Chapter 16 Regan
REGAN
“You did what?” Robyn demanded as I tried to get out of her choke hold.
Slapping her arm to let me go, I gasped with relief as she abruptly released. My decision to take her up on an MMA session because my Wednesday morning was suddenly free didn’t seem like such a good idea. I growled in irritation. “You are impossibly strong!”
“You okay?” Now she was concerned.
“Fine.” I waved her off before falling backward onto the mat. Splayed like a sea star, I stared up at the private gym’s ceiling.
Robyn stood over me, her hands on her slender hips, one eyebrow raised. “Repeat what you just told me.”
So I did, which was pretty much the entire conversation with Thane in Arro’s backyard the previous weekend, minus what he’d confided about Fran’s affair.
That shocking revelation was going to take longer to process.
It also made me empathetic toward Thane when all I wanted to do was hate him after what he’d said to me.
I didn’t want to judge a dead woman … but how the hell could she cheat on Thane Adair? Was she nuts?
You hate him, remember!
Yes, I hated him. And hurt for him in equal measure. Ugh, it was so complicated.
But Robyn knew none of that, and she wouldn’t ever find out from me. What I’d told her was my suggestion to Thane that we have no-strings-attached sex.
“Are you crazy?”
I had a feeling it was a rhetorical question.
“It just slipped out!”
“That’s like having sex with someone and saying we didn’t mean it, it just slipped in.”
“Ew, Robbie!” I laughed. “It’s not at all the same thing.”
Robyn huffed and kneeled beside me to pull me to sitting. Her brow knit together. “Seriously. Why would you suggest that to Thane?”
“Why not?” I deflected. “You and Lachlan started off with a sex-but-zero-commitment affair.”
“Yeah, but we didn’t even like each other, let alone have feelings for each other.”
“Not true. I know you can’t just have sex with some random.”
My sister considered this and amended. “There were things I liked about him, but there were more things I didn’t like about Lachlan.
But I couldn’t deny that I had never wanted to have sex with a guy more in my life.
Would I have fallen into bed with him if I had emotional feelings for him, knowing he only wanted sex?
No. That’s asking for trouble. As it was, it was horrible thinking I’d fallen in love with him and he didn’t feel the same way.
You suggested having sex and zero commitment with a man you actually care about. Why?”
I winced, dreading the truth, so I posed it as a question. “Because I thought that if we got close enough, he might develop feelings for me?”
She gave me her best “big sister is disappointed in you” look.
Ouch.
“You’re setting yourself up to get hurt. And you’re being dishonest. With yourself and with Thane. That’s not fair to either of you.”
Shamed, I looked away. “It just came out … without me thinking it through. It’s a moot point, anyway. I kind of actually detest his guts right now.” Sort of. Like seventy/thirty in the hate/sympathy ratio.
Robyn grimaced. “That’s not good. What happened?”
I told her what he’d said to me at Arro’s.
A dark cloud fell over my sister’s face. “Shit. It looks like I’m going to be a parent sooner than I’d thought.”
Confused, I blinked rapidly. “Uh, what?”
“Well, someone is going to have to adopt Eilidh and Lewis after I kill their father.”
Even though I knew she was joking, there was a serious, hard glint in her eyes. “Robyn, it’s fine. I’m fine.” I beamed at her. “You know me. Water off a duck’s back.”
“Why do you do that? Why do you lie to me?”
I flinched. “I’m not …” Shaking my head, I shrugged.
“Because if I told the truth half the time, I’d cry.
People don’t want to know if you’re sad or hurt or angry or depressed, Robbie.
Not even so-called friends. They just want you to say that you’re fine so they don’t have to expend emotional energy on you. ”
Hurt flickered across her face. “And you think that’s how I am?”
“No.” I hurried to assure her, realizing belatedly how it had come out.
“No. I meant I picked up on that a long time ago with other people, sometimes even with Mom, and I’ve just gotten into the habit of being happy-go-lucky no matter how I’m really feeling because I know most people don’t want to hear the truth. ”
“You don’t have to do that with me.”
I stared at my sister, blinking back tears. “I know that. I do.”
“So hit me with the truth.”
I sucked in a breath and shakily exhaled it. “He hurt me. He made me feel … like I had imagined it. He used the word harass. I spent the night crying in my bed like a sixteen-year-old because I was so scared I was doing to him what Austin did to me.”
“That is completely different.” I could hear the sharp edge of genuine anger in Robyn’s voice.
“I know that now. I’ve had four days of giving the bastard the cold shoulder to come to that conclusion myself. He said what he said so he didn’t have to deal with me anymore, and he didn’t care if he hurt me to do it.”
“I doubt he didn’t care,” Robyn said, surprising me.
“Really?”
“I’m angry at him for speaking that way to you, but I can’t imagine he’s happy with himself about it.”
“Where’s his apology, then? He’s not giving me the silent treatment anymore, but he didn’t apologize for what he said.” I shook my head, looking toward the water beyond the cliff. “I should quit, but every time I think about it, I cannot imagine leaving Eilidh and Lewis.”
“Or Thane.”
“No, he can go fuck himself, preferably with a glove made of splinters.”
Robyn threw her head back in laughter, and I couldn’t help but laugh too. Then she reached for my hand, squeezing it. “Do you know how brave you are?”
Instantly, my smile fell and I tried to pull away. She wouldn’t let me. “Don’t.”
“No, I will.” Robyn leaned toward me. “Do you think for one second that I would have told Lachlan I wanted him if he hadn’t made the first move?”
“Of course, you would. You’re the most courageous person I’ve ever known.”
She looked modestly uncomfortable with the praise and shrugged.
“Maybe I’m okay with situations like kidnappings and break-ins and shootouts …
but when it comes to my heart? Regan, it took me ten years to get up the courage to find Mac.
And I never told a guy I loved them after Josh Horner broke my heart.
I didn’t even try to let a guy in until Lachlan.
And he wasn’t very nice to me at first, so I would most definitely have not made myself vulnerable to him.
If he hadn’t mauled me”—she raised her eyebrow with a smirk—“in Gordon’s trailer that first time, and then again in his office and again—”
“Got it. Lachlan is a horndog. Moving on.”
She grinned cheekily. “My point is, he made the first move. But you … you put yourself out there with Thane, even after he’d treated you not very nicely and with full knowledge and awareness that the idea of you two together is a little controversial.
You still did it. You still followed your feelings—”
“And my libido.”
“My little sister doesn’t have a libido, and putting yourself out there with him is really brave. I’m proud of you.”
Her words were like water on a thirsty seedling. “Thank you.”
“Now that we’ve established you’re brave … my sister is nobody’s punching bag—”
“I said those same words to him!” I exclaimed.
“Good. Now live by them. If you’re mad at him, be mad and stay mad at him until he mans up and apologizes for being a dick. But once he apologizes, you move on. Thane goes back