we’ll have reduced visibility,” he adds, getting to his feet.
I blink in surprise.
Getting to my feet, I follow after him.
“Is that all you have to say?” I demand, reaching for his shirt to stop him.
He suddenly halts, and I almost crash into him—which would have been awful considering his injuries. I almost trip as I stop myself from colliding with him, but he’s faster than me, his hands grabbing onto my midriff and stabilizing me.
I don’t get to relish the feel of his hands on me, though, as he quickly withdraws his touch, straightening his back and avoiding to look directly at me.
“What do you want me to say, Noelle?” he asks, his shoulders angling up in a lazy shrug. “I appreciate you telling me the truth of what happened, but I need time. I…” He trails off as he takes one deep breath. “You’ve had time to come to terms with this. I’ve only just found out about it. I don’t know how to feel about it—about you.”
I open my mouth to speak, only to close it as I realize there’s nothing I can say that will change his mind—no amount of begging that will make him forgive me if he doesn’t want to.
“I see,” I murmur slowly.
“What you told me and what I witnessed in those videos…” he purses his lips. “I would have never imagined our past to be so… violent. I need time,” he repeats.
“I understand.” I nod. “I’ll respect your boundaries. Just please, can you not shut me out?” I ask in a low voice, peering at him from beneath my lashes.
I’m ashamed of everything I’ve done—to him, to us, to our baby… But I’m also shameless because I cannot fathom living another day on this earth without him.
Even if he never forgives me, I’ll forever be his shadow. As long as I’m by his side, in any capacity, I’ll be fine.
Will you?
I shove my inner voice aside, focusing on the moment at hand. He hasn’t asked me for a divorce again, so I’ll take that win. I know who I am and who I was in the past—I’m well aware that no one in their right minds would look back on that time in my life and declare me just a victim of circumstance.
Yes, I might have been backed into a corner by my family’s choices. But at the end of the day, my love for this man has been my driving force all along.
I am wicked, just as he accused me. But I am a wicked woman who is mindlessly in love with him. And for him, I am capable of anything.
Anything.
He gives me a nod, and not a moment after he’s telling me about his plan to catch dinner.
I look at him in wonder, the fissure in my heart becoming larger and larger by the minute. He looks so unbothered, so utterly unconcerned as if I hadn’t told him the worst things I’ve done, and that have been done to me.
More than anything, he hasn’t once said anything about Mali, nor has he inquired about him.
Why?
I follow his lead as we set about making the trap for a small animal to roast for our evening meal, but all the while my mind is filled with worry. Yet it’s not just that. Uncovering the past has paved the way for those nasty memories to make their way back, and I can almost visualize that night before my eyes.
My baby hadn’t even cried when Sergio had killed him.
The only time I’d heard his voice had been right after the birth, but I’d been too weak to do anything, but faint from the pain and exertion.
God, but his little body… The picture I’d found on Cisco’s computer reminds me of that last moment, when I’d sung him a parting song—imbuing every note with all the love I had for him.
“Noelle,” Raf’s voice startles me back to reality.
I bring my gaze up, blinking repeatedly as I bring him into focus.
God, but how I miss hearing him call me pretty girl.
“I’m fine.” I strain a smile.
“You don’t look fine.” He frowns. “You had a very faraway look. What were you thinking about?”
He… he’s asking about me. He’s inquiring into my thoughts. A big smile spreads across my face as I clasp my hands together, gazing at him with stars in my eyes. Yet the excitement is short-lived as I realize he didn’t mean it that way.
I release a heavy sigh.
“Just wondering when we’ll get back,” I lie, squaring my shoulders.
“Is that so?” He narrows his eyes at me.
“Yup. We should go.”
He’s still watching me intently, as if he’s unconvinced by my words.
I give him another fake smile as I start ahead. I don’t get to take another step, however, as he pulls me back until I’m fitted to his body.
“I’m only going to ask you one more time. What were you thinking about?”
