Cova ain’t close?”
“Because she told on me?”
He nods.
“That and many other things. Cova and I have a strained relationship. There were times, times when he was so angry he’d actually hurt her, that she’d come to me and we’d hang onto each other to get through. But mostly, she played her part as his little pet and that earned her the freedom she had. Cova never wanted him to hurt me, she really didn’t, but she also wasn’t going to give up the preference she got by defending me.”
“You think she regrets that?”
“I’d like to think she does,” I exhale. “But she’s here, isn’t she? Looking for him. Wanting that life back. So I doubt it.”
“You’re a thousand times the person she is, Merleigh.”
I don’t say anything to that, I just stare into the crystal blue water. Maybe he’s right, maybe he’s not. I don’t know. I just know I had my own back after that day, and I will continue to do so for the rest of my life.
“There you are.”
I exhale at the sound of Isla’s voice coming up from behind us. Bohdi turns, I don’t. I keep staring at the water, wishing, for just one second, she’d go away. I get it, she’s his wife and she probably has a lot of wounds from their past together, but I also know she’s making her presence very well-known and isn’t willing to let him spend a single moment alone with me.
“I’ll be in soon, Isla. I’m talking with Merleigh.”
“I need you now, though.”
“I said—” he turns and glares at her “—I’ll be in in a minute.”
I can’t see her face, but boy do I know there is a glare there that would be so intense, it would probably make me stand and walk away.
“Fine.”
She disappears, and I dare to ask the question that bothers me so very deeply. “What’s going on with you two?”
“No idea,” he murmurs.
That’s it? That’s the best he can give me?
“No idea isn’t really an answer.”
“It might not be an answer, Merleigh, but it’s the truth. It’s all I have to give you right now. I know you want more, fuck, I wish I could give you more but that’s all I have to give right now. I don’t know. I honestly don’t fuckin’ know.”
He stands, and guilt slams into my chest, so I quickly stand, too.
“Want to go for a walk with me?”
He stares at me, those eyes racing with emotion. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”
“Come on, I know somewhere really cool.”
We walk out of the motel complex and through the town, neither of us saying anything. Only when we are through it, past all the people and at a little lake, does Bohdi speak. “You know your way around well.”
“I was here for a long time, and we often went places with him, so long as we were seen and not heard. This place I found before I met him, though. This was somewhere I used to come when I was on the streets. This big tree—” I point to the massive tree in the middle of the green grass “—used to shelter me from the rain so incredibly well.”
“It’s fucked you had to live like that.”
“Well, not all of us have good families.”
“Yeah.”
He follows me down a dirt track that goes around the entire lake. People walk here all the time, but I had my own direction. I walk off the beaten path and toward a small stream that flows off the lake and into a pretty little area that not many people know about. It’s probably just overflow from the lake, but I never minded. I always liked it.
We reach it, and it is exactly the same as it was the last time I was here. I stop and just spend a moment taking it in, glancing around and enjoying every single breath of fresh air that fills my lungs.
“You find this place?” Bohdi asks me.
“Yeah,” I say, finding an old fallen tree and sitting on it. “I used to sleep here a lot. I liked the way the water trickled. It was relaxing.”
He sits down beside me, stretching his legs out. His shoulder is touching mine and the overwhelming emotions I’m feeling are hard to contain. I want to curl into him, kiss him, let him become part of me. I’ve never had a person who has willingly made love to me in my life. My boyfriend when I was younger was forceful and cruel, and then I was sold