Total pages in book: 54
Estimated words: 54383 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 272(@200wpm)___ 218(@250wpm)___ 181(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54383 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 272(@200wpm)___ 218(@250wpm)___ 181(@300wpm)
"Easton—”
“All I would want to hear is you explaining how the fuck could you do that to me?”
“It wasn't my original intention to lie to you.” She stutters. “I didn’t want to hurt you.”
I step back, still seething. "Every time I got a letter from Tully, I…Beautiful as hell or not, I can't even look at you right now. Fuck this.”
She tries to grab my arm as I walk away, but she’s not strong enough.
I return to my car and speed off into the distance.
53
ME
“Is anyone home?” I bang on Mr. Rush’s front door an hour later. “Please answer me!”
I can’t get Easton’s face out of my mind. Despite the time that’s passed and the livid looks he gave me, he’s still sexy as hell. He was wearing a simple white T-shirt and jeans, and he easily put every guy who has ever approached me to shame.
I desperately wanted him to kiss me and take me, to tell me we could pick up where we left off despite my lies…
“Scarlett?” Easton’s dad appears seconds later. “Are you alright?”
“No.” I shake my head. “Can you give me Easton’s cell phone number? I need to talk to him.”
“He was supposed to buy a new phone today, but I haven’t heard from him yet,” he says. “Can I text you whenever he gives it to me?”
“Yes, please. The moment you have it.” I can’t bring myself to leave his doorway just yet. “Is he here? Are you keeping him in there and not telling me?”
“No, Scarlett.” He places his hands on my shoulders. “Calm down, calm down.”
I shake my head. “I can’t. He knows about the baby…I should’ve told him.”
“No,” he says. “You shouldn’t have.”
“With all due respect, if you’d seen the way he looked at me an hour ago, you’d think differently.”
“I doubt it…” He pauses. “The only reason he did so well in prison is because he didn’t think there was much on the outside for him. He loved you more than anything, even football, so knowing that he had a daughter would’ve made things worse for him emotionally. We both know that.”
I shake my head.
I’d believed that before, but now I’m not so sure.
“It’ll be alright.” He looks over at my car, where I’ve left the back door hanging wide open. “Bring my grandchild inside, so we can talk.”
54
EASTON
There are no fucking words.
Actually, somehow, Scarlett wrote seven thousand of them.
The envelope they’re covered in is the first of all the letters that bear her actual name on the front. The seal features a smudged kiss from pink lipstick and pencil sketches of pink petals.
But the bold words on the flap are what initially caught my attention.
I Wish I Would’ve Told You
I’m sitting at my kitchen table, reading her words and I haven’t come across anything that excuses or explains her years of lies. Nothing that excuses keeping the birth of our daughter from me.
My heart is reeling and broken in pieces, and yet I still have this urge to comfort her about this bullshit she pulled.
Sighing, I take another sip of coffee and start the letter from the beginning, hoping that this time will be the time when I can finally get past the third page.
On page eleven, sixteen lines down, in the second to last paragraph, her writing shifts from wistful to downright painful.
I want you to know that I’ve lied to you.
Not once.
Not twice.
This entire time.
Every letter you received from “Tully” was actually from me.
(And there’s a reason I used the recovery center or the hospital for the return address.)
At first, I wanted you to let go of me, of us, because I knew
that living without me was painful enough for you. It was painful for me, too, but I could move around in the world and temporarily lessen the pain; being locked inside a cell doesn’t offer the same ability.
You told my father that you didn’t want anyone to see you behind bars, and I know you meant that…
The media harassed me and Tully for months when we were released. They had questions and they wouldn’t give up until they finally realized we didn’t have any answers.
Any letters that you sent to certain people—fangirls mainly—were reported on from time to time…something called “the Freedom of Information Act,” I believe.
Your father helped me discover a loophole, though.
Since medical records & hospital correspondence don’t fall under that act, that’s why I used those addresses.
I still feared that news would get out, though, and without you here with me to face the “sister’s boyfriend” mess, I couldn’t do it…
I desperately wanted to tell you that I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, our beautiful baby girl, and I considered bringing her to the prison to meet you, but…I just thought that would hurt you more since you wouldn’t be able to leave with us.