Chapter 3
Ashby
No.
No.
I’d dreamed of this—that one day, Kieran would turn around, look at me, and realise that who he wanted had been here all along.
And then he’d kiss me and we’d live happily ever after in some shiny castle.
Yeah, I’d always been a hopeless romantic when it came to him.
Too bad that kind of thing only ever happened in fairy tales.
Because—no. Not like this. Not in a crowded bar with sticky counters and my ex watching, not just Kieran trying to prove a point.
And yet I didn’t move away.
Held my tongue and my breath for him, just like I’d done since we were fifteen—a decade, and I was still so very in love with him. Didn’t matter how hard I tried to move on.
His mouth brushed over mine, the contact light and cautious, almost a little clumsy.
But, God. It was Kieran. My lungs felt too small to power the vast expanse of my body, a sparkler going off behind my ribs and crackling in my blood.
The bar’s neon glow filled my vision, too damn bright.
I closed my eyes and dragged him closer.
His hand slid into my hair, fingertips warm and sure, open mouth catching mine.
I pressed into him, felt the solid line of his body against me, pink and blue flashing behind my lids.
Fuck. This wasn’t some teenage dream—reality sharp in how I tasted the ale on his tongue, people jostling us as they passed, the thrum of music in my gut.
I drew back for a harsh breath, dizzy with it. Paige was gone. Whatever, good riddance.
“Ash.” Kieran sounded hoarse, and I met his eyes, found his lips parted, pupils blown wide. He was… He wasn’t joking. This was more than just some game to prove a point and defend my honour, or whatever crazy impulse might have gripped him.
I’d never seen him look like that—at me, at anyone.
God, I needed air. The humid press of bodies was suffocating. I broke free of his hold, shoved my way past laughing strangers. I just… fuck. It was cruel, being handed this mirage of everything I wanted when I knew, I bloody knew that it would slip like water through my fingers.
“Ash?” Kieran called, voice just barely cutting through the noise. I heard him, though. I’d hear him anywhere. My breath came in short little bursts.
I pushed past a cluster of lads who toasted each other with their pints, towards the exit. Spilled onto the pavement, icy wind slicing through, our coats left in the car. I welcomed the shock of reality.
Hurried footsteps, then Kieran grabbed my elbow. “Ash, hey. What’s going on? Why are you running?”
“I’m not running.” The denial was instant, honed by years of practice. I didn’t try to shake him off—didn’t truly want him to let go. “Just needed some air.”
“Paige?” he asked softly, like I was some wounded animal that needed soothing. Oh my God, he was just… so very kind. So fucking oblivious.
“No,” I said shortly.
“Oh.”
Kieran’s touch fell away. The road stretched behind and before us, nighttime stragglers drifting past, trailing conversation and laughter in their wake.
“Is it, um.” Kieran wrapped both arms around himself, looking abruptly smaller than usual. “Is it me? Did I overstep? I thought you were—but maybe not, and I just wanted to show the guy what he’s missing.”
“I know, okay?” It came out too harsh. Streetlights swayed through my vision. “I know that’s all it was, thanks.”
Fuck. The words were fine, but my tone gave me away—too much, too bloody hurt. I didn’t dare look at him.
“Ash, are you…” He trailed off, and if he asked me whether I was fine, I might just scream. “You’re not, uh… Just something Dom said, okay?” He paused for a chuckle that held a nervous edge. “It’s silly. You’re probably gonna laugh, but… So, he thinks you could be in love with me?”
The world ground to a halt. That’s what it felt like anyway, all my secrets ripped away and exposed. Deny. I raised my gaze, grasping for resolve, and found Kieran watching me with eyes turned black by the cover of darkness.
And… fuck it.
“Was that a question?” I asked, my voice thin and reedy.
He didn’t move and somehow still looked like he was reeling from a blow. “You’re not laughing.”
“I’m waiting for the punchline.”
It was me. I was the punchline.
For a heart-shattering beat, there was nothing. Just us, staring at each other in the light of a passing car. Then Kieran’s hand reached to circle my wrist, his fingers cold against my pulse point. “How long?”
A fucking lifetime.
”Fifteen,” I said instead. Numbness coated my cheeks—might be the winter air, might be that my heart had gone quiet. “Maybe longer. But that’s when I realised it.”
“Before you even came out.” It wasn’t a question, but I answered anyway.
“Yeah. Let’s just say I’ve had better months.”
Something in Kieran’s expression cracked apart. “Shit, Ash. I should have noticed. How did I not notice?”
I swallowed around the pricks of a thousand tiny needles. “I didn’t want you to.”
“Why?” His hold around my wrist tightened. “It wouldn’t have changed—I mean, even if back then, maybe I wasn’t ready to… you know. Or maybe I’d have cottoned on more quickly and we could have—”
“Kieran, no.” I wanted to sound firm, yet my voice trembled.
My whole body did—just the cold, though, because I was fine.
Or I would be fine. Somehow. “This? It’s exactly why I didn’t tell you.
Because either you’d have tiptoed around me, like, not flirting with others when I’m around, that sort of thing.
Or you’d have talked yourself into something that’s not true. ”
“Something that’s not true?” he echoed, gently confused, like he honestly didn’t know what I could possibly mean. Everything hurt.
“You’d convince yourself you love me, too.” I shook my head, dizziness spinning through my empty chest. “But you don’t. Not like that.”
His mouth twisted, then firmed. “What if I do?”
God. A wave of hopeless, helpless love nearly forced me to my knees. “You don’t. And sooner or later, you’d realise it, and—just, no. It’d break me.”
