Sweet Soul (Sweet Home #5)(68)

“It was life-changing,” I said quietly. I pushed up on my arms. Levi watched me closely. “Lexi told me about her past. She showed me her picture, of when she was sick.”

Levi swallowed and his olive skin paled some. “Yeah?” he questioned. I nodded my head. “She told me about how she nearly died, about how Austin helped her heal.”

Levi glanced away, then turned back to me. “It was real close, Elsie. She was so sick, so was my mamma. I thought me and Aust were gonna lose them both in the same week.” He inhaled. On his exhale said, “But we lost only Mamma, Lexi fought back. She still fights every day… for Aust, Dante…”

“For you,” I added. “She told me.”

“For me.” He sighed and I leaned my hands on his chest.

“She took me to Kind and I met Celesha.”

Levi nodded. “You’ll like her. She’s real good with the kids. And the staff. She’s got a real pure heart.”

“You go there?” I asked, and Levi nodded his head. “Most Sundays, before I met you. I’m there when Austin’s not playing. Some weeknights too. I’m not real good with talking to them, but I help in the office some and throw the pigskin around with those that like football.” His finger ran down my face. “I just hate seeing them so cut up like they are. Damn bullies, you know? Assholes for making people that sad,” he cussed. I could clearly hear the anger in his voice.

My confession was on the tip of my tongue. The scars from the past trying to push through, to be free. But something stopped me from going there. I didn’t know what, I guessed I just couldn’t relive that time yet. I was afraid I wouldn’t be strong enough to cope with the demons it would unleash.

I lay back down on Levi’s chest. “I signed today.”

Levi stilled. “I didn’t know you could sign?”

“Yeah. I was at a deaf school until I was eight, then I had the operation and they mainstreamed me. They wanted me to be amongst hearing kids. I’m not too good, but there’s this girl there, at the center, Clara. She’s deaf, Lexi and Celesha needed someone to sign, to encourage her to talk.”

“And did she? Talk to you, I mean?”

“Yeah, a little. She’s had a tough time.” My eyes fluttered closed at the feel of Levi’s fingers in my hair. I sighed, content and completely safe. “I’m going back tomorrow to speak to her some more. I… I want to help her. She’s so sad. You can see it in her eyes. She’s in a lot of pain inside. She’s completely lost.”

“That’s real good, bella mia,” Levi said and I smiled, loving how he spoke Italian to me, loving that he called me his beautiful.

I closed my eyes, feeling the safest I’d ever been, when the conversation I’d had with Lexi sprang to mind. My eyes opened when that thought then drifted to my mom, and how she’d feel if she’d seen me like this… happy… falling in love.

Tears pricked in my eyes, and I felt myself saying, “My mom told me to hide my voice from the world.” I felt Levi tense underneath me, but I didn’t move off his lap. I couldn’t look in those gray eyes without losing control. I couldn’t see his handsome face and the understanding I knew I’d find when I talked about her. Talked about that night… the day I got the news.

“From as young as I can remember, my mom told me not to speak to anyone but her. She told me that people wouldn’t understand us, that there was no place in this world for us.”

“Elsie,” Levi said when I paused. “Look at me, bella mia.”

I shook my head as my hands gripped onto his sweater. “I can’t, Levi. I can’t look at you when I tell you this… just let me tell you. If I see your face I won’t be able to get through it.”

Levi didn’t respond immediately, but then he said, “Okay,” and I relaxed as much as possible.

“I know I told you that my mom had a hard life, that she was never given a chance. She was my mom and I loved her with my whole heart. I felt sorry for her every day as she struggled to get through to the next… unless she had her drugs. Until she shot up with heroin… until she forgot.” I inhaled the strong scent of Levi’s spicy scent, taking the strength he gave.

“We were mostly on the streets. We would live in alleyways or doorways, sometimes with some of my mom’s ‘friends’, sometimes on our own. Occasionally we would have an apartment or a room when my mom would hook up with some new dealer or guy, but that never lasted long. All our clothes and worldly possessions in one small bag.”

Levi’s hand dropped to trace lightly up and down my back. I inhaled deeply. “And that was my life, every week living somewhere new, hiding from the world was the reality of our life. My mom always managed to get us somewhere long enough to have an address and collect her disability, but we never had a home.

“I went to school, I kept my head down and I cared for my mom who, most of the time, didn’t even realize I was there. Until she did, when she would make me feel like the luckiest girl in the world to have a mom like her. My heart ached at how broken she had been made by life. Her parents rejected her, hiding her from their snooty friends. She’d been isolated from receiving life’s tools. In most ways she was the child and I was the adult.”

I cleared my throat when I heard it beginning to break, and Levi’s arm came around my waist. He didn’t pull me close, but I knew he was telling me that he had me… he had me.