I broke down before I could answer properly, and she let me cry before asking anything else.
When I finally explained everything, she listened carefully and then said something that stayed with me.
“A bad man would use your pain against you, and a shallow man would run from it, but a scared man lies because he does not know how to hold something valuable,” she said.
“That does not make it right,” I replied.
“No, it does not, but it helps you understand what you are dealing with,” she answered calmly.
Days passed, and Caleb did not pressure me, only sending short messages saying he was there when I was ready.
On the fourth day, his cousin Danielle Foster visited me with documents from the old case involving the bakery explosion.
She showed me an unpublished article written by Rachel that exposed corruption tied to a city official named Victor Langley.
Reading those notes made me realize my story had never truly been forgotten, only buried.
When I finally met Caleb again in a public courtyard, I told him clearly, “I am not ready to forgive you, and I may never be.”
“I understand,” he said.
“But I want the truth about everything,” I added.