Page 127 of Shamed
“You can’t help me,” she finally murmurs after a painful silence, then drops her gaze to her arm.
“Why?”
Sucking in a deep breath, she pulls the sleeve down, then sets her jaw like she’s accepted something. “The cuts . . . there is one for each day Jacob was in prison. And now that he’s out . . . I can’t seem to stop.”
My eyes fall shut, and it feels like my chest was put in a vice. I suspected as much when she mentioned marking days off like a calendar.
And I knew Jacob was being released, and I should have known it would affect her.
“Jayne, you need to talk to someone about this. Maybe a—”
“He didn’t do it,” she cuts me off with her shaky declaration.
I open my eyes again, forehead creased with confusion. “What? What are you talking about?”
“Jacob.” Her voice cracks, eyes still cast downward. “He wasn’t the one who attacked me.”
I freeze while those words turn around and around in my head, and I try to make sense of them. Because surely, I misunderstood, or heard wrong, or fucking missedsomething. “What do you mean, he wasn’t the one who attacked you?”
Jayne finally lifts her tear-filled eyes to me, and the sheer amount of guilt I see in them has me taking a step back, shaking my head.
I open my mouth to say something, but nothing comes out.
What the fuck is she saying?
“It was an accident.” She reaches for my hand, but I pull it back, stepping further out of reach. “Mase, please. I didn’t mean to.”
I turn away from her while my gaze and my mind both try to latch onto something that will make this make sense. “I don’t understand. How exactly do youaccidentlyaccuse someone of rape?”
“He was there when I came to. I was . . . I was confused and scared. And then the police were there, and everything was just happening.”
“So you blamed the first person you saw?! And then what, you realized it wasn’t him?”
A sob rips from her chest as she steps closer. “It wasn’t like that. I truly believed it was Jacob who did it . . .”
I stare at her for long seconds, jaw clenched and mind still playing catch up, while my heart thumps behind my ribs.
No.
This has to be a joke.
A sick fucking joke.
Gnawing on my cheek, I pace a few steps away, then reach up and grip my hair with both hands. “Help me understand this, Jayne, because I’m fucking struggling here. Why do you say it wasn’t Jacob now, when you were so sure it was him back then?”
“Because I found out who actually did it.”
Fuck, thisisn’ta joke.
I think I’m going to be sick.
Jacob didn’t do it. He didn’t fucking do it.
That reality doesn’t just slap me in the face, it sucker-punches me in the gut.
“Jesus. You sent an innocentboyto prison.”
“I know.”
