He tilted his head, a line forming between his eyes. Eyes so much like their father’s, and yet so different too. Her father’s had been filled with malice, Julian’s were empty. Lost. He’d served time in that hole in the ground too. But he’d given in to the monsters. He’d let them lead him away. “To set you free,” he said. “I wanted to set you free.”
Liza stared, transfixed, barely able to breathe.
“I heard the things he did to you,” he said. “I saw your blood. You bled a lot.”
Liza’s stomach seized. Yes, she had bled, especially that first time. Her father had beaten her the next day, made her clean it up. She’d bled sometimes after that too, but only when he was especially angry. Especially violent. Her heart felt like it was shriveling. God, the memories were ugly. Brutal and graphic. What she’d lived through was so incredibly unspeakable. She’d told Reed some of it, but she knew, she knew that there would be small pieces she’d never share with another living soul. Because some of the things she’d done just to survive were so abhorrent and personal, they would never leave her lips. She wouldn’t even have the words. It was a kind of loneliness she’d carry all her days. Liza wasn’t certain of much, but she was certain of that.
“He would have done it to Mady eventually,” he said. “You know it’s true.”
No, she thought. Not if I could have helped it. Never.
“Why didn’t you just kill him then, Julian?” she choked. “Why not kill our father and let us live?”
He squinted off in the distance for a moment. “He ruined you. And me. He was going to ruin her too. It was better that I set you free.”
He ruined you. Yes. He had, hadn’t he?
Ruined.
And there was no coming back from ruined. It was vile, and filthy, and permanent.
How could she ever have a normal relationship? How could anyone see her sexually after knowing the way she’d been victimized? Picturing it? How could she ever make herself worthy of someone’s love? Wouldn’t her filth rub off in a hundred different ways, leaving him defiled too? And how could she ask someone to make such a sacrifice?
That, that was what ruined meant.
Julian met her eyes again. “I’m not going to hurt you again, Liza. I see things differently now. I see that what I did hurt you too. That’s what I was trying to tell you with the rose.” He glanced at the burnt-out husk of a house. “It was like this place . . . infected me. And then I got away and I wasn’t infected anymore.”
“But now you’re back,” she said. “Why?”
“I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
Her gaze moved away from him, to the trailer in the grove of trees. “You’re living there?”
“Yeah. You own this land, you know.” He dug his boot-clad toe into the dirt. “Suppose you could kick me off.”
She let out a humorless laugh. “You can have it. It’s all yours.”
“Yeah, well . . .”
When he didn’t take that thought anywhere, she cleared her throat. “What will you do?”
Julian shrugged again. “Try to get some work. Hope people in this area will give me a chance.”
Liza was doubtful of that. The area was already struggling. And he was a felon. But Julian’s biggest obstacle was going to be his name. Small towns remembered things like that. “This probably isn’t the place for second chances, Julian. You should move away. Start somewhere new.”
“I can’t. Like I said, nowhere else to go.”
Liza thought about that, thought about the turns her own life had taken since that horrifying night, and a seed of something fragile and tenuous sprouted inside of her. Thankfulness, maybe, though that didn’t feel quite like the right word, not in the midst of all she’d lost. Maybe the best word was recognition. Recognition that he’d been a victim too. Recognition that he’d made a choice he’d believed would set his sisters free. And now? Recognition that in his very broken way, Julian had given her a future. A chance to start again.
“I’d better go.”
Julian met her eyes. “Okay. It’s good to see you, Liza. You grew up real beautiful.” His eyes shifted away as though the words had shamed him.
She nodded once and then turned, tossing the stick to the side. She hesitated for a moment, turning back to her brother. “Hey, Julian? You did.”
“Did what?”
“Set me free.” She nodded at him. “You did do that.”