Total pages in book: 166
Estimated words: 160356 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 802(@200wpm)___ 641(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160356 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 802(@200wpm)___ 641(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
And his wife has gone. But more significantly, Albi’s mother has gone.
You’re fucked-up, Camryn. Why ever would he want to share his child with you?
Steam curls up from the surface of my coffee, twisting and turning then disappearing. I lift the cup and blow across the lip, making the vapor’s trail flicker chaotically. It’s apt. It doesn’t know what direction it should be going in.
It settles on disappearing. I’ve wanted to disappear so many times. Give up, stop fighting, because I still haven’t figured out what I’m fighting for if I don’t have my boy. I can’t remember who I was before I was his mum.
I glance at the clock on the oven. Seven fifteen. I could make it to work on time if I hurry, but I’m not needed there either. I probably won’t have a job for long, anyway, because Dec withheld that information as well. What other bombs is he going to drop? And will the next one wreck me like every other silent lie?
“She’s a special friend.”
“Like Petal’s my special friend?”
“Do you love Petal?”
“Yes.”
“Then she’s like Petal.”
The innocence of love in a child. How pure and easy it is. So different from the love between two adults, which can be so complicated and ugly. And yet the same as the love an adult can only feel for their child. Irrevocable.
My love for Dec felt easy. It even felt pure. Now, it just feels like an irreversible mess. I’ve spent three years avoiding small children, even my niece and nephew. It may have been extreme, it may have been unreasonable, but it was the only way for me. It was too triggering, and I was already running a daily gauntlet of triggers.
Which is why he didn’t tell you.
I lift the mug to my mouth with shaky hands and sip my coffee, immune to the scorching hot liquid as I struggle to swallow it down past the golf ball in my throat, my eyes welling.
“Camryn?”
My mug meets the table with a thud, my gaze moving to the doorway. Dec’s there, looking like he’s just rolled out of bed and thrown on some sweatpants and a hoodie, his hair a dishevelled mess.
And yet he’s still the most beautiful example of a man I’ve ever seen.
My lip wobbles, my heart now yelling at me, refusing to let me shut it down or build an impenetrable wall around it. Begging me to let him in. Telling me there’s a way. I shake my head and drop my eyes, my hands going between my thighs, the tears trailing my cheeks before they fall and splash on the table.
Dec’s pulling my chair around and kneeling in front of my naked body in a heartbeat, holding my face in his warm palms. But I can’t look at him, tears now splashing my naked thighs, my shoulders jerking from the force of my sobs. He curses under his breath and pulls my thighs apart, moving closer and squeezing me into his chest, hushing me quietly. The emotion pours out of my slumped form into the material of his hoodie, unstoppable, hard and never ending, until my body aches, my face is sore, and my eyes are scratchy. A mess. I can’t catch my breath, can’t breathe, and in utter desperation, I clutch the sleeves of his top, hanging on for dear life.
“Come,” he says gently, lifting me out of the chair and carrying me across his arms to my bedroom. I curl into him, willing the tears to stop, as he walks up the bed on his knees, still holding me, and sits up against the headboard, covering us with the duvet. He’s cradling me to his body, patient and quiet as I cry it all out, clinging to him.
Scared to let go.
Even more afraid to hold on.
“I love you, Camryn,” he whispers, almost with regret. “I’ll fight for this. I can’t let you go.” And that just makes me cry harder because, deep down, I don’t want him to let me go. And yet I don’t know if I can do this.
I snivel, rubbing my face into his chest, terrified to look at him. He gives me no choice when he tilts my face up to his. “Letting you leave last night was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Knowing I was the cause of your sadness killed me. Tell me I’ve not fucked everything up,” he begs. “Tell me you still love me.”
The ability to talk is beyond me, as no words can make it past my throat to be heard. So I sink my face into his neck and hold on that little bit tighter. He’s wrong. He’s not the cause of my sadness. The cause, the root cause, is nothing to do with Dec. I still feel somewhat betrayed, but also not. Dominic and even my brother? They both betrayed me. But Dec? I can’t hold him to the same card. Yes, he’s hidden things from me, but not for his own benefit. I saw the grief in his sister’s eyes. It wasn’t pity for me. It was pity for her brother. He hid his son to save me more pain. He’s suffering the consequences of my grief.