She pulled back before the kiss could turn into something else. ‘I need to tell you something.’ Oh god, now she’d blurted it out there was no going back. She sat up. ‘And I think you’re going to hate me.’
‘Well, that’s impossible.’
She took a deep breath. ‘It’s about Liam.’
‘OK.’ He sat up too, leaning against the headboard as she kneeled up next to him.
‘And the night he died.’
‘He was drunk, got in the car and lost control and drove into a tree. What more do I need to know?’
‘It was my fault,’ Alex all but whispered.
He frowned. ‘How could it possibly be your fault?’
‘You have to understand I had lived with the worst version of him for eighteen months. I was at breaking point.’
‘I know how hard it must have been for you.’
‘I knew I had to leave him not just for my own sanity but for Zara. She was getting older and wiser to what was happening and I didn’t want her to grow up in that environment. But I was always scared that leaving him would push him over the edge. Then one day he picked Zara up from nursery. I had no idea he was going to do that, I was due to pick her up at three but he got there before me, I don’t know why. I never left her alone with him because I just didn’t trust him to look after her properly when he was always drunk. When I got home shortly after he’d picked her up, he was playing with her and it was quite obvious he was out of his head drunk. He’d picked our daughter up and driven home with her when he was drunk.’
Quinn took a sharp intake of breath.
‘When I think about what could have happened.’ She shook her head angrily. ‘And that was the final straw. I snapped. I told him I was leaving and taking Zara with me. I said I would push for full custody and anyone looking at the state of him would give it to me. I told him he’d never see his daughter again. I was just so angry and I wanted to hurt him like he’d hurt me for thelast eighteen months. We had a massive row and he got in his car and drove off. I immediately phoned the police to warn them that he was drink driving and they found his car half an hour later embedded in a tree. He never made it. And to this day, I’ve lived with the guilt that he died because of me, because I told him I was taking his daughter from him. She was his entire world. I’ll never know if he simply lost control of the car or if it was deliberate but he would never have got in that car if it wasn’t for me.’
She wiped the tears away and Quinn stared at her. He frowned but he didn’t say anything. Oh god, it was over. More tears spilled over onto her face.
‘Do you want me to go?’
He blinked in surprise. ‘Why would I want you to go?’
‘Because you must hate me, your brother is dead because of me.’
‘No, honey, you can’t think like that. Alcoholism is a sickness, and he had so many opportunities to get the help he needed and he didn’t want it. Some people just can’t be saved. None of this is your fault. My brother behaved abysmally. You had to do what you had to do to protect you and your daughter. And so what if things got a little heated? It was his decision to collect his daughter from nursery when he was drunk, his decision to get back in the car and drive off. And it wasn’t the first time he’d driven while drunk. If he’d survived that accident, there would have been other times that had nothing to do with you. I can’t believe you’ve beenliving with this guilt all this time and you never told me.’
‘I never told you because I thought you’d hate me for it.’
He smiled sadly and cupped her face. ‘I could never ever hate you. And regardless of what happened, you were not responsible for my brother’s death. Only he was responsible for that.’
He pulled her onto his lap, wrapping the blanket around her and stroking her face. ‘I love you with everything I have and there is nothing you could ever say or do, there is nothing that you did in the past, that can ever change that.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, absolutely.’
‘Do you think Violet will feel the same?’
‘Well, I don’t think she loves you in the same way I do – I’d be a bit worried if she did – but she knows what Liam was like. She won’t blame you for this. No one could ever blame you for this, knowing what you had to put up with.’
Alex let out a huge sigh of relief. She’d finally got it off her chest after all this time and it was OK, she could finally let go of all this guilt she’d been clinging to for all these years. He pulled her close against his chest, stroking her back, and she felt all that stress melt away.
After a while she drew back and kissed him briefly on the lips. ‘Thank you.’
‘You have nothing to thank me for.’
‘Thank you for loving me.’
‘Oh, you make that very easy. You are the most wonderful, incredible person I’ve ever met.’
