She frowns as she reads the message, an expression that twists my heart until it feels wrung out and lifeless. Is that a look of a woman who has been caught? Is she upset I know now she hasn’t been faithful to our relationship?

“Oh, Lakin,” she whispers, lightly placing her soft palm on my cheek. “There could only ever be you.”

“But–” I begin to say when she covers my lips with her finger to hush me.

I search her eyes, looking for clues to my fate, and I’m met with compassion. I’m met with the same love she would see in my eyes.

“Evan is my foster brother. It’s true that he loves me, no less than I love him, but not in the way you’re thinking, Lakin. That man was once a boy who saved me. Rescued me from a fate that nightmares are made of.”

I scoot back onto the bed and pick her up so her legs are straddling my waist. I’ve never forced her to tell me about her past, but in this moment, my need to know is stronger than my compassion to let it lie.

“Please tell me,” I say lightly, placing my hand on her chest. “I need to know this heart. I need to know why it beats the way it does. I want to be able to grip on to it and cradle it in my hand for all eternity, but I need to know that it’s mine to hold.”

She closes her eyes and leans in to rest her forehead on mine. I feel each of her breaths tap against my lips, ragged, uncertain. If I could reach into her mind and soothe the uncertainty, I would give every bit of wealth, every bit of my own courage to ease her anxiety. The only thing I can do is hold her, let my body plead with her soul to share herself with me.

Finally, finally she speaks, and I’m able to exhale my own apprehension.

“It was a long time ago and there are days I wish I could forget, but there are some things that happen to us that our mind will never let us escape from,” she says, her eyes still closed.

She slowly pulls away from me and searches my eyes. I plead with them, with her, to feel the safety in my arms.

She takes a deep breath and runs her nails through the hair at the base of my neck. “Evan is Sharon’s son. When they took me in, he and I went to the same high school; he was a year older than I was. I was only a freshman and I was new, but he helped me adjust to everyone at school. We became friends.”

She hesitates, so I brush her damp hair away from her face and softly kiss her cheek to encourage her to continue. Her legs are still tangled around me, but when she gives me a nod, I scoot back slightly to provide her the space she needs.

“I only stayed with them for a few months at first. There was an emergency case on Christmas Eve and I had to be moved so they could take in a group of siblings. Sharon and my caseworker arranged for me be able to remain at the same school for the school year, and it was fine for the first month or so. Well, fine enough. My new foster parents didn’t really have much to do with me. They weren’t mean to me, but they didn’t care much either. I was a means to help pay their rent in the trailer park.” She pauses again, gathering the strength for the next piece of information. I can feel the pain she’s wrestling with, the shame that lies beneath.

“But then her brother was released from jail and he came to stay with us,” she whispers. “Then everything changed.”

“What did he do?” is all I can say.

“Nothing at first. He gave me the creeps so I avoided him. But then her mother got sick and she left me in her husband’s care so she could be with her. They never told my caseworker, because I would have been removed.”

She looks away from me and stares at the ceiling as she continues to speak. Tears roll down her face but her voice never breaks, and I’m in awe of the strength I never realized she had.

“That’s when it got bad,” she says. “Drugs flowed in and out of the house, and they took turns using me any way they wanted. When I tried to run, they caught me and chained me up in a back bedroom of the trailer. There were days I didn’t know if I was alive or dead, and I wanted it to be over so badly that I didn’t care if it was the end.”

I grip onto her shirt, imagining every vile thing these two men could have done. The heat of my anger boils at the thoughts that run through my head.

“How did no one know this was going on? You just get dumped off and no one checks on you?”

She squares her shoulders to look at me. “Evan came looking,” is all she says.

“What happened? Did he call the police? Contact social services? Please tell me the day he found you is the day you left that house?” My mouth can barely keep up with what I’m thinking. I rattle off questions without waiting for responses. Instead of getting shaken or upset, she continues to run her fingers through my hair to settle my emotions instead of me helping her.

"He took care of it, of me,” she declares, avoiding further details.

“How? How did you get away?” I ask.

She leans in close to me as if she is going to share a secret no one knows. She grabs the back of my neck and delivers a sentence that rocks my very core.

“He killed them,” she whispers.

My eyes widen.

I admit I would have done the same had I been confronted with the opportunity, but for a teenager to swoop in and save her from that misery without being caught is almost unbelievable.

She lays her head on my shoulder and continues her story. I just hold onto her, hoping there is an end to the misery in sight. It pains me to think of her hurt, used, and damaged. She is the strongest person I know, and for this world to have brought her to her knees, makes me want to both weep and battle to the ends of the Earth on her behalf.

“There was a tear in the window covering that they used to black out the window in the room that I was in,” she continues. “Evan saw me and the next thing I remember is him carrying me through the house and to his car. There were drugs scattered all over the living room and their bodies were on the couch and the floor, motionless. I asked later and he said they overdosed. He took me back to Sharon, and I never had to leave her house again.”

“So why do you think he killed them?” I ask.

“Because he told me he was the one who gave them the hot dose,” she says. “He cleaned me up and called his mom. I remember her making phone calls before social services and the police came to the house. All I ever told them, though, was there were drugs in the house and I was with Evan when we came home and found them dead. I never moved from Sharon’s house after that and we never spoke of it again.”

She picks up her phone and examines the screen before looking back at me. “So yes, I love Evan,” she explains. “He saved me in every way a person could be saved, and I’ll forever be thankful for his bravery that day. But the only person I’m in love with is you, Lakin.”

I cradle her face in my hands, wiping away any remaining tears. “I’m sorry,” I tell her. “I’m sorry that happened to you and I’m sorry it wasn’t me who saved you. I promise you, though, I will never let your heart hurt again. I promise you everything I have.”

She pulls the back cover off her phone, revealing the love token I gave her. She throws the phone on to the bed and holds the charm out for me to hold. Campbell then takes her necklace off and replaces her forget-me-not charm with the one I gave her.

“I can’t promise you everything,” she says before placing my hand back onto her heart, “but I can promise you this.” She smiles and kisses me deeply, twisting love and passion together and pouring it into our kiss.

“I won’t ever be able to let you go,” I say between kisses. “I’m stealing your forever.”

I flip her over and pin her to the bed. Holding her hands above her head, I bend down and lick along her neck. “You know what I want, don’t you?” I ask.

I rise up to see her smile and she pushes me to stand before her. I offer my hand and she accepts it. “I want that, too,” she says with a grin.