I can no longer go on.

This isn’t your fault. You did your best to try to help me, but I’ll never be able to forget what my uncle did to me when I was so young. I tried, and I prayed that I could heal, but it’s just not in the cards for me.

There’s something else I need to tell you. This isn’t easy for me, and I wish with all my soul that I had the courage to tell you in person.

I love you.

And no, I don’t mean I love you as a friend or as a therapist. I mean I’m in love with you. I’m truly in love with you.

I don’t normally fall in love with women, at least I never have before. The feelings I have for you are so strong that I’m not sure I’ve ever felt anything close to them for anyone, male or female. I dream of kissing your red lips, taking you into my bed and making love. I dream of you holding me in your arms, chasing the beasts away.

I don’t expect you to return my feelings. I know you could never be interested in someone as horribly defective as I am. But before I leave this earth forever, I want you to know how I feel.

Please don’t blame yourself. I know you did your best for me. No one on this earth could have helped me. I’m too damaged. I wanted to be whole, but I know now that I never will be. I’m not good enough for you or anyone else. You deserve so much better.

That’s why I must leave. Please don’t worry about me. I’ve chosen a painless and cowardly way to die. For that’s what I am, a coward. I don’t have anything more to give to this life.

I will love you forever, even beyond the grave.

Yours,

Gina

When he finished, he sat down on the bed. “Wow.”

I sat down next to him, caressing his forearm. “I hope you don’t think less of me because I didn’t tell you about the letter. In truth, I haven’t told anyone. It was personal correspondence to me and not part of her official record. I know I should’ve turned it over to her family when I received it, but I…couldn’t.”

“I don’t think it would have been a bad thing to show it to them,” he said. “But I also don’t think it changes anything. If nothing in your sessions indicated that she was suicidal, you’re still in the clear. After all, the deed was done by the time you got the letter.”

I nodded. “This letter was the bane of my existence for many months, Jonah. I never thought to question its validity. But after having been kidnapped myself and thrown into a garage with a running car, I began to wonder. Could the same thing have happened to Gina?”

“It’s probably a long shot, baby.”

“It could be. Probably no one thought to look at her wrists or ankles for signs that she might have been bound, that she could’ve been killed the same way my attacker tried to kill me. And if my theory is correct, when the killer went back later, he simply unbound her, put her in her car, and made it look like she had committed suicide. The letter to me served as further proof.”

“No one knows about that letter.”

“Precisely. It only serves as further proof to me. If her parents found her unbound in the garage with the car running, they wouldn’t have thought twice about suicide. It was apparent. But as a therapist, I would require more proof because nothing in my sessions with her indicated that she was suicidal.”

“So you think the letter is a forgery.”

“Yes, I think it might be. She may well have written it, but what if she was forced to do so? And the killer added the part about her being in love with me to further throw me off track?”

He furrowed his brow. “Wow.”

“It’s funny. I’ve been thinking more clearly since I was attacked. It’s like I stepped outside the box and started looking at the situation from a different angle. It made me question Gina’s suicide. So then I started thinking about the letter. I’ve had patients develop feelings for me before. It’s very common in therapy. Granted, they were all men, but I saw the signs right away and nipped them in the bud before they could go too far. It seems I would’ve seen the signs if Gina had been in love with me. And I’ve had suicidal patients before. I’m well-versed in suicide. I know the signs, Jonah. I’ve spent the last several months going over and over her sessions in my mind, and I can’t find any indication that she was suicidal, other than a remark she made when she was flashing back to the first time her uncle raped her. She said ‘I’d rather die.’ But she was talking to her uncle at that specific time, not saying it in real time. In fact, she had told me earlier that her uncle wasn’t worth her life.

“It finally dawned on me, after I was attacked, after I was left to die the way Gina died… Maybe I missed those signs because they weren’t there.” I took the letter from him. “And something else never dawned on me either. Why would she send me a letter? I haven’t gotten a handwritten letter in ages. Why wouldn’t she have sent me an e-mail?”

“Maybe because an e-mail is delivered instantaneously, and she didn’t want you to try to stop the suicide.”

“But she could have put the e-mail in her out-box and programmed it to be sent later.”

He nodded. “That’s true.”

“I realize I could be wrong, but I have to know for sure. She always said the uncle who had abused her was dead, but she could never tell me how he died. I asked her several times to ask her parents about it, but she kept saying she forgot, or that she didn’t want to talk to them about the situation. Even though I stressed to her how important it was that she understand how he died and that he was gone, she wouldn’t take that step.”

“Do you think maybe the uncle isn’t dead?”

I nodded. “It’s a leap, yes. But it rings true for me. Maybe, Jonah, just maybe, I didn’t make a mistake here. Maybe I didn’t miss the sign that she was suicidal. Maybe she wasn’t, and maybe that uncle, whoever he may be, found out she was in therapy and thought she might go to the police, so he took care of her.”

“But why would he do the same to you?”

“Because I knew the truth about him. She could have told me his name, for all he knows.”

Jonah rubbed his chin, looking thoughtful. “Like I said, we’ll put some private investigators on this. And we’ll need to talk to her parents. As far as I’m concerned, they are still prime suspects in your attack.”