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“I’m a mean fucking drunk.” His hands dropped, and sure enough, tears spilled from those dark eyes. I crawled over the blankets and right into his lap, desperate to hold him. To comfort him. I pulled him to my chest, rested my head on his, and held him tight. A sob tore through him and wrecked my heart. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. You never deserved that, Genevieve.”
I stayed silent, holding him tighter, as he spewed apology after apology. No words could make this kind of hurt right, so I didn’t even try.
“Keep going,” he said into my shirt. The hold he had on me didn’t let up, and I didn’t want it to. I squeezed my eyes shut as I continued.
“I listened to you,” I told him. “I packed it all up and got rid of it to forget. I couldn’t… I can’t make myself go into the rooms, so I just sort of… pretend they’re not there. But everything else? You were in everything, so I got rid of it. And I put a smile on to convince everyone it was okay—that I was okay. I told your family and friends that I didn’t want to talk about you or what happened. And everyone just… let it be. The stories still floated around, but they mostly let me be.
“Life just kept… going, and I couldn’t move with it. I can’t breathe when I’m alone. It all just hurts too much,” I admitted. “I fill all my time with all these things just so I don’t have to feel anything. It doesn’t stop the nightmares or the nights I spend crying, but it… pretending helped.”
Until you came back like a wrecking ball and ruined all my pretending. I couldn’t add that last part in. It was for the better. This was for the better.
Chapter 82
Killian
Jesus fuck, I was a horrible fucking person and an even worse husband. Not only had I said those things to her, but I couldn’t even remember. What fucking bender had I been on to forget that?
My hands ran up her back as I clung to her tighter. I pressed my ear to her chest, listening to the quickened thrumming of her heart. The sound was heaven. A song ready to lure me in with its comfort and hope. I could die a happy man to the sound of her heartbeat.
Another time. Instead, I made myself pull back to look at her. I was a fucking mess of tears and uneven emotions. Gentle fingers brushed over my cheeks.
“I’ve never seen you cry before,” Genevieve murmured with something akin to fascination in her voice. I’d always been very careful to never cry—especially around her.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she said. Okay? This woman was far too good for me.
“It’s not,” I insisted.
“We both did horrible things, Killian.”
“I’ve done far worse.” But we’d get there. “What else?”
“I don’t know,” Genevieve admitted. “I didn’t do much, Killian. I just… stayed here. There’s just not much to tell you.”
“Okay,” I whispered, nodding slowly. That went a lot faster than I’d been anticipating. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to share with her—I did—I was just worried about how she’d take it. Deep in my core, I was afraid. What if it was all too much for her? What if I was too broken? I wouldn’t blame her. Not after everything.
As if sensing my trepidation, she pressed her lips to mine softly in a kiss that spoke volumes.
“You won’t scare me away, Killian,” she said against my mouth. A sad sort of smile tugged at the corners of my lips. I didn’t believe that for a second. Twisted with a little bit of darkness in her or not, my wife was a good fucking woman. Better than most people in the world could ever hope to be. Me? I’d grown real fucking comfortable with my demons and darkness. It was easier to dance to the fucking song they were playing than fight them.
“Do you remember when I was sixteen? I spent two weeks in the hospital?” I asked. Better to start at the very beginning than in the fucking middle.
“I do.” She frowned. “I remember being mad at your mom for not letting me go with her to see you. I also remember realizing just how scary your mom could be.”
“Yeah, she has that effect when she wants to,” I said. Sighing, I took Genevieve’s hands in mine and stared down at where our fingers laced together. I traced her empty ring finger with my thumb. Fuck, I missed the sight of my ring on her finger.
“Killian, you’re worrying me.”
“I wasn’t sick. I tried to kill myself,” I told her quietly and gave her time for the words to sink in. I refused to look at her, my entire focus on our hands. I wanted to know what she was thinking, but I also didn’t. “I stole my dad’s heart medication from my mom’s medicine cabinet—I don’t know why she still fucking had it. Not that that’s important right now anyway. I took the whole bottle, but Declan found me. Mom… Mom managed to revive me.”
“Killian…”
“I was just… so tired of hurting. It was like… no matter what good happened, I felt fucking awful. I was so stuck in my head and just… I wanted to be done with everything. I just wanted to be done with it all.” Words caught in my throat as I choked up. She removed her hands from mine, and I braced for the fucking backlash. It never came as she wrapped her arms around my shoulders and buried her face in my neck. I hugged her tight and did my best to hold back the waves of emotions rolling through me.
“It’s okay, Ian,” she whispered into my skin.
“It’s not,” I muttered. I clung to her, using her closeness to help push me through. “I quit the medication they gave me as soon as I turned eighteen because it made me feel like fucking crap. I didn’t feel good. I just was fucking numb to the world. I like to think I had a fucking handle on things, but I know I didn’t. It didn’t get worse until the shit with your dad happened and I lost my job. I drank. A lot. And I hid it well enough.”
