Seeing Red by Crandall Susan

Author:Crandall, Susan [Crandall, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Forever
Published: 2009-01-31T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Ellis stared at Nate. How could Laura’s attack not have been random? Alexander was a twenty-one-year-old Peeping Tom living miles away in a run-down section of Charleston. What possible connection could there have been between him and Laura?

Her breath caught. Had Uncle Greg been right? Had Nate somehow led the man to Laura?

As much as she feared the answer, she forced herself to say, “Explain.”

Nate took her gently by the arm and led her to the couch.

She was still burning from that kiss. His hand on her bare arm flamed the embers she was trying to stamp out. When they reached the couch, she pressed herself into the far corner.

“You were young,” he said. “You couldn’t see things for what they were. And everyone else . . . Well, everyone else only saw what they wanted to. Or maybe they saw what Laura wanted them to.” He paused, as if choosing his words wisely. “She was working so hard to maintain that image of perfection and to have everyone love her; she was like a leaking vessel, and no matter how much love and adoration you poured in, it would never fill her.”

“That’s absurd,” Ellis snapped. “Laura was always happy. She was beautiful and popular. Everyone did love her.”

“That’s how you saw it—because she wanted you to.”

Ellis crossed her arms and shook her head. “No. We grew up together. I would have known something was off.”

“You were thirteen, Ellis,” he said patiently. “Think about the perspective of the kids you teach.”

Ellis knew that a person’s brain wasn’t fully able to process emotions and make intelligent decisions until after their teen years. That’s why teenagers did such illogical and obviously stupid things. But she’d never thought of herself that way. At thirteen, although she’d been mature for her age, she supposed she’d been the same hormone-charged mess that every other thirteen-year-old girl was. And she had idolized Laura.

Ellis tried to view Laura from this alternate perspective as she nodded for Nate to continue.

“I know you—and everyone else, for that matter—thought I was her boyfriend. But my relationship with Laura was much more complicated. She was much more complicated.”

“But you loved each other.” Ellis realized her voice sounded like that of a child hanging on to her belief in Santa Claus.

“I did love her,” he said solemnly. “But Laura didn’t love me, not in the way you imagine. She sort of needed me; sometimes I think she even hated me. But now I realize what she hated most was herself.”

Ellis frowned and shook her head. “She and I were close; I would have seen it. She was happy.”

He sighed and appeared to weigh what he was about to say. After a moment, he said, “She appeared to be happy. She was a chameleon, showing everyone exactly what they wanted to see—and it was eating her alive.”

Ellis struggled to look beyond the memory of the brilliant smile, the memory of the coolest girl in school, the memory of the fearless horsewoman. But she still could not see what Nate claimed to be the truth.

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