by Thorpe, Elle
Only the Truth
Only You, 2.5
Elle Thorpe
Copyright © 2018 by Elle Thorpe
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
For anyone who has ever made a mistake, owned up to it, and asked for forgiveness. None of us are perfect.
xxx
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Also by Elle Thorpe
Acknowledgments
About the Author
1
Bree
The second hand on the wall clock ticked on silently, my impatience growing every time it moved. There was a special place in Hell for people who continually ran late. Nothing annoyed me more. Though, I didn’t know why I’d expected her to be on time today. She hadn’t been on time for any of my other appointments either. “Just go on through to her office, Miss Jacobson. She’ll be right with you, Miss Jacobson,” I muttered under my breath to the empty therapist’s office. Yeah right.
I straightened my pencil skirt, smoothed over my work blouse, and sighed. It wasn’t the poor receptionist’s fault, and I was being catty. At least I recognised it this time. Closing my eyes, I counted backwards from one hundred, breathing deeply. By the time I got to single digits, the bubbling anger had diminished.
The door behind me finally opened, and a short, dark-haired woman strode into the room, unhurried despite the fact she was over thirty-five minutes late for our five p.m. appointment. She deposited a pile of papers on her desk before sitting primly in her over-sized chair. “Bree. It’s been some time.”
“Six months.”
Dr Guzman scribbled something on a notepad. “So, fill me in.” Her gaze tracked carefully over my features, and I straightened my spine, folding my hands neatly in my lap. “How have you been?”
I plastered a smile across my face. “Great. Really great, actually. I have my own apartment now. It’s only small, but it’s in a great area. I enrolled in a Naturopathy course—”
“Naturopathy? That’s…interesting.”
I forced myself not to roll my eyes. I still worked my day job, as a makeup artist on a local TV soap, but after the breakdown of my last relationship, I wanted a change. Makeup appealed to my creative side, but I needed something that would exercise other parts of my brain as well. The mentors who ran the course had warned us we’d be given grief for studying alternatives to Western Medicine. They hadn’t been wrong. My own mother had scoffed when I’d told her about it during our annual phone call. She’d called it ‘hippy rubbish’ to be exact. But if I hadn’t bothered getting into an argument with her, I certainly wasn’t going to try to explain the benefits to this woman.
So, instead, I carried on as if she hadn’t spoken. “I’ve also been doing yoga and meditation and I’ve taken up cycling. That bike seat is the most contact my vagina has had in that time, too.”
Dr Guzman looked up sharply, her pen hovering in midair. “Excuse me?”
My face flushed hot. Oops. Too much information. “I’m still not having sex, is what I meant.”
“Right. Right. That’s good.” She moved to her laptop and scrolled through a file before turning back to me. “You don’t have long left on your celibacy vow. Only about a month, according to my records. You’ve kept it this whole time?”
“Yep.”
It had been one of the easier aspects of my therapy. Doctor Guzman had pointed out on our first session that I’d bounced from one toxic relationship to another, ever since I was old enough to realise boys existed. She’d made me write and sign a contract, stating I would avoid relationships or casual sex for a year while I worked through my issues. Not that she could enforce it, of course, but she’d pointed out I needed to make things right within myself before I could take on someone else and their needs. And, at the time, I was so sick of men, it hadn’t been difficult to swear them off for a year. Other aspects of my reinvention had been much harder.
“And the anger management course I suggested?”
“Yes,” I reported, legitimately pleased to be able to answer in the affirmative. Unlike the last two appointments, where I’d had to answer no because I’d skipped out on going. “I completed it last week. It was great. I really think it’s helping. I feel less…highly strung.” That was mostly the truth. I did feel less highly strung…when people didn’t keep me waiting for forty minutes, anyway.
She raised an eyebrow. “Hmmm…”
I held onto my fake smile, but irritation crept up on me. I hated when she did that. I was here, on time for my appointment. Unlike her. I was talking. Why did she have to hmmm me? The woman reminded me of my mother and the disapproval I’d put up with for my entire life. I didn’t need this judgement. Not when I was paying her eighty dollars an hour to fix me. The silence drew out between us as she waited, and I studied my shellacked nails, pretending not to know what she was waiting for.
She gave in first. Ha. “And your sister?”
Ugh. There it was. The one thing I hadn’t done and the one thing I really didn’t want to talk about. “What about her?” We both knew I was stalling, but she played along.
“Did you speak to her, like we discussed last time?”
My fake smile faltered.
“Bree. Don’t you think you need to speak to her?”
“No,” I stated dully.
She frowned, her eyebrows pulling together in the exact same way my mother’s used to.
I really needed a new therapist.
“Fine,” I huffed out. “I’ll call her.” Maybe.
“Today?”
I winced at the thought of making that call. Of speaking to the sister who had been a surrogate mother to me when our own was too busy with her career to care for the children she had never wanted.
