Page 64 of What He Never Knew

Iwas the older one, the teacher, the one who should have been in charge. And yet it washerwho was strong enough to say no, to remind me where we stood.

I’d failed her.

“Sarah…”

“No, please, Reese.” She gripped her glass tighter, pulling it toward her like it was the water she was pleading with, or like it was me she held in her hands. “I came here to explain something…” Sarah shook her head, biting her lip against the tears welling in her eyes. “But it is so,sohard for me to even consider telling you what I’m about to. And I don’t know how this is going to come out, or what you’ll think of me when it’s all done. I just… I need you to just listen to me. Please. If you can.”

“Of course, I can,” I said, and this time I reached for her, wrapping my fingers around her forearm with a squeeze. I willed her to look at me, but she still wouldn’t. “Whatever it is, I’ll always listen to you.”

I couldn’t do anything right, couldn’t comfort her the way I desperately wanted to. She pulled away from my grip like it had burned her, eyes squeezing shut again as she tucked her hands under her thighs. She stared at the ground, at the counter — at anything but me.

And I couldn’t blame her.

I couldn’t find any fault in that innocent, wide-eyed girl who sat across from me, who had trusted me, who I’d betrayed. Now, she was here to tell me something that was so hard for her that she was visibly shaking, and I had a feeling I already knew what she needed to say.

We can’t do this, Reese.

You’re my teacher, I’m your student.

I’m sixteen years younger than you.

You work for my uncle.

I’m leaving for New York, I have my whole life ahead of me. And you… well, you’re nothing. You’re not what I need.

You’re not what would make me happy.

“I don’t know where to start,” she whispered after a long while.

I sighed, swallowing down any hopes that were still alive. “It’s okay, Sarah. You don’t have to say it. I know. I know what happened can’t happen again, and I know—”

“I was raped.”

Her hands clapped over her mouth as soon as the words were out, her eyes wide in horror as they lifted to meet my gaze. Tears welled over those golden irises so quickly she didn’t have time to try to stop them before they broke the levy of her lower lashes, falling down her cheeks to meet where her hands still covered her lips without so much as a blink.

For a moment, she stared at me like she couldn’t believe she’d said what she had, or like she was waiting for me to run, like somehowIwould be tempted to bolt after what I’d just heard.

The only thing I was tempted to do was full on Hulk smash whoever the motherfucker was who put his hands on her without permission.

Everything slowed in that moment — my breathing, the strong beat of my heart in my chest, my thoughts. They almost came to me like zombies in a fog, slow and gruesome, disappearing again before I could latch onto them and digest them fully. I couldn’t think, couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything but try to breathe and loosen the menacing grip my fists had wound into.

I wanted to murder him, and I didn’t even know whohimwas.

More than that, I wanted to pull Sarah into my arms, shelter her from the pain, from the memory, from the tears falling freely from her eyes. I’d never had an urge to protect someone more in my entire life.

But all I could do was sit there, breathing.

And even that took all my effort.

Sarah dropped her hands into her lap along with her gaze, tears still leaking out of her eyes. Every now and then, she’d sniff, reach a hand up to wipe the wetness from her cheeks — all the while staring at her lap while I stared at her.

Nothing that came to mind felt right to say in that moment. I wanted to ask her who it was, when it happened, what happened to him when she told someone —didshe tell anyone? I wanted to know if that motherfucker was in jail or if I could get his address and kick his ass myself.

But none of that would help Sarah. None of that would take her pain away.

I wasn’t sure anything ever could.

“It was my professor,” she whispered after the longest time. Her face broke again with the admission, letting more tears run freely. “That’s why I left Bramlock.”