Fighting Redemption (21 page)

“Don’t remind me of what I did.”

“Okay,” she replied simply. “But you being there takes away so much of the hurt. I need you with me. Mum and Dad need you too.”

How could he face Mike and Julie and knowing they would have preferred it was him that died rather than Jake? What if they blamed him? He couldn’t live through that again.

Ryan shook his head. “Not tonight, Fin. I’ll go get my things while you’re at dinner, okay? Today I have you all to myself.” His gaze dropped to her mouth. “So what are we going to do?”

She gave up pressuring Ryan about seeing her parents. For now. Instead, she pretended to give serious thought to his question. “Well,” she drawled. “The lawn needs mowing and my veggie garden needs weeding. You could do that while I do some work.”

Ryan sat back on his heels, his brows raised.

“And Jake promised he’d repaint the fence at some stage too, so that needs to be done. Maybe I should write a list?”

He stood up and started walking away.

“Hey!” she called out. “Where are you going?”

Ryan turned and smirking, slowly peeled his zipper downwards. Fin’s eyes dropped, her breath catching as he reached in and fisted himself in his hand. “Seems you have a lot of work you need me to do. I’ll just quickly go take care of this so I can get started.”

“Ryan!”

He moved swiftly into the bathroom and shut the door behind him.

“Damn the man,” she muttered. Scooting off the couch, she got up and raced after him. Grabbing the handle, she flung the door wide open and gasped.

Ryan was already naked and standing there facing her. His arms were folded and a smirk still lingered on his face. “Took you long enough.”

Fin pursed her lips to fight the grin. “Oh sorry, Ryan. I didn’t realise you were in here.” She peeled off her top and shimmied out of her sweatpants and panties, leaving her as bare as he was. His eyes ignited as they roamed over her. “I just came in to brush my teeth, but I’ll come back when bathroom rush hour is over.”

She turned and barely took a step before Ryan wrapped his arms around her and yanked her into him. The hard length of him pressed into her spine when he leaned into her ear and whispered, “Where do you think you’re going? Don’t you have to brush your teeth?”

Fin licked her lips. “Maybe.”

Ryan picked her up and set her in front of the sink. She met his eyes in the mirror as he trailed his hand down her spine and over the curve of her ass. “Don’t let me stop you.”

She said something in reply, but she wasn’t sure what. It came out a jumbled mess as her body slumped against him.

“Fin?”

Ryan’s arms wrapped around her ribs, holding her up.

“Baby?”

Fin blinked, her pulse racing as the world faded out again.

Ryan pulled his car to a stop outside the single-story red brick home and stared, his face impassive. Inside, his stomach was churning from the memories of a house and a family he hadn’t seen for ten years. It hadn’t changed. It just looked a little older and a little sadder than what he remembered.

“Why are you here?” came the soft cool whisper in his ear.

“Maybe ‘why are
you
here?’ is probably the better question, Jake. Get out of my head.”

Jake’s chuckle reverberated around the confined space. “I can’t, Kendall. You won’t let me go.”

Tears swam in his eyes, but he wouldn’t let them fall. “Why do I have to do that?”

“You’re kidding, right—me in your head for the rest of your life? Do you
want
to be batshit crazy?”

“You mean as batshit crazy as you were?”

“There’s the Ryan I know.”

Ryan stared hard at the house. The white trim needed painting, the gardens tending, yet it was neat and tidy. “Well, I’m glad someone knows who he is.”

Pulling the key from the ignition, Ryan slid from the car and forced his feet to move towards the front door. He drew strength from thoughts of Fin while he waited for someone to answer his knock. Unable to bear waking her, he’d left her sleeping. Instead, he wrote a note on her pillow telling her he had things to do and would be back later that day. He was worried if he told her where he was going this morning she would insist on coming, and he had such a hard time saying no to her, even in this.

He’d been living at the cottage for two weeks now, and for every one of those days he’d been watching her carefully. She swore that day in the bathroom she’d just got a head spin from moving too quickly. After an emotional few months, and such rapid weight loss, it was a wonder her health was as good as it was. Her eating in the last week had been improving steadily, and after forcing a promise from her to go to the doctor if it happened again, he let it go reluctantly.

Ryan rapped smartly again and when the door flew open, his hand dropped to his side.

“Ryan!”

He nodded impassively. “Mum.” His eyes fell to where her hand shook on the doorknob before they rose to her face. He felt so different, so removed from her. It was like knowing her was another lifetime ago. “Can I come in?”

She stood out of the way, her hand fluttering to her hair to smooth the dark brown strands. He remembered it as long, glossy waves, but now it was to her shoulders, and smooth.

“I wasn’t expecting you.”

Huh. After all these years, this was the best she could come up with? “Well, I wasn’t expecting an invitation.”

She frowned. “You left.”

“Why do you think I did that?”

Annoyed already, he stepped inside the house. Most of the furniture he ran his eyes over was new. No. Not new, just different, changed. The photos still plagued the walls like some sad, godforsaken shrine. Ryan ran his eyes over them, his heart aching.

“Would you like some of the photos, Ryan?” his mother asked softly.

Ryan only had the one in his wallet. It was faded and worn from use. He took it out all the time and stared at it, wondering what his life would have been like if she were still alive. Always fucking wondering. He couldn’t let it go, and it made him so damn tired.

He swallowed. “Please.”

“You can choose them. Can I get you a drink … or something?”

“No.” He turned to face her. She was hugging herself, rubbing her hands up and down her arms. “Where’s Dad?”

She sighed. “We divorced a long time ago, Ryan. I haven’t seen your father in years.”

His brows flew up. “Oh. Was it …”

“Some people, when they lose a child, they never really recover. Your father couldn’t let it go. It was killing us, and then how he was with you, how
I
was with you. We lost you too, that’s on us, I know, but I’m—”

“Mum,” he cut her off and she froze, her fluttering hands halting mid-air.

Ryan drew a deep breath and let it out. Why couldn’t he hate her? He wanted to but it was such a useless emotion. There was no room left in his heart for hate, but for his mother there was no room for love either. He looked at her, really looked at her. She seemed tiny and faded somehow, just a transparent version of the person she used to be. His heart softened. “Maybe I’ll have that drink after all.”

She flushed. “O-of course. Um … coffee?”

“Black, no sugar.”

“I’ll go make it. Why don’t you go choose some photos while you’re waiting?”

Ryan nodded, moving towards the wall of photos when she stepped out of the room. He ran his eyes carefully over each and every one of them. His sister’s bright happy face stared back at him in all of them. Closing his eyes, the day she died burst vividly in his mind.

“Mum!”
he yelled loudly, grabbing the football as he flew out the front door.
“Going outside to kick the footy around.”

“Don’t go far,”
she called out from the kitchen.
“Dinner won’t be long!”

“Can I come too, Ryan?”
his little sister called out.

“No, Kass. You can’t catch properly. You’re all thumbs.”

Ryan gasped, pushing the memory away. It hurt too much. It should have faded over time, but it still taunted him with the brightest clarity.

His little sister had followed him everywhere with those puppy dog eyes. Ryan had always been such a jerk, telling her to leave him alone. The day she died was the one day,
one fucking day
, when he’d given in.

In his young mind, Kassidy had been just a dumb annoying girl, always stumbling over something. So clumsy, just like Fin was. Despite their different colouring, meeting Fin that first day at school, seeing her trip up the stairs, God, it was like seeing his sister all over again. From that day on he watched over Fin, scared that something would happen to her just like it did his sister.

“It wasn’t your fault, Ryan,” came his mother’s soft voice behind him.

He opened his eyes, swallowing the sudden rush of fury. Turning, he looked at her, his jaw tight. Ryan had lived with the blame, the pain, the beatings, their hate; he breathed it into his lungs with every step he took, every single day.

“Twenty years,” he ground out. “I lived with that and I had to come to you for you to say four little words that back then might have changed my entire world.”

She sank down into the pale, cushioned couch behind her and set his coffee on the little side table with shaky hands. When she let go of the cup, she gripped her hands together, her knuckles white. “I’m sorry.”

He opened his mouth to speak, but she continued before he could say anything.

“I know words are meaningless, but when Kassidy died … I couldn’t come back from it. It was like I was lost, standing outside of myself, for years. Your father … he’d always been quick to rage, but he … oh God,” she moaned, wiping at the tears that rolled down her face. “How he would beat you for the smallest things, and I was so lost I did nothing. Then one day, you were just never home anymore and I was glad. I was so glad,” she said fiercely.

The words stung. “You never wanted me around anymore.”

“No, I didn’t. I wasn’t strong enough to stand up to your father, Ryan. I wanted you away from him. You had Mike and Julie looking after you, and that was so much better than being in the poison of our house.”

Ryan’s mouth fell open. “You knew where I was?”

She choked on a sob. “I did.”

He went and sat down on the chair beside her. “You never said.”

“I watched you. Sometimes I would sit in my car and watch you play rugby with Jake. Mike would be there helping you with your bags, Julie would be cheering you on, and their daughter, Finlay, was always there with either her nose stuck in a book or watching you. Living on the sidelines of your life hurt so much, but that was all I deserved. You were thriving with the Tanners, Ryan. You were smiling and laughing, so I would leave and go back to your father and dread the nights you returned. Though as you got older, and taller, your father couldn’t be less bothered with you at all and just drank more.” She ran her eyes over him. “You’re so big now, so much more than I ever hoped you would be. Seeing you now makes me wonder how Kassidy would’ve turned out.”

Ryan looked down at his hands. Time and again he wondered the same thing. Fin and Kassidy would have been fast friends if her life hadn’t been cut so short. “She would have been beautiful.”

His mother sighed heavily in the silence.

“Jake died,” he blurted out.

Her bottom lip trembled. “I know. It was on the news. Every time I heard of a soldier’s death in Afghanistan I would hold my breath and pray. And one day there was your Jake on the news. I’m so sorry.”

Why the hell did he bring that up? Ryan stood abruptly. “I should go.”

“Oh … but you didn’t drink your coffee.”

The walls were closing in on him and she was talking about coffee?
Fuck.
He needed to get outside and draw air into his lungs. “Another time maybe.”

Ryan strode towards the door, and his mother started grabbing randomly at some of the photos on the wall. She piled them in his arms, fussing when one started to fall. He clutched it before it fell and turned to leave. Hesitating, he stopped and met her eyes. “Mum. For what it’s worth, I’m glad you kicked Dad out.”

“Ryan,” she whispered and reached for his hand. She gave it a squeeze. “You have this quiet, inner strength about you, and I have no idea where it came from. I’m not like you. I’m weak and tired, never strong enough to deal with your father, let alone kick him out. He just left.”