Chapter 2 - The Scars of a Survivor
I expected to see the natural, beautiful body of the woman I loved. I was prepared for stretch marks, surgical scars, or any physical evidence of the three pregnancies the entire staff had mercilessly gossiped about.
Instead, as the white silk of her nightgown slipped down her left arm, my breath caught in my throat.
Her skin was not unblemished. From her collarbone, stretching across her shoulder and disappearing down her spine, was a massive, twisting expanse of raised, jagged tissue. It was a severe, horrific burn scar.
"Emily..." I breathed, my hand hovering over her shoulder, too afraid to touch her and cause her pain. "What happened to you?"
She didn't answer. Her trembling hands pushed the manila envelope into my chest.
I opened it.
The first photograph was of three young children—two boys and a little girl—sitting in wheelchairs, their bodies heavily bandaged. The second was a newspaper clipping from a small West Virginia town, dated nine years ago.
The headline made my blood run cold:
TRAGIC HOUSE FIRE CLAIMS PARENTS; 16-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER SAVES THREE YOUNGER SIBLINGS.
I looked at the final document. It wasn't a birth certificate. It was a court-ordered legal guardianship form granting Emily Carter full custody of Jonathan, Paul, and Lily Carter.
They weren't her children. They were her siblings.
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"They aren't my babies, Nathan," Emily whispered, tears finally spilling over her cheeks and dropping onto the hardwood floor. "I was sixteen when the fire took our parents. I went back into the house three times. I pulled them out, but the roof collapsed on me during the last trip."
She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to pull the silk nightgown back up, ashamed of the scars that made her the bravest person I had ever met.
