Tempting Nora (16 page)

"You jus
t told me that you're a bad guy," she teased, trying to ignore the way her stomach twisted due to her nervousness. "Maybe I'm having second thoughts about confiding in you."

"Nora."
He gave an exasperated sigh.

"Okay, okay." Right now wasn't the best time for
banter anyway. "About last night…I'm sorry that I freaked out on you again. It wasn't right. That's why I decided I'm ready to answer all of your questions about my mom, no matter what that means."

The two of them arrived at a shady park. A single bench faced an empty play
ground. Gideon led her over to it and sat down.

"Are y
ou sure you want to talk about your mom?" He grabbed her hand and squeezed it.

"I don't
want
to talk about her, but I
need
to talk about her." She stared up at the overcast sky. "I've spent the last twenty years being afraid of my memories. When I was with my mom, I always felt so weak, so defenseless. That's why I'm scared that if I talk about her, then I'll become the same scared little girl all over again. But the truth is that I can't be strong unless I overcome this aversion to my past. Don't you see? I need to talk about my mom just to prove that I'm strong enough to do it."

Waves of black feathers appeared out of nowhere and were swept away by the wind. She was too immersed in the conversation to care.

"Some people take much longer than you to face their past." Gideon's jaw clenched. "Some people never face it."

"Unless you face the past, then you can never
move on." She stared into Gideon's caramel eyes.

"That's true." Gideon
nodded.

For a moment neither of them said anything. Nora
bit her bottom lip, ignoring the burning in her throat.

"Do you really not hate her?" Gideon
finally asked, pulling her from her thoughts.

"No, I don't." She shivered
, but not from the cold. "I feel sad that I was never good enough, but I don't hate her."

"
Not everyone would be so kind." A vein throbbed in his jaw.

"Well,
my mom and I had our good times too, you know." She cast an uncertain glance at him. "Every time I'm filled with resentment, I think of how nice she could be."

"
Really?" Gideon studied her face with such intensity it made her nervous.

"
Yeah." She stared down at her hands because she was afraid she'd lose control of her emotions if she maintained eye contact. "There were days when she would scream at me and lock me in the closet. Then there were other times. Better times. We never had much money after the bills were paid, so she would take me to the beach during the summer because it was free. She would always pretend to drown, so I had to go save her. After we swam until we were exhausted, she'd take me to the dollar store and we'd eat candy bars until my stomach ached."

A
tear escaped her eye, even though she tried to stop it. Still Gideon didn't move. Maybe he was afraid that if he did, then she might stop talking.

"Unfortunately,
my mom's bad days started to come more and more frequently as I aged." She wrung her hands. "I always thought I deserved what she was doing to me. There are still times that I feel guiltily, even though I know the truth about her."

"The t
ruth?" Gideon sounded shaky as if he was having a hard time controlling his emotions.

"My mom was
mentally ill. I didn't know it when I was eight, but I figured it out when I got older. The true reason why I can't hate her—why I pity her—is because of that." A tremor tore through her body. "Deep down, I don't think she ever meant to hurt me. At least, I'd like to think that she didn't. I believe that whatever was making her sick turned her into a monster. Maybe it's no excuse for how she acted, but sometimes even now I wonder if she's okay. I'll never look for her, but I hope she found happiness. I know it's crazy, but…I want the best for her."

At long last, she stared into Gideon's
eyes again. The man appeared wounded.

"Are you okay?" Shakily
, she pressed her hand against his cheek. He looked so distressed that she couldn't help herself.

"
You're
asking
me
if I'm okay?" Gideon asked.

"
You look…"
Haunted. You look haunted.

He didn't say anything. For some reason, the silence made it harder for her to stifle her tears. As she stared straight ahead, thinking about her mom and Gideon and everything else, her bottom lip trembled. That was the last straw for
him. After giving a pained groan, he pulled her into an embrace so tight it chased the air from her lungs. She hadn't realized how badly she needed his arms around her until that moment. She burrowed her face into his shoulder and smelled his sweet scent. Despite how hard she tried to keep her emotions at bay, a sob tore through her before she could stop it. She cried so hard her whole body hurt. The entire time she wept, Gideon rocked her back and forth, rubbing her back. He kept whispering things in her ear, but she was too far gone to make out what he was saying.

As she was overwhelmed by melancholy, s
he cried for herself because of the pain of being abandoned, but that wasn't all. She cried for her mom too. How awful had it been for the woman to lose control of her own emotions and thoughts? In this world, the person Nora trusted the most was herself. She couldn't imagine how painful it would be to not trust her own mind.

Finally, as the sharp pain
in her heart faded to a dull ache, her sobs became soft whimpers. Soon after that, she made no sound at all. As Gideon continued to hold her so tight her body ached, she sighed as her form molded against his. During that moment, she realized that while her eyes were sore and her nose throbbed, she felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off of her shoulders. The weight had been there for so long that she hadn't realized it was present, but now that it was gone, there was a notable difference.

She breathed a sigh, burrowing her fingers into Gideon's collar.

"Gideon," she said.

"Uh-huh." His voice was soft and gentle.

"Thank you," she said.

His response was a kiss to her ear. She couldn't believe how safe she felt
pressed against his chest, even though she'd spent ages keeping him at arm's length. She realized that Gideon had a way of sneaking around all of her self-maintained barriers, but instead of hurting the already bruised parts of her soul, he healed them.

