The feigned surprise and confusion in her voice annoys me almost as much as the fact that she felt she couldn’t just say whatever it is she has wanted to. We’re friends. We have been since a few days after she arrived on McBride Mountain. She shouldn’t feel like she has to hold back anything from me. I certainly never have from her…
Except that I was writing the story.
I turn and look at her. “Whatever it is you’ve been trying to say but you won’t. Just spit it out.”
She frowns as Willow tries to hide a laugh behind her hand, the other supporting Niall, who completely wore himself out around the homestead today.
And I envy him.
I wish I could sleep that soundly.
The last time was on the mountain, in that tiny bed, in that dilapidated shack, in Connor McBride’s arms the night before he left with my story and everything went to absolute shit.
Lucky releases a sigh and leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
She narrows her eyes on me. “You’re joking, right?”
I release an annoyed sigh, rolling my eyes. “I swear to God, if you apologize to me for what those fuckers did, something that you played absolutely no role in, I’m going to come over there and smack you.”
Willow barks out a laugh. “I’m glad to see none of this has changed you at all.”
Her words draw my gaze over to my best friend, the person who has helped see me through all of the fallout from my story, who has been a rock for me through the last few weeks of uncertainty and pain. “Why would it have changed anything?”
The humor in her face fades, her smile faltering because she knows exactly what I’m talking about.
Connor.
The man who, even as we speak, is at his cabin here on the homestead, packing up more of his life, preparing to hike back up that mountain again to get in a few more weeks of work on his new home before the weather completely changes and he would be stuck up there.
The man who has barely spoken to me since he left me in the hospital…
One moment, I was in his arms, being cradled so gently, handled so carefully and with such affection, and the next, I was on a gurney, and then received nothing but awkward hellos and goodbyes when we were in the same room together and looks I never want to see on his face again.
It isn’t the same hatred that once lied there; it’s worse.
It’s guilt.
And that’s something that is so much harder for him to get over than anger.
Two weeks…
Two damn weeks was all it took for us to figure out we didn’t despise each other the way we thought we did, to find something in each other we hadn’t with anyone else.
But two lifetimes could pass and he’ll never forgive himself for what happened to me.
He’ll never stop thinking it was all his fault. And that means Connor McBride will never again be the man he was up on that mountain with me.
Willow’s lips twist into a frown. “You haven’t talked to him?”
I shake my head because I’m afraid if I open my mouth to try to answer that way, I may end up sobbing or saying something stupid.
It didn’t take long to come clean with her, and Lucky, about everything that happened between us up on the mountain. There was no way to avoid it when I had to explain how I had to spend two weeks with that man, writing the story, when they know how much we always hated each other. But now that they know everything, it’s almost worse than when they knew nothing about why I hated Connor McBride.
“He’s planning on leaving in the morning.”
I nod slowly. “Killian told me when he picked me up from my follow-up appointment this morning.”
