I laugh again, just as miserable as the first time around. “She wanted to leave him.” I turn and look at Rae. She’s pale. The wind has blown her hair across her face and she hasn’t bothered to push it back. f**k, she really does look just like my mother, both my memories of her and the few pictures I managed to hide from my father before he could destroy them. There’s a kindness in her eyes I remember so well. “Look where it got her.”
Her eyebrows furrow. “What do you mean?”
“I mean she’s dead, Rae.” I hold her gaze. I want her to see that I’m not being dramatic or exaggerating for effect. “Eighteen years in the ground. And my father’s the one who put her there.”
She pulls back from me. Not a lot, but enough. I don’t blame her. I just told her that the man who bought her at auction murd