She
was glad she'd given him her trust.

"Gideon," she said again.

"Mmm-hmm." His face was in her hair as his arms tightened around her.

"Tell me about you."
She wanted to learn something about this mysterious man who was both cad and confidant. "Anything you want."

At first Gideon didn't
speak. Her stomach sunk when she realized he might not trust her as much as she did him.

Finally, after a brief pause, he said, "You know how I said I'm a bad guy?"

"Yeah." She went still.

"Well, I
wasn't always like that." He sighed. "I used to be pure and kind."

"You're still kind." Why else would he hold
her like this?

"Not anymore." He let out a mirthless chuckle. She realized he did that a lot when he
felt bitter. "But years and years ago, I was. I didn't use women and I lived entirely for helping others."

"What
happened?" She had a feeling she was about to learn a huge secret.

"It's a long story." Gideon sighed. "I used to be a guard
ian."

"You mean
like a bodyguard?" It was easy to imagine him doing such a job.

"Yeah, l
ike a bodyguard," he said.

"Wow," she said
.

"I loved my job.
I lived for the people I protected." His body became rigid, even as he remained molded to her. "One day, I was ordered to look after a wealthy woman and her three children. The kids were amazing—smart, beautiful, loving. But their mother…She was spiteful and mean. She beat the kids constantly as I was forced to watch."

"Oh no." She tried to pull back to look at his face, but
he held her so tight she couldn't.

"I tried to protect those kids.
I would have done anything in my power to save them from her." His voice dripped with pain. "Unfortunately, nothing I did worked. For the first time in my entire life, I felt hatred. I loathed that woman who hurt her children. It was a new and startling emotion."

"Anyone would feel that way." Since she couldn't see his face, she comforted him by tightening her arms around his rigid body. "It wasn't your fault."

"Whether or not it was my fault, I felt powerless." He let out a mournful groan. "The longer I remained in the situation, the stronger the negative feelings became. That was when I did something terrible."

She wondered what he could have done that made him so tense. The man didn't weep or
shiver, but she could feel stress billowing off of him.

"What
happened?" she whispered, not knowing what to think.

"
A few years after I was sent to protect that family, there was an earthquake. I remember the earth shaking and the children screaming." Gideon's voice was so soft she could barely hear it. "I knew the kids were safe, but their mother wasn't. I searched for her, thinking that I would try to bring her to safety. I found the woman standing in her bedroom."

"Oh, Gideon…." She shook her head. At least, she tried to. It was hard
to move when she was pinned against his chest.

"
As the earth quaked, cracks formed in the ceiling. I knew that there was going to be a cave-in. During that moment, I remember thinking, 'I should save her. It's my job.' I knew it wasn't her time to die." His voice broke and it took him a moment to regain his composure. "But I didn't save her. I watched the ceiling crumble and felt glad—
glad,
Nora—when she was buried alive."

"You can't possibly blame yourself for th
at," she cried. "You hesitated to save her because she was a woman you hated. That's all."

"No, that's not all. It was my job to save her. I was never meant to feel anger or hatred. I was supposed to
feel only love. But something went wrong." He shook his head. "No being on this earth should feel happy because of the death of someone, but I did."

"But i
f you'd tried to save her, you might have died yourself." She tried desperately to ease his guilt.

"I wouldn't have died," he
said.

"You might ha
ve." How could he be so certain he would have lived?

"I wouldn't have," he
repeated. "Take my word for it. The only one who was at risk of losing their life that day was her and she did."

She wasn't sure what else to say. Half of what was coming out of Gideon's mouth
sounded crazy. How could he blame himself for the death of the woman? Even she would have hesitated to save her in a situation like that. Also, he shouldn't have been so certain that the earthquake wouldn't have killed him too. People died in natural disasters all the time. It sounded like Gideon suffered from some serious PTSD. After all, it was obvious that the death of this woman still haunted him every moment.

And somehow that made her even sadder than anything her mom had ever done.

Even as she longed to say the right thing, all that came out of her mouth was, "I'm so sorry, Gideon."

"Don't be sorry," he said. "It's not your fault."

It's not your fault either
.

"How long ago did this happen?" She wondered
how many years this man had suffered.

The words made Gideon give yet another mirthless
laugh.

"Too long ago," he said. "Yet I'm still paying for it.
My actions that night destroyed everything."

"Everything?" She pressed herself against him so hard that her chest ached.

"I lost the job that I lived for. I'll never again be able to guard people the way I once did. I can't blame anyone for that. My mission was to protect that woman and I failed." Gideon's jaw tensed. "On top of that, I was never the same after that night. I doubt everything now, including myself. I especially can't figure out why that woman was allowed to abuse her children when it would have been so easy for God to stop it."

Does he blame God for
what happened?
she wondered.

"
Well…" She hesitated.

"What?" he asked.

"I don't know if I should say it," she said.

"
Go ahead." His voice was gruff.

"When I was still in the orphanage, I used to
be angry a lot too. I wondered why God would let me suffer when normal kids had families that loved them. Then one day I met this boy named Martin. He'd been abused by his dad, but he was cheerful anyway." She sighed, remembering the scrawny, brown-haired boy. "To be honest, he was so optimistic that it was, well, annoying. One day I sat next to him in the cafeteria and asked him why he was so darn nice all the time. Do you want to know what he said?"