I made it to him and gave him a hug, but when we broke, I moved to Dair who slid his arm around my shoulders as I did the same around his waist.
Hale watched all of this with rapt attention and a weird hint of animosity.
“Are you good?” he asked me.
“Fabulous,” I replied. “More so with this surprise visit. What are you doing here?”
He stared at me, then looked to Dair, and back to me, he said, “I was attending some meetings in Cardiff.”
“You should have said. It’s just over the bridge. I could have come to you.”
Hale again stared at me, then Dair, then again to me. “I think I missed something.”
“What?” I asked.
Dair gave me a squeeze so I looked up at him. “What you are missing is that the richest man in the world got wind I’d hurt ye, so he dropped everything and hauled arse here to see to you.”
“I…”
Oh my God.
Seriously?
I turned to Hale. “Is that what’s happening?”
“More that Alex, who was worried about some conversation you two had, shared that with Chloe. Chloe called me and told me to get my ass over here to look in on you since I was the closest of us all,” Hale replied. “But even if Chloe wasn’t being her usual bossy, once I heard you two had split, I’d have come anyway.”
It felt like my heart had grown so big, my chest would explode.
And bizarrely, that wasn’t a bad feeling.
“So, aye, lass,” Dair piped up. “Tell me again how ye dinnae ken how to love.”
“Excuse me?” Hale asked.
God, Dair was impossible.
I waved my hand in front of me. “Nothing. Just some stuff I’m sorting through.”
“Helena did a number on her,” Dair piped up again, this time to Hale. “Blake didnae think she knew how to love. She thought you all were here for the funeral for Alex.”
Hale looked incredulous and a little hurt.
“Even me?” he asked.
His reaction made me pull from Dair’s arm before I smacked it.
“You don’t have to be all honest all the time,” I complained.
“I’m trying to prove a point,” he retorted.
“Well…duh,” I shot back.
Dair burst out laughing.
I screwed my face up in a poisonous look aimed at him which only made him laugh harder.
I gave up on Dair and turned to Hale.
