She was tense, her hands twisted together as she began, but she got it all out, and the hostile look she sent him told Fin she wasn’t happy that he’d made her.
Why had he made her, he asked himself. It wasn’t like he was an open book or anything, after all; in fact, his family life was hell, and he’d been avoiding his father since the night he’d said they needed to talk.
Was it his place to force her to do this? Possibly not, and yet it was done and he hoped she felt better for it and didn’t hold it against him for the rest of his life.
“You were shot and nearly killed and didn’t tell us!” Nash’s roar pulled Fin from his thoughts.
“Shut it down, Nash. She’s telling you now, and roaring won’t help that,” Fin said. He wasn’t having her yelled at when she had already been through so much.
“You don’t get to tell me how to speak to my sister,” Nash snarled.
“I will if you yell at her. She was wrong not telling you, but now she is. Intimidating her is not helping anyone.”
They glared at each other.
“Enough,” Maggie’s father said. He had an arm around his wife, who was crying. “Fin’s right, Nash. While I’m angry too, yelling won’t help.”
“I’m sorry,” Maggs said, looking ready to cry herself, which made his chest hurt. “Really. I was wrong not to tell you.”
Nash exhaled. “How would you feel if the roles were reversed and it was me over there, shot and hurting, and I didn’t tell you?”
“Angry,” she said in a subdued voice.
Ford arrived, and the story was recounted again. He was no more happy than his brother had been, but he didn’t yell at Maggs, he just looked devastated. Fin realized then, this was a family who loved deeply. It wasn’t the life they lived, or what they had beyond these walls; this family had love in its foundations. He envied them that.
They talked it through, and Fin watched silently, drinking more coffee. His family had never talked stuff through; they just ignored the great big black cloud that had loomed over their life. His mother, he realized, had been unstable, one minute happy, the next sad. Sometimes irrational and others sane. It had been exhausting growing up with her, and he’d resented his father for always working and leaving Fin and his sister to cope with her.
“Show us, then.”
“What?”
“I want to see your scar,” Ford said.
Maggs shot Fin a look; he simply raised a brow. He’d seen the scar and the lovely creamy skin around it. He’d run his mouth over that skin and caressed every part of her he could before passion had driven him to take her. He planned to acquaint himself with the rest of her soon.
She lifted her shirt and rolled up her sleeve and let her family see. Fin only saw her back. The line of her vertebrae and waistband of her jeans. He looked away, feeling uncomfortable that just her back could have him hot in seconds.
She told them about the gallery then, and that didn’t go down any better. When it was done and everyone talked out, they said their goodbyes and got back in his car.
“Feel better?” he asked when they were back out on the road heading to Ryker Falls.
“I feel like I’ve been awake for twenty-four hours and all of it standing in the middle of the road evading oncoming cars.”
“It’s done now.”
“Not all of it.”
“They’ll forgive you too. There may be more yelling, at least from Pip, but they’ll move on. The rest of the town will then find out, and you’ll be something of a hero.”
“Oh, God.” She banged her head against the window.
“Tomorrow will be better.” He stroked her cheek. Hell of a thing, this need he now had inside him to touch her.
“I hate you.” She yawned. “But loath as I am to admit it, I feel lighter inside that I can let my crazy out and no one will flinch now.”
“You’re not crazy. Just a little nutty.”
“Nice, I like nutty.”