“I—”
“Don’t lie,” he interrupts. “You were on the verge of crying, Noelle,” he remarks.
Flattening my lips into a thin line, I inhale deeply before I give him the truth.
“Mali. I was thinking about our son,” I whisper.
He tenses behind me, his breathing growing labored.
“It’s not your fault,” he suddenly says, shocking me.
I pivot to face him, my eyes searching his.
“It’s not your fault,” he repeats, giving me a nod before stepping past me and continuing into the woods.
Running after him to keep up, I can’t help but replay the words in a loop.
It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.
God, how I wish that were true…
This time, the tears fall silently down my cheeks, but I don’t let him see.
We quietly work together as we hunt and make a fire to cook the meat. We both take a seat next to the fire as we eat some of the pieces that have cooked. Although he’s right in front of me, Raf barely looks at me, seemingly focusing on anything but me.
I sigh as I slowly chew my food. The ball is in his court now. I’ve told him everything he needed to know to make his decision. Now it’s up to him whether he forgives me or not, whether he wants to work together to move past this.
But if he doesn’t…
God, I don’t know what I’m going to do if he leaves me.
My throat clogs up with pain as I picture a bleak future without him. If he leaves, there’s nothing left for me either—not when he’s the only thing that brings me joy in the world.
“Is that why you were angry with Lucero? Because she took Mali to Sergio?” Raf suddenly asks.
I raise my gaze to meet his. Swallowing my food, I nod.
“I never saw her after I woke up. I didn’t realize she’d managed to leave the hacienda until I saw her with Michele.”
“So the person I found with the necklace was just a servant.” He nods to himself.
“I’m sorry,” I say quietly.
“Huh?”
“That I didn’t protect it better. But at that time, it was the only thing of value that I could use for bartering.”
His brows shoot up in surprise.
“I got it back.” He shrugs. As I’d told him about that day at the hacienda, he’d also filled in the blanks on his side. After he’d arrived and seen the start of a fire, he’d run inside to search for Lucero, and that’s when he’d found the necklace and the person he’d assumed was Lucero. That had all been before he’d tried to kill me.
I give him a feeble smile as I pluck some more meat from the bones, bringing it to my mouth.
A few more minutes pass before Raf speaks again.
“Why didn’t you tell me, Noelle? Why didn’t you tell me you remembered? If you had…”
“Would you have been any less upset?” I fire back. “I didn’t tell you for the obvious reason, Raf. I knew that you would hate me if you found out what happened.”
“I think you’re being too hard on yourself,” he mentions.
I frown, looking at him questioningly.
“It wasn’t your fault.” He gives me a smile. “Did you do a lot of fucked up shit? Yes. But you didn’t kill our son. You tried your best to save him. How could I ever hate you for that?”
“How could you not hate me for sleeping with you while knowing you wouldn’t remember?” I whisper before I can help myself. My eyes widen, and I avert my gaze, shame filling me to the brim.
Lucero’s words come back to haunt me, and despite the fact that I’d disregarded all those warnings in the beginning, I can’t deny that this is something that’s been eating at me all along.
“Do you want me to hate you for it?” he asks quietly.
“What?” I blink.
“I’ve seen the recordings, Noelle. Granted, I didn’t see all of them, but from the few of them I watched, it was enough to get a different perspective than before.”
“What do you mean?” My lashes flutter in confusion. “What different perspective could you have gotten, Raf, when the truth is that I raped you,” I say, my voice breaking on the last words. Tears stab at my eyes, but I do my best to avoid crying.
The last thing I want is for Raf to think I’m using tears as a way to manipulate him. And maybe one side of me wants to do that—play the victim until he has no choice but to side with me—but I find that the other side of me hates the thought of that.
That side wants him to accept me as I am—with my qualities and my flaws. If he doesn’t love me for who I am, then what is the point? Wasn’t that why I fell for him in the first place? Because he was the only one I could be my real self with.