“But what if I do?” he insisted, more urgent, voice raised just enough to carry beyond the two of us.
A group of party girls, five or six, hair and faces done up, parted around us as though we were an island in the whitewater rush of a river.
That’s how I’d used to think of our friendship—steady and solid, able to weather any storm. We’d get through this.
“You don’t, Kieran.” I tried to keep my voice even. “Trust me—I looked.”
“Maybe you didn’t look hard enough. Maybe I was just…
I don’t know. Blind, slow, oblivious.” Christ, he just wasn’t giving up, was he?
His hand still circled my wrist, and I fought the small, reckless impulse to take what was offered—grab him for a bruising kiss, bite at his lip, fingers digging into his forearms so hard it would leave a mark, a reminder.
See how well he handled the full weight of what I wanted.
No. That was a ledge I couldn’t step back from.
“And,” Kieran continued, words slower now, heavy, “I was in denial. But when Dom and I kissed, it just all made sense, you know? Why I missed you quite so much.”
“Did it, really?” Tired sarcasm layered my voice, and I should free myself, take a step back. “So yesterday, when we put up the tree and you said you’d be curious to try something with a guy—you already knew you were in love with me?”
A brief moment of hesitation followed, carrying its own answer.
“Thought so,” I said, only I felt no triumph. Just a keen sense of resignation, a sudden ebb of adrenaline that left me empty. When I tried to shake off Kieran’s touch, though, he held on.
“Could you please stop jumping to conclusions?” he asked, voice painfully gentle. “I’m still catching up, okay? This is new for me. And I’ve never felt this way about anyone before—like, you’re my best friend, and I’m also attracted to you. So really, it’s not that complicated, is it? I love you. ”
“Aww,” a girl commented brightly, moving on before it even fully registered, and God, this was… We were outside in just our jumpers, spilling our guts to the freezing December night. I was so fucking cold.
“That’s just…” I paused to gather myself, managed to hold Kieran’s eyes for only a second.
Everything about him screamed genuine intent.
“You’re probably just confused. You figured out you fancy guys, and you already love me, and I happen to be attractive.
” Did that sound arrogant? Maybe. But I sure didn’t have trouble finding a guy—I just didn’t care enough to make them stay.
“So you’re confusing the combination of that with, like, romantic love. ”
“What’s romantic love if not friendship combined with attraction?”
I inhaled, icy air slicing through my lungs, and fine. Fine.
“You really want to know?” I raised my head and held his gaze—enough hiding.
“Okay, then how about this? It’s crying yourself to sleep because your best friend just told you about his first time snogging a girl and you tried your fucking hardest to smile and ask the right questions.
” My voice dropped, heart thudding painfully inside the cage of my chest. Streetlights painted bright streaks across my vision.
“It’s your first shag, and you close your eyes and wish it were someone else.
It’s watching every single one of your relationships crumble because at some point, even the most self-involved guy notices that your heart’s not in it. That’s romantic love.”
“Fuck, Ash.” Kieran’s voice broke on my name, and maybe I had wanted to hurt him, just a little—make him feel even a fraction of the ache in my bones. Only I didn’t feel better for it. “I am so sorry.”
“You didn’t know.”
“I do, now.” He paused, then swayed just a hint closer. “But Ash, you’re wrong. That’s unrequited love, what you described. And this isn’t that.”
Jesus, really? I scoffed and felt the sound catch in my throat. “What do you know about love?”
“Not very much.” He admitted it lightly, easily. “But I’ve always been a fast learner.”
“You also jump before you think, Kieran.”
“Maybe.” He smiled, and even now, something in me wanted to respond to that. “But you know me—once I’ve made up my mind, I follow through.”
Bloody hell. Ice was creeping up my back, cheeks numb, breath turned visible. “I’m not a fucking project.”
“No, you’re not—because I love you.” He infused it with the confidence of someone who’d known it for ages when no, he hadn’t. Unlike me. “Convincing you it’s true, though?” he continued. “That’s a project. Please give me a chance, Ash?”
I wanted to cry. At the same time, there was a strange lightness in my blood, like the bright sizzle of champagne bubbles.
This was Kieran, dangling everything I’d ever wanted right in front of my face, daring me to grab it with both hands.
But if he pulled the rug—fuck, I might just hate him for it.
“Please,” he repeated, much more softly, confidence diffused.
And… God. He was the risk taker, the one who towed me along even as I listed all the things that could go wrong. This? Was the ultimate risk. But no matter how scared I was—if I shot him down now, I’d be left wondering for the rest of my life.
I exhaled, my breath fogging up the air, his touch an anchor around my wrist. “Okay,” I said. Repeated it, mostly because it felt good. “Okay.”
His smile built like a wave—slow at first before it crested, dazzling like the reflection of the sun on water. When he pulled me into a tight hug, I folded into him like I’d given in already. His lips feathered along my cheekbone, and I shivered a little, more from the cold than from the contact.
“Time to go home?” Kieran asked like that still made sense, like he’d never packed up and left.
“Yeah,” I said anyway, and when I tried to step back, he held on for one more second before he let me go. Such a small thing, and yet it felt like a seismic shift.
Please don’t break me.
I held my tongue, just like I had for years.
Quiet, we started moving towards the car, the faint glow of streetlights catching the soft line of his mouth.
When he caught me looking, his lips curved up for another smile even as he stayed silent.
I averted my eyes and wrapped my arms around myself, blood still sizzling with that strange, bubbly lightness.
All right. Prove it, then.