Chapter Fourteen
Luke
One day I would learn to trust my gut. Or at least, other people’s. As I sat by my brother’s ICU bed, Mia’s expression when I’d ignored his text haunted me. Fucking idiot had fallen off a garage roof and smashed his shoulder to bits. They’d temporarily fixed it with pins, but he’d inherited the Daley family reaction to general anaesthetics and nearly died on thetable before I’d got there. Twat. He was out of the woods now, but fuck if I wasn’t going to kill him myself.
When he woke up.
I shifted in the hard chair I’d taken up residence in when they’d brought him back from surgery. Hours had blurred into days, and I had no idea how long I’d been in the Birmingham hospital. My only comfort was I now had a vague idea of where Billy had been livingall this time—a village on the outskirts of the city.
Sighing, I gazed down at him for what felt like the thousandth time, taking in hair that was a little darker than mine, pale skin, and rough stubble. Damn it, he looked just like our dad, and I hated him for that. And I hated him for dragging me all the way up here too, even though I knew there was nowhere else I’d be right now. I hatedthat I loved him. That I wouldn’t survive it if the doctors were wrong and he really did die on me. Fuck, how would I tell Fran? She was on holiday right now, the first time she’d been away since Dad died. I hadn’t told her. Couldn’t. Not until I could swear to her that everything was gonna be okay.
My phone buzzed.
Gus:u okay?
Luke:yeah
Gus:sure?
Luke:did u finish thechurch job?
Gus:yes, mate, don’t worry about work. call me if u need anything
He ended every exchange with the same words, but I didn’t call. What was the point? He was doing everything he could do for me already. Besides, misery loves company had never been my thing. There was only one person who’d ever fought her way through.
I let my eyes fall closed as my thoughts drifted to Mia.We hadn’t spoken since she’d told me I couldn’t see her anymore. In a fit of emotion I still didn’t quite understand, I’d left my decade-old bullshit apology on her doorstep, but she hadn’t responded, not even to tell me to drop dead, and somehow silence hurt more than rejection.
Oh the fucking irony, made worse by the fact that I’d always known how much I’d hurt her. That what I felt rightnow was just a fraction of what I’d put her through. She’d never said, but she’d loved me back then, and knowing it had kept me swimming. On my own with Billy in this fucking hospital, I was drowning without her.
Somehow, I fell asleep. I was woken sometime later by a hard punch to my thigh.
I jumped awake to find Billy conscious and glaring at me. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
Blinking, I uncurled myself from the chair and cracked my neck. “You’re awake then?”
Silence. Billy’s malevolence was brutal. Always had been.
I sat up properly and leaned over him, taking in the signs of stress and pain anyone who didn’t know him might miss—tiny, rapid breaths, tight eyes. He’d broken his wrist once and not told anyone for three days. I moved to brush his messy hairoff his forehead.
He caught my hand with his good arm. “Don’t touch me.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t fucking want you to.”
Defeat swept over me. Somehow, in the past few months, the sporadic texts we’d exchanged had led me to believe our relationship had healed a little, but as he shoved my hand away like it burned him, I was struck by the echoes of the last time I’d seen him. He’d beenwhole and upright then, swaggering drunkenly at the end of Fran’s drive two days after I’d made it home for good.
I’d tried to shake his hand.
“Don’t fucking touch me.”
“Billy—”
“Don’t,” he growled. “Just fuck off. I don’t want you here.”
“I don’t know what to tell you, Ma. He doesn’t want me here. What am I supposed to do? Cause a fucking scene in the hospital?”
Fransighed. “Can you at least get along until I get there? I’m flying into Birmingham first thing in the morning.”
