“And did you decide?” Rachel asked bitterly. “Because I spent 17 years in hell—two jobs, selling everything, crying every night so the kids wouldn’t hear, going back to the police station every month for two years, and hearing ‘no’ every time. Do you know how many times I wanted to give up?”
Her voice broke.
“Because I loved you. Because part of me held onto hope you’d come back. And now here you are—alive. And you were never really lost. You just left us.”
Michael stood and took a step toward her.
Rachel backed away.
“Don’t.”
“Rachel, you have to understand—”
“It wasn’t easy for me either,” Michael said desperately.
Rachel laughed, bitter and almost hysterical.
“Not easy? You chose this. I didn’t. My kids didn’t. You made a decision alone and shattered our lives.”
“I did it to save you!” Michael shouted—his first raised voice.
Silence crashed down.
“To save you,” he repeated, softer. “Those men didn’t make empty threats. A month before I vanished, a coworker tried to walk away. They found his wife and his eight-year-old daughter at home. Their throats were cut. The bodies were left for him to find.”
That man killed himself a week later.
Rachel’s legs went weak. She sank onto the couch.