He starts pacing, grabbing fistfuls of his hair. “Mya was born with a congenital heart defect. She’d had multiple surgeries over the years. Around this time, she started having problems. Was in and out of the hospital. She had a mini-stroke a few months before she died.” He drops down onto the bench, leaning his elbows on his knees and burying his face in his hands. His shoulders heave.
I calm myself down, rejoining him on the bench, although I’m careful to keep a distance between us, because I’m fucking mad at him. And furious at my father.
“I’m sorry for how you lost your sister. Genuinely, I am, Galen, but how is it connected?”
“They neglected her!” he yells, lifting his face to mine. His nostrils flare, and a splash of red creeps up his neck. “Your dad gave my mom fifty grand and it was like Mardi fucking Gras for my parents. They took that money and partied hard, leaving me and Mya to fend for ourselves. I was fourteen. She was ten. Grandma was sick, dying, and I didn’t want to burden her, so I tried my best. Took Mya to her appointments, made sure she ate and took her meds, but she was growing weaker, and my parents just weren’t there.” His voice cracks, and he buries his head in his hands.
His body shakes, and I let go of my anger, scooting over beside him, wrapping my arm around his back. “It’s not your fault. You were a kid, and your parents should’ve cared for their daughter better.”
“She died in my arms,” he mumbles, lifting his head and slumping against my body. “She had a massive heart attack. I called nine-one-one, but they got to us too late. I couldn’t save her,” he adds in a whisper, as a tear sneaks out of one eye.
Now, I get why saving his pathetic excuse of a mother means so much to him.
“Oh, Galen.” I hold him tighter. “No kid should have to go through that.”
He turns red-rimmed eyes on me. “Like no little girl should have to go through what you went through.”
Silent tears roll down his face. “It haunts me, Lo. I see Mya every night when I close my eyes, and I miss her so fucking much. Most little sisters annoy their older brothers, but Mya was never that for me. I loved everything about her. She had so much spirit, and she never complained even though her life was curtailed in so many ways because of her illness. She always saw the positive in every situation. My parents never deserved her.”
“They didn’t deserve either of you.” I rub my hand up and down his back, and he leans into me, pressing his forehead to my shoulder. I hold on to him as he clings to me, my mind churning with all I’ve learned. I still don’t understand why he hated me for this, but I’m not going to press him while he’s so upset.
Galen and I have already suffered enough for the sins of our parents, so I’m letting go of my anger, for both our sakes.
“The night I heard my parents fighting,” he continues, lifting his head but still keeping his arms around me, “Mom mentioned how much Trey loved you. She said everything revolved around you.” He has the decency to look ashamed. “I latched on to that. I made it all about you. In my head, you were the reason your dad started an affair with my mom and got her knocked up. And you were the reason he bought her silence, and in doing so, he set everything in motion. When Mya died, I have never felt so lost or alone. Saint and the guys were all I had. Then Dad overdosed, and Mom stopped trying. That anger burning in my veins fueled my vengeance. That was the reason I got up every day. I swore I would get revenge on your father.”
“And then Sinner killed him,” I say, fitting the pieces together.
“And I transferred my anger to you. It wasn’t that hard because you had my brothers in a tailspin.”
“This is so fucked up.” I sigh, letting my hands drop away from his body.
“You want to know what’s really fucked up?” He raises his hands to my neck, rubbing his thumbs up and down my skin, eliciting a rake of fiery tremors. “They say there’s a fine line between love and hate.”
I stop breathing for a second, eyes locked on his. “Don’t you dare say it,” I hiss after a few seconds. “I can’t hear that right now.”
His expression is contrite. “Doesn’t make it not true.” He removes his hands from my face, propping his elbows on his knees, and resting his chin in his hands. “I told you I’m fucked up.”
“Don’t turn this into a pity party, because you’re stronger than that.”
“Am I?” he turns toward me. “It feels like I’m running on empty these past few weeks.”
My anger dissipates again. “There is only one truth I know that matters anymore.”
He stares at me with an intense lens, waiting for me to elaborate.
“We’ve got to stick together. We’ve got to trust in each other and believe that together we can make this all right, because otherwise we’re doomed to lead lives we don’t want.” Fierce determination surges through me. “And I fucking refuse to accept that’s my destiny.”
CHAPTER 27
Harlow
“NO! PLEASE NO!” Galen thrashes about in the bed, crying out in his sleep, rousing me from my own troubled slumber. “You’re not dead! You’re not dead!” he whimpers, and that ache is back in my chest.
“Shush, babe.” I sit up, resting my back against the headboard as I reach out for him. The second my hands land on his back, he scoots forward, snuggling into me with his head in my lap. “It’s okay. I’m here. Go back to sleep,” I murmur.
His arm wraps around my thighs, and he whimpers again. My fingers thread through his hair and I lean down, dotting kisses on his cheek. I continue stroking his hair as I lean my head back and close my eyes.
It’s been an exhausting day, which seems to be the pattern of my life now.
When Galen asked me to stay here tonight, so he could keep a close eye on his mother, I wanted to tell him no. To explain I wanted to run a million miles from him and his horrid mother and this house full of terrible memories.
And that’s precisely why I stayed.
There is no point coming here, moving into this in-between space with Galen and then running off half-assed before it’s resolved. Best to confront it all head on.
I open my eyes as a slight breeze enters the room. I shiver and Galen’s arm clutches my thigh harder as he cuddles into me. I smile as I run my fingers over his hair, watching, as his murmurs fade and his breathing evens out, until he’s in a deep sleep. I’m happy one of us is. His long lashes fan out over his cheekbones, and air whooshes out of his gorgeous mouth in gentle puffs, and I could stare at him all night.
What a complex, broken soul he is. And so tortured. I’m happy I stayed now because this is what we both need. We didn’t have sex, and I doubt it was on his mind either. He seemed content to go to sleep wrapped around me, and it didn’t feel weird.
It felt right.
I lean down and press a kiss to his head.
I can’t hold on to my anger because Galen doesn’t deserve it. I’m going to offer him my forgiveness because it’s right and it’s what I feel in my heart.
It’s not pity.
It’s compassion.
He has been through so much, and even though he was misguided and so cruel to blame me for something I knew nothing about, and had no control over, he was so broken at the time, grieving his sister and drowning in responsibility.