“Fine, let’s say that the consent in that situation was dubious.” He rolls his eyes. “But you didn’t rape me. If anything, I was too rough with you.” He swallows hard. “So what if I don’t remember everything? It’s clear I was very much lucid at the time, and quite enthusiastic about it,” he says, a blush climbing up his cheeks.
I gawk at him, unable to believe his words.
“But, Raf…”
“It was a tricky situation,” he interrupts me. “We were both doing things that would be considered more than questionable. You took advantage of my lack of memory, and I took advantage of your body—and don’t even try to deny it when I saw.” He gives me an intense look.
I tentatively nod, realizing he really means it.
“Where does that leave us?” I make the courage to ask.
“I don’t know,” he sighs. “I can understand you did what you had to do at the hacienda. I can even understand that you’re some type of killer,” he laughs, shaking his head. “But that’s not what I have a hard time forgiving, Noelle. It’s the fact that you remembered and didn’t tell me—that you had my child and didn’t think I deserved to know about it.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“And that’s the thing. I don’t know what you’re sorry about. Are you sorry about what you did, or are you sorry you got caught?”
I stay silent.
“Because of that I don’t know if I can trust you.”
My mouth opens on an objection, but he puts his hand up, stopping me.
“I don’t mean I can’t trust you to be faithful to me.” He smiles. “If there’s one thing I’m completely sure of, it’s the fact that you’d never look at another man. But beyond that?” He shakes his head ruefully.
“I understand,” I tell him quietly.
He looks at me pensively, the fire accentuating the blue of his eyes in a way that makes my heart clench in my chest with longing.
I give him a fake smile, getting up to put my food away before heading to our makeshift tent to sleep. Although my body isn’t necessarily tired, I am emotionally exhausted. In times like this, I’d like nothing more than to be alone in my room, so that I could cry myself to sleep, but since Raf is nearby, I can’t show him how much his words hurt me.
Huddling down on the little bed we’d made, I bring my knees to my chest as I close my eyes, willing all my troubling thoughts away.
Still, it’s not as easy as I would have liked. Not as I feel Raf slide in next to me. We’re not touching, but I can feel the heat of his body, beckoning and alluring.
I gulp down, burrowing my face in the crook of my elbow, so I can wipe the tears away.
We stay like that for what feels like forever, both frozen on the spot, neither speaking. The forest is so quiet, and his raspy breaths caresses my senses, reminding me of what I lost.
God, but why is my life so unfair? I gained him back only to lose him once more.
I sniffle away the tears, trying to occupy my mind with other thoughts. There’s simply no point in despairing over spilled milk. And as Raf said, I need to let him take his time and come to terms with the situation on his own.
But what if he never does?
There’s a tiny voice inside of my head that won’t let me be, showing me all the horrors that await me in the future and how my heart will slowly wither and die.
Once, I thought I’d died with my son. Now, it seems I’m bound to die again. But this time, I doubt there’s anything that can save me.
“When you bought me at that auction,” Raf suddenly speaks. My ears perk up, but I don’t turn. “Were you intending to keep me at the hacienda?”
“No,” I whisper. “No, of course not. I only wanted to make sure no one else bought you. And I would have arranged for you to be sent home if Sergio hadn’t questioned my interest in you. I knew that if I let it slip that you were in any way important to me, he would use you. All along, that was my worry. Sergio…” I take a deep breath as I do my best to forget the images of the past—especially my last day at the hacienda. “You have no idea how much he hated me, Raf.”
“But you outsmarted him.”
“Did I?” I smile sadly. “I wonder. In the end, he still won, didn’t he? He still hit me where it hurt the most.”
“I can’t imagine the strength you must have had to withstand that.” His voice is wistful, and I instinctively hold my breath as I await his next words. “You risked a lot didn’t you?”
“Yes,” I whisper, blinking back tears. “I risked everything.”
The rest remains unspoken.
And I lost everything, too.
