Bad Girl by Night

Author:Lacey Alexander [Alexander, Lacey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780451233233
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
Published: 2011-06-06T23:00:00+00:00

Over dinner at the Grizzly Grill, Jake had told her he was leaving the next day for Chicago. Before accepting his job with the Turnbridge Police Department, he’d asked for this time off to visit his parents, who’d moved to the Windy City around the time Jake had gone to the police academy. His brother and sister were coming, too, and bringing their families; they planned to spend the week celebrating his father’s sixty-fifth birthday and retirement by playing golf, fishing, and having quality time together.

And even as attached as she felt to Jake now, Carly thought maybe it would be good to have the coming days all to herself—so she could process what she’d finally acknowledged about her past.

Jake had stood with her on Saturday morning, kissing her goodbye and sweetly asking if she was okay. She’d just nodded. She felt a little numb, a little strange, but underneath all that, she had the strong sense that, “I’ll be all right—I promise.” And then she’d kissed him some more before finally sending him on his way.

After which she had called Tiffany Cleary, who was always up for odd jobs, and asked if she wanted to make some summer money by manning Winterberry’s for a few days.

By noon, she was driving to a bookstore in Cherry Creek—God knew she couldn’t check out the books she sought from the Turnbridge Public Library, if they even had such books—and she soon found herself thankful for the store’s large selection when she discovered exactly what she was looking for: a book on sexual abuse, and another on incest.

An ugly, ugly word, but she supposed that was what she’d suffered. As she’d acknowledged when talking with Jake, she’d simply never permitted herself to think about those horrible nights long enough to give them a label. After all, who wanted to accept that they’d been abused?

Carly then spent the following days up in her apartment reading. She even did some exercises the books suggested. As a first big step, she went to her father’s graveside and talked to him. Only in her head, but before it was over, it began to feel . . . healing.

Then she followed instructions from one of the books to write a letter to her abuser, addressing what he’d done, and then forgiving him for it. It wasn’t something meant to be delivered—it was more like getting it off your chest and onto paper. Just as Jake had told her, the book explained that the forgiveness was for her, not her dad—it would allow her to let go of the tremendous hurt inside her as much as possible and move on.

Continuing as the book directed, she read the letter out loud. She’d cried during the process, but she supposed that was to be expected. Then, after the shop was closed Thursday night and Tiffany had gone, she walked out to the little patio in back where she kept a picnic table and grill, and she burned the letter. And though

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