My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 687

Chapter 687

His gaze softened in a way thad only seen a handful of times.

“Raphael, if anyone can convince her to speak, it’s you.”

I looked away, the words never reached my mouth because another thought had already taken their place.

Scars.

My breathing slowed by instinct. Images surfaced one after another. The first time I had seen the marks beneath her feet. Some were new, some were old, layered over one another.

The faint lines on the inside of her thighs, barely visible unless the light caught them at the right angle.

I remembered tracing them with my eyes, wondering how someone could hurt themselves in a place they worked so hard to hide.

She had brushed it off.

Another memory followed, one that had never made sense. My fingers moving through her hair, and then I felt it, there had been tiny ridges against her scalp. Hidden beneath thick strands where no one would ever notice them unless they were scarching.

I remembered asking if she’d bumped her head as a child. She’d gone quiet, then changed the subject.

At the time, I hadn’t questioned it. Now, I wished I had. Then another image surfaced. The narrow marks scattered across her back, just pale lines that crossed her skin.

I remembered standing behind her, trying to make sense of them. Their placement had bothered me. Some sat so high that she could never have reached them herself. Others rested near the center of her back, awkward places, impossible angles.

I had assumed they came from her own hands. A punishment she had invented for herself.

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