The same sister who had then run off and married my high school sweetheart.
We hadn’t spoken in years.
I’d let the trauma fester to the point it affected every part of my life, creating a temper I couldn’t control. I’d explode into a fiery outburst at the smallest upset. It had almost become my trademark. But after a year of therapy, painstakingly fixing myself, I’d come too far to not finish the process.
“Fine. Today.”
* * *
It was well after six when I finally got out of the therapist’s office and unlocked my bike from the stand. Dr Guzman’s offices sat amongst several other medical practices and a mixed martial arts gym, with a combined total of three off-road parking spaces. It was impossible to get a spot, so I always cycled.
Normally I enjoyed the ride, as it was only around fifteen minutes from my apartment, but as I pedalled along the side of the building, all I could think of was the late hour. How I should have driven because I had a huge exam tomorrow, and between Dr Guzman being late, and now having to ride home, my study time was slipping away. I’d be pulling an all-nighter at this—
“Fuck!” a deep voice yelled as something huge ploughed into me at high speed. I careened off the path, wobbling wildly onto the road. Mother of God! What the—
I didn’t even get a chance to do any yelling or swear
ing of my own before my tyre hit a pothole and I crashed headfirst into the unforgiving ground. My helmet cracked as it hit the road, my cheek scraping along the tar in the process. My head spun, but it was my bare shoulder and arm that took the brunt of the fall.
I slid to a stop, my legs tangled around my bike, my skin probably left behind me somewhere judging by the stinging pain in my arm. Damn summer evenings. If it had been winter, I might have had some protection from the road, in the form of a jacket or coat. But this thin blouse had no chance.
At least I was close to medical help, I supposed as I lay there. Though, I blinked at the sky, wondering how helpful a therapist, a dentist, and a gynaecologist would be with probable broken bones and a concussion. I almost laughed. It sounded like the beginning to one of those jokes. Three guys walked into a bar…
As I pondered peeling my aching body off the road, a face appeared above me. A ridiculously handsome face. Dark hair. Hazel eyes. Scruff covering a strong jaw. If I hadn’t just been nearly killed, I might have tried slipping him my number.
Why was I even checking him out when I’d just been mowed down? Maybe I really did have a concussion.
“Shit, are you okay?” he asked.
I groaned, my body protesting my attempts at moving. “Something the size of the Titanic just hit me, and now I'm a bloodied mess in the middle of the road. Do I look okay?”
I finally managed to get myself to a sitting position. Frig, my arm really hurt. I glanced down at it and grimaced. Yep, there used to be skin there. “What the hell just happened?”
The guy bent down and lifted my bike off me before he squinted at my wound. “I kind of ran into you. I was coming around the corner, and my phone was ringing, and I was trying to find it in my bag. I didn’t even see you. I’m so sorry. Here, let me help you up.”
He extended a hand in my direction, but I just stared at it, my brain not comprehending what he was saying. He ran into me? With his car? I gazed past him. No, he’d been on a bike, too. I could see it abandoned on the ground over by where he’d run me off the path. But, he was on his phone? WTF?
I was banged up and now going to be even later for my study session after I went to the ER and got myself fixed up, all because he’d gotten distracted by a phone call? Who was on the other end? The Queen?
The simmering anger I’d been working so hard to keep in check for months now threatened to erupt. Breathe, Bree. Breathe.
But then I saw a badge, dangling from his pocket, Dr Damien Farrow printed in neat type beneath a photo of his smiling head. His stupid, smiling head! You had to be kidding me. My barely in check rage bubbled over. Fucking doctors!
“You could have killed me, you douche nozzle! Why didn’t you just let it go to voicemail? Are you really so important you had to take the call that very second?” I went to rub my aching arm, but my fingers came away sticky with blood. My stomach rolled.
“Shit! This is going to need stitches!” My voice came out high and squeaky, and I was probably overreacting, because I had a tendency to do that, but damn it, today was not my day, and I’d had enough. People sucked.
I expected more apologies and maybe some grovelling for forgiveness, but Dr Dickhead’s lips curved up and, to my astonishment, a chuckle rumbled out of him. “Feisty, aren’t you?”
My mouth dropped open. Scratch that about overreacting. The guy probably had awards for asshattery.
“What?” he asked as he took my arm, being careful to keep his fingers away from the blood. “It’s a graze. You’ll be fine.”
“Fine? Easy for you to say. It wasn’t your head cracking off the ground! What kind of doctor are you anyway? Don’t you have some sort of duty of care to help the people? I could have a concussion for all you know. You didn’t even ask me how many fingers you’re holding up or anything.”
“True.” His voice was irritatingly calm in comparison to my yelling. He took my jaw between his fingers, tilting my head. I stilled as his gaze met mine. There were flecks of gold in amongst the hazel, and they were surrounded by long, dark lashes. The skin at the corners crinkled as if he smiled a lot, and there was a twinkle—
A bright light nearly blinded me, causing my eyelids to slam closed. I swatted his hands and doctor’s torch out of my face. “What are you doing?”
He threw up his hands in frustration. “Since you implied I was being a shit doctor, I’m checking you for a concussion. How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Oh, for frig sake.” I scrambled to stand, pulling my bike up with me. My head felt intact, I was good to go. “I’m fine.”
“Your shirt is ripped, and you’re bleeding. At least come back to my office. I may just be a gynaecologist, and not much good with concussions, but I can at least fix up a graze for you.”
I snorted back a laugh. “You’re a gyno?”
He frowned. “I specialise is gynaecology and fertility. Why is that funny?”
“Because you’re entirely too young and good-looking to have your head between any woman’s legs, unless you’re—”
He raised an eyebrow as I realised what I’d said. Shit! I definitely had a concussion. I needed to go to the hospital. “I’m going to go now.”
“Have dinner with me tonight?”
I spun back to where he stood with his arms crossed over his chest, one eyebrow raised as if he’d laid down a challenge.
“Why on earth would I do that? You just ran me over with your bike.”
He shrugged, an annoying half-smirk, half-grin spreading across his face. “You’ve got attitude. I like it. And you really may have a concussion so you shouldn’t be alone. Plus, you think I’m handsome.”
“And arrogant. And possibly blind, considering you didn’t even see me riding right in front of you. And anyway. I don’t date. So, no thanks. I’ll pass.” I pushed my bike away, walking it a few steps before I swung my leg over and found the pedals.
“Shame,” Dr Knob-Jockey called from behind me. “Because for the record, I’m really good every time I have my head between a woman’s legs. Not just when I’m at work.”
2
Bree
“Move, Sass, you’re wrecking my system,” I complained to Sassenach, my furry, grey fluffball of a cat. I’d named her after a character in my favourite book, because she was a bit on the uppity side, just like Claire from Outlander. Sass ignored me and settled herself in the middle of the dining room table, right on top of the notes I was trying to work through. She eyed me with the same attitude Dr Jerk Face had accused me of having earlier.
Ugh. I did not have attitude. I just didn’t put up with people’s shit. There was a difference.
I’d decided to forgo the emergency room visit, concluding, on my ride home, that Dr Dumbass was right. My arm didn’t need stitches. Instead, I came home, cleaned up, and shoved some food down my throat before settling in with my books.
Moving Sassenach off my notes for the third time, I used my free hand to pull up the website of the online university. But instead of the white, green, and blue logo that normally greeted me, I got the there is no internet connection error page.
Great. This had been happening more and more lately, and it was really beginning to grate on my nerves. I probably needed to invest in a new router, or some other piece of Internet-related equipment, but with the astronomical amount of money I’d shelled out for this course and the necessary text books, I didn’t have a spare cent to my name.
I clicked my Wi-Fi name when the list of available networks showed up, pointing a finger at Sass who was stealthily trying to get back on the table. It was already nine p.m. If I could study until midnight, or maybe one a.m., I’d get through all the notes I wanted to revise, and I’d be able to go into tomorrow morning’s exam feeling confident. The homepage finally loaded, and with Sassenach pinned to my lap, I finally got to work.
For exactly seventeen minutes.
The door to my neighbour’s apartment slammed, and a loud, masculine laugh echoed through the walls, start
ling me out of my herbal botany bubble. Something heavy was dumped on the floor with a thump. A female voice called something I couldn’t make out, then someone cranked up a stereo.
The inhabitants cheered.
Nineties rock pounded through the wall.
You had to be kidding me.
They’d only moved in over the weekend, and they were having a party. On a Monday. Seriously? I pulled on some headphones, but even a white noise app couldn’t drown out the thumping bass, the constant slamming of doors, and multiple loud voices. Sassenach jumped off my lap and took refuge under my bed when they turned on a karaoke machine.
God-awful singing splintered through the thin plasterboard walls.
I cranked the white noise app as loud as it would go, reconnected the Wi-Fi, which had dropped out again, then forced myself to concentrate. But it was impossible. Over and over, I read the same lines, and an hour later, I was still on my first page of notes.
“Ugh!” I huffed as I threw a pen at the wall. It bounced off and dropped to the floor harmlessly. Realising I didn’t have another, I stomped across the room to retrieve it. This couldn’t go on. I was going to have to do something or I’d fail my exam.
This was a good opportunity to use some of the strategies I’d learnt through therapy and the anger management course. I’d never really been able to deal with conflict in a proactive way; instead, I was always reactive, and the course had taught me that wasn’t the best way of dealing with problems. I’d just go over there and calmly ask if they could keep it down. No need for dramatics or hysterics.
