Free unForgivable (An inCapable World Novel Book 2) by Sara Hubbard

think I have good reason.”
    “Fair enough,” he agrees.
    “Just tell me who you are. I want to understand, because you appear out of nowhere…and you’re pen pals with my aunt?” I laugh, “I mean, what the fuck? Mona has a pen pal?” I quiet for a minute. “Then all of a sudden you’re the guy my best friend turns to when I have an emergency. Why haven’t I ever heard of you?”
    “You’re welcome,” he says, grinning.
    “Bastard,” I mumble as I move to my feet. I wait for him to move his leg out of the way so I can walk away.
    I glare at him and he takes the hint, rising to tower over me. I spin on my heel and stomp away. As I reach the hallway, he starts talking and I slow to listen, touching the wall as if I need to be held up.
    “I met your aunt just before my eighteenth birthday, right before my mother married husband number four. Daddy-to-be and I didn’t get along so well and one night your aunt broke up a fight between us. I was much smaller then…maybe half the size I am now. Not short, but thin. He all but knocked me unconscious and she stopped it.”
    “So…that’s it? You became friends?” I sigh, looking over my shoulder. “I didn’t even know Mona had friends.” I turn and start walking back to him, but I maintain my distance.
    He smirks. “I came to her pub one night to thank her for saving my ass and she handed me a wad of cash, told me to get out of town, and get away from this place. She said Sterling has a way of destroying everything good in your life. And the way she said it…I could see real sadness in her eyes. I couldn’t stop myself from really listening to what she had to say. I didn’t want to leave on her dime, but then…your aunt was persistent.”
    “You don’t say?”
    “So I took the money and I left.”
    “And then what?”
    “Wow, you’re very much like your aunt, you know that? You like to control conversations.”
    “Only when people avoid my questions,” I say.
    “Back to your issues with trust, are we?”
    “So you’re not going to answer?”
    He scratches at his neck and then settles back down on the ottoman like he might be there for a while. “All right. I’ll let you have your way this one time.” He flashes me a wink and I glare at him. “I joined the military. It was my way to stay away from my stepfather and his influence.”
    “He’s a bad guy?”
    Damien nods, his face grim.
    “Then what?”
    He grins, shaking his head at me. “Soon after I signed up, I did a tour in Afghanistan and when I had the money, I sent Mona a letter, along with the money she’d given me. She…uh…” His smile touches his whole face, even leaves small lines along the corners of his eyes. It’s as endearing as fuck and a little distracting. “She sent it back with a Polaroid of her giving me the finger. Then she said I could keep writing her if I wanted to, but not to expect her to write back because she had better things to do with her time.” He gives me a small smile but it doesn’t touch his eyes and I get he can’t fully enjoy the memory, not when he knows he’ll never have any more with her.
    “That sounds like my aunt,” I say quietly.
    “One of the best laughs I had on that tour. So I kept writing. And for a while she didn’t send anything back. Not until I stopped writing on my second tour. I…uh…got myself injured and was kind of out of commission for a while. She wrote that first time to makes sure I was okay.”
    “She actually asked?”
    “Not in so many words. But, yeah. After that, she always wrote back. For the last six years.”
    “How could I not know that?”
    He shrugs. “I think she’s the type of person that only tells people what she wants to tell them.”
    “I feel like I didn’t even know her, like I only got a piece of her. I mean, how is it that I’m discovering a whole different side of the woman I thought I knew the best?”
    “I feel like that too. I’m sure everyone who knew her did. That was her