She was right.
“You’re not God, Finn,” Nate says quietly. “You’re human. You’re allowed to make mistakes.”
“Not when they cost someone their life.”
“So what then?” Nate shoots back. “You punish yourself forever? Refuse every chance at happiness like somehow that balances the scales? Push away everyone who loves you? What exactly’s the sentence here, Finn? Five years alone? Ten? Your whole damn life?”
“Mary doesn’t love me,” I mutter weakly.
Nate stares at me like I’m the dumbest man in the Highlands.
“Of course she does.”
“It was an arrangement. A fake relationship to?—”
“I know. Lily told me everything. The whole plan to outmaneuver Maggie. But that was at the beginning.”
He pauses.
“You know damn well it stopped being fake after that. You can keep lying to yourself if you want, but honestly, I expected better from you.”
I don’t answer.
Because he’s right.
It stopped being fake the moment I kissed her.
Or maybe before that.
Maybe the first day Ragnar chose me and Mary laughed, annoyed but amused.
“You want to know why I brought you out here?” Nate asks.
I look at him, waiting for the next blow.
“No, but apparently I’m being held hostage, so go ahead,” I mutter.
“Because Mary’s leaving.”
The world stops turning.
“What?”
“She’s leaving Glenfield. She already applied for jobs somewhere else.”
My heart slams so hard against my ribs I think it might explode.
“She’s… leaving?”
“Perthshire. The Borders. Somewhere. Who knows.”
Mary.
Leaving Glenfield.
Leaving me.
Disappearing from my life forever.
