AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I press my finger to his lips and he kisses the tip. “I know that now, but at the time, I didn’t. You had shared nothing about your family or situation with me, so what else was I to think? I left, got in my car, and I was crying so hard I could hardly see straight. It was raining hard and, between my tears and the rain, it was impossible to see the road.”
I can still smell the pineapple-scented car air freshener I had hanging from the rear-view mirror. I still can’t stand the scent to this day.
“Please don’t say it.”
I can see the plea in his eyes. He has the prettiest eyes, and they’re filled with grief as he watches me. “I hit a tree. Not hard, but I hit my head and got slammed around. When someone came to help, I was dazed, and I asked them to call Lincoln. He met me at the hospital, and I was already bleeding. I knew I was losing our baby and all I wanted was you. I needed your arms around me. But then as the days and weeks went on, I got so fucking angry.”
Hudson reaches up and swipes the tear from my cheek. “Baby.”
“It was easier to hate than to feel the pain of my loss. I molded and shaped you into the villain and focused everything I had on hating you. Every move I made was to show you who I was and could be. Every decision I made, you were in the back of my mind, driving me. I thought it was hate but I know now it was grief and trauma. After a year, my periods had hardly come back and weren’t the same.”
I blush talking about this with him, even after what we’ve done, and he tangles his legs with mine to press closer. “They did some investigations and found I had Asherman’s Syndrome. It’s when scar tissue forms inside the uterus or, in my case, the cervix. It makes it almost impossible to have children. I was told my chances were nigh on non-existent. It was like a kick in the teeth. I’d lost our baby and now I was being robbed of my future family and I thought you were playing happy families.”
His hand strokes my cheek as I cry. “I’m so sorry. If I could go back and change things, I’d do so in a heartbeat. The thought of a child with you is all I ever wanted and, because of my callous, reckless actions, I took it away from you.”
“This isn’t your fault, Hudson. This could have happened no matter what we did. Perhaps this is just my journey.”
“I can see why you hated me.”
“At the time, it was what kept me going. I would lie awake and imagine you with your family. How you’d be as a father and it tortured me because I knew you’d be amazing, and I was right. You’re an amazing parent to Tia.”
“Where did you think my child had gone or did you know about Tia before I introduced you?”
My fingers skim the stubble on his chin. “I thought you’d split up and she’d left with the child. And that made me angrier, that you had everything I wanted and had walked away. Not a word or sniff about the child ever came up in the media.”
“You didn’t ask Ryker to look?”
I shake my head. “No, a part of me didn’t want the truth.”
His hand cups my cheek and he bends his forehead to rest it against mine. “I need you to know, I’d never abandon a child of mine.”
“I know that now. Honestly, I think I always knew that.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you needed me.” He rolls to his back and takes me into the cradle of his arm. A loud sigh leaves him, and I know he’ll need time to process this. He lost something too. He just didn’t know it at the time.
“I guess I know why Lincoln hates my guts.”
“He doesn’t hate you.”
A snort leaves him.
“Okay, maybe a tiny bit, but that’s because he was there. He picked me up and put me back on my feet and has been with me every step. He’s more than my cousin, he’s the brother I never had.”
“Do your parents know any of this?”
I shake my head, my hair catching on the stubble of his chin. “No, I never told them and, as I’d turned eighteen, the hospital didn’t inform them. Linc handled everything.”
Hudson goes quiet on me, and I sit up. He has one hand behind his head, causing his bicep to flex, the sheet pulled low exposing his ripped abs and the delicious V of muscle leading toward his cock. His eyes are on the ceiling, and I wonder if he can’t face looking at me, now he knows I’m broken.
“I’m gonna take a shower.”
He nods absently, and a sliver of disappointment fills me that he doesn’t try and coax me into staying in bed with him. I guess I always knew this would end, but now it feels like it’s over before we had a chance to begin.
I shower and wash my hair, rinsing the soap from my body. I gasp when the shower door opens and Hudson steps inside. He takes me in his arms and kisses me, but not like he usually does. Not with hunger or desperation, but with so much tenderness my heart flails in my chest.
He kisses me until I’m dizzy with it, my body yearning for something only he can give me. He lifts me and my legs wrap around him as my back hits the tile.
“I need you, Belle.”
