That hurt.
That hurt so bad.
I wanted to scream the truth at him. To tell him that I didn’t want to eat again, that I felt like hell, but he wouldn’t understand.
He couldn’t understand.
He’d think that the baby in my belly didn’t matter as much as Jake and him. He wasn’t wrong, but I just… I just couldn’t terminate the pregnancy. I couldn’t. Not yet. There were all kinds of surgeries that gave me hope—
Biting my lip at the thought, I barely managed to stop myself from shoving his hand away and told him huskily, “I’ll wash my face and be right out.”
“You sure you don’t want anything to eat?”
“No. I’m not hungry.”
He nodded, stepped back and started tugging at the half-Windsor knot on his necktie. As he pulled it free, I watched him, watched as what should have been an easy motion took a good couple of seconds.
“Has someone died?” I blurted out before I finished washing up, my little face sponge still dripping suds and water onto the bathroom floor.
His head whipped to the side, and as our eyes caught and held, I knew someone had died.
Blinking, I took a step back, turned to the sink and quickly rinsed off my face. I saw him approach in the vanity mirror, but I didn’t expect that the second I’d cleaned away the suds, he’d haul me into his arms.
He hugged me.
He hugged me so hard that it hurt.
But it hurt good.
God, I’d needed that earlier. I’d needed this hug when I got out of the doctor’s office.
I sagged into him, barely managing to stop myself from breaking down and telling him the truth there and then, but Finn sagged into me too, and if I’d needed even more confirmation that everything was wrong, I had it now.
Sucking in a breath, I whispered against his shirt, “Finn? Talk to me, baby.”
“I—” He tried again, “I—” He fell silent.
My hands tightened their clasp at the back of his jacket, and I pulled him even more into me, so much so that there was barely an inch separating us.
“I’ve been keeping secrets, Aoife.”
Whatever I’d expected him to say, it wasn’t that.
“What kind of secrets, sweetheart? To do with work?”
“I wish that were it. I wish that were all it was.” He pressed his face into my hair then whispered, “I’m a fucking coward.”
I tensed. “Why would you say that?”
“Because I wanted the best of both worlds, but lies… there shouldn’t be lies between a wife and her husband.”
When he started to pull back, I let him. Thoroughly confused by his statement, I tilted my head to look up at his tortured expression.
“What are you talking about, Finn?”
“For years,” he rasped, “I’ve carried this burden, and I did so because I knew that there was nothing that could be done to bring justice to the people who deserved it.
“It’s worn on me and worn on me, but that doesn’t excuse what I did. That doesn’t make it right or fair. I deserve that burden. I deserve worse. But don’t think that I’ve felt like I’ve gotten away with—” His mouth quirked a second before he closed his eyes and shook his head. “—gotten away with murder,” he finished.
“What are you talking about?” I demanded, folding my arms across my belly and hugging my elbows.
Of all the goddamn days for Finn to need to confess to whatever the hell it was that was going on, he had to pick this one?
I wasn’t even sure if I had the mental capacity to deal with this, well, whatever this was, and truthfully, I knew I had to. Not because Finn clearly needed to get this off his chest, but because as much as that was true, he was struggling to do that.
Struggling to confess.
That really amped up my nerves.
“Will starting at the beginning help?”
“Where’s the beginning?” he exclaimed, and then he stunned the hell out of me—he spun away from me and screamed, “WHERE’S THE MOTHERFUCKING BEGINNING?”
Brow puckered, I ground out, “Finn? What the hell?”
I almost moved closer to tug on his jacket, but he twisted back to look at me, and out of nowhere, there was a chasm between us.
It was wider than the Grand Canyon and just as impossible to cross.
At that moment, I felt more alone than I had in years.
After we met, I’d been lucky, I knew. I’d been swallowed up by his family. Absorbed into them. I wasn’t used to feeling this way, and I didn’t like it.
It happened in a glance.
Without a single word uttered.
That was when he started to break my heart.
“I don’t know where to goddamn start, Aoife. I don’t fucking know. So many goddamn lies, so many secrets. It’s starting to be like some kind of—” He dragged his hands through his hair. “I don’t have all the answers. I just… what I’m about to tell you is literally all I know, you understand?”
Warily, I whispered, “Okay.”
“Nothing’s okay, Aoife.” His jaw clenched. “When I’m done, when I’ve told you everything, I’ll leave, and I won’t come back—” Finn sucked in a breath, seeming to correct himself. “I won’t come back until you let me in.”
A gasp escaped me. “You’re scaring me, Finn!”
Finn—leaving? Finn didn’t do things like that!
“I deserve nothing less than for you to toss me out but, please, baby, please don’t ask me for a divorce. I can’t give you that. I can’t. I’m incapable of—”
I rushed at him, and though he was taller than me, bigger and heavier as well, I surged onto tiptoe, grabbed his shoulders, and I shook him. It barely moved him, but I did it again.
“STOP IT,” I snapped. “STOP IT. Tell me what the hell’s going on.”
“I know who killed your mother.” His nostrils flared. “I’ve known for years.”
For a second, I stared at him. Just stared.
Then I bit off, “Who?”
I’d break down later.
What was more grief on top of what I’d learned today?
My throat clutched so hard I wasn’t sure if I wanted to cry or puke, but as I stared at him, waiting for him to answer, rage bubbled up out of nowhere.
“WHO?” I screamed at him when he remained silent. There was an apology in his eyes but that wasn’t fucking enough, was it? “Who killed my mom?”
“It was…” He closed his eyes. “It’s complicated. I knew what the ramifications would be. I’ve known since the beginning, but I swear to you now that if I’d known I could have gotten justice for her, I’d have fought for that, Aoife. I’d have fought for the truth to come out, but there was no chance of that.”
“How do you know?” I ground out, well aware that I was in his face which was no easy feat seeing as he was so much taller than me.
“Because… it was Lena.”
He said those fateful words on a sigh.
On a shaky breath.
On an exhalation so heartfelt that I knew it came from his soul.
Because that was goddamn confession for you, wasn’t it?
Good for the fucking soul.