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I didn’t even consider backtracking. It was time to lay everything out on the table. “Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because she told me to and that’s how it worked between us – she told me what to do, and I did it.”

“I don’t get you, Emily.” That simple statement pushed the knife farther into my gut. I’d thought that he was the one person who had understood.

“And that just validates why we don’t belong together.”

He shook his head, rocking backward as though he were too angry to continue the conversation. Just as I thought he might turn to leave, he twisted back at me. “How do you still let her have that much power over you? She’s gone. You’ve been released. But you’re like a victim with Stockholm syndrome, still defending her, still looking to her to tell you what’s ‘allowed.’ When will you see that you don’t need her to tell you how to feel about things?”

I hadn’t cried throughout the entire service, and suddenly, now, my eyes burned and my throat constricted. “You’re one to criticize someone for u