“Are you cold?” he asks in a low voice.
My skin is covered in goosebumps, my body shaking quietly.
“Come here,” he says when I don’t reply, and I soon find myself in his arms as he fits his body perfectly to mine, spooning me from behind.
“Why are you nice to me?” I croak, tears spilling down my cheeks.
“Because I love you. Even when I shouldn’t, I still love you,” he murmurs, his mouth close to my ear.
He settles his face into the crook of my shoulder, tightening his grip on me.
“You hurt me, Noelle,” he whispers, and I feel the meaning behind his words in the way his voice trembles with emotion. “You have no idea how much you hurt me.”
“I know,” I whisper back.
“But you also brought me light in my darkest moments,” he continues. “You hurt me, but you also proved to me how much you loved me—time and time again. You put yourself in danger for me—time and time again. You sacrificed yourself for me—even when you thought there was no hope for you. And because of that…” He takes a deep breath. “Because of that, I forgive you.” His voice is gravelly, and charged with emotion.
I turn to him, blinking the tears from my eyes as I search his features.
He’s tense, his eyes full of sorrow, but also full of love.
“Raf,” I sniffle.
“Shh, don’t cry,” he says as he brings his thumb to my face, wiping my tears. “You break my heart when you cry.”
“Is this real?” I whisper.
From the moment I’d remembered what happened at the hacienda, I’d known that should Raf ever know, he’d hate me for it. I’d tried to prepare myself the best I could, but I’d been convinced he could never forgive me.
And now? To hear the words? That he… forgives me.
“Pretty girl.” He smiles, caressing me softly. “I forgive you,” he repeats.
“I don’t deserve it.” I shake my head, more tears running down my cheeks as I feel myself closer to my breaking point. If before I would have done anything to hear those words, now I’m weighed down by them—and by the heavy chains of my guilt.
God, I’d shoved it so deep within my heart in order to pretend I was okay, and now it’s coming to the surface like a raging tsunami.
“I don’t deserve it, Raf. I don’t deserve anything.” I cry harder. “It’s my fault. Everything is my fault. And Mali… Our baby. Oh, Raf.” I break down, clinging to him as I weep, the pain so strong, I feel it in every pore of my body.
“I loved him so much. I used to imagine he’d look like you, that he’d have your blue eyes, so that even if you weren’t with me, I could stare into the eyes I loved the most every day. My God,” I yelp in pain. “I used to talk to him every day while he was in my belly. And I couldn’t even hold him while he was alive. I couldn’t even…”
“Let it all out,” he encourages me softly, caressing my back in languid motions. And I do. Oh, but I do. I cry all the tears I never cried, and I feel all the pain I never let myself feel.
“He’s dead, Raf. I was a mother, but I was never a mother.”
He doesn’t speak, merely holding me tight as he urges me to spill my grief onto him.
“I loved him so much,” I repeat like a broken record.
“We’ll get through this together.” He wipes my tears away. “We’ll cope together, pretty girl. Please don’t hide from me again. Every time you need to cry, cry, and I’ll cry with you. Every time you need to mourn, mourn, and I’ll mourn with you. And every time you think yourself undeserving, let me prove to you that you are. I love you, Noelle. I’ve loved you for years on end, every time a little more, and every day from now on, even more.”
I start hiccuping as I cling onto him, taking in his assurances and letting them slowly penetrate the wall of pain that’s crusted around my heart.
“I don’t deserve you, Raf,” I tell him after I’ve calmed down a little. “No, don’t bother denying it. It’s true. Maybe you don’t think so, but I know it.” I place my finger to his lips to stop him from refuting it. “But one day I will deserve you. And I promise you that I will work every day to get back your trust and show you that you’re my everything.”
He grabs my hand, keeping it still as he kisses each finger. His eyes are on me, so blue and so beautiful, and for the first time in my life, I’m truly home.
A languid smile spreads across my lips as I huddle closer to him and drift off to sleep.
