My man.
“I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Why?” Gabriel set his hands on my shoulders, breaking the connection between us. “It was a terrible thing they asked of you.”
“I can’t believe I was such a fool, okay?” I snapped. “But it all comes back to the fact that I couldn’t have her go to jail, pregnant and with a little child at home. Would you? I was thinking about her, I’vealwaysthought about Cassie, and she knew that and took advantage of me. I was too naïve and stupid to think my own family would use me like that.” I couldn’t bear the sympathy radiating from Gabriel and tore away from his pitying eyes. “Family first. Such bullshit.”
“I understand,” Gabriel muttered, surprisingly subdued.
“Yeah? You think you do? I doubt it. No one can understand betrayal until they experience it.”
“I said, I know.”
Abruptly, he got up, leaving me staring after him as he went to his bedroom and slammed the door.
Oh, hell no.
I stormed after him. Was he talking about the senator’s son? He wasn’t going to say something like that to me without telling me what was going on inside his head. Not when I’d ripped out my heart in front of him.
Someone has some explaining to do.
Chapter Sixteen
Gabriel
Dammit.
I hadn’t meant to lose it in front of Ronan. Or at all. I was a grown-ass man who should’ve moved past his daddy issues years ago, instead of still letting my father’s abandonment get to me. But hearing Ronan’s horrific story transported me to that day when I came home from school to find my mother red-eyed and trying not to cry at the school bus stop in front of our house, and my father, bags packed, ready to leave. Would he have waited to say good-bye to me, or would he have sneaked away? Did he just not give a damn?
More than thirty years later, I still didn’t know, and most likely never would, but fuck it all, I hated that I still cared.
I let it eat at my self-confidence in relationships, screw with my trust in people, and mire me in self-doubt about my desirability. Then I met Ronan, who handled his sister and brother-in-law’s brutal betrayal of his trust and incredible sacrifice with strength, self-preservation, and a dignity most people didn’t possess.
My preconceived opinions of him were shot to hell, as were my best intentions not to let down my guard. He’d somehow crawled under my skin, and I wanted nothing more than to hold him and promise that I’d never let anyone hurt him again.
“Gabriel?”
At the knock, I stiffened but couldn’t answer.
Fuck.
Coward that I was, I stayed silent and unmoving, hoping he’d take the hint and go away.
Had I thought hell had frozen over? Because that would be the only way Ronan would simply walk away. He opened the door and stepped past the threshold.
“Come on in, why don’t you.”
My feeble attempt at a joke fell flat as Ronan ignored me and continued inside. With each step he took, I took a corresponding one back until I hit the bed and sat. He stood over me, darkness marring his beautiful face.
“What did you mean?”
Nervous as a virgin, I licked my lips. “I meant it was an awful thing your sister and brother-in—”
“Don’t play that bullshit with me,” he lashed out, the words stinging my face as if he’d flicked a whip. “You said you understood betrayal. Gabriel, please. Talk to me. Tell me. It’s your father, right?” Instead of raging in anger, Ronan turned soft and pleading, sitting beside me and taking my hand. I gripped him like a safety rope, feeling as though if I let go, I’d fall. And I wanted to survive this climb out of myself.
“I told you before, my father walked out on us when I was four.”
“But didn’t he have to pay child support and do the whole visitation thing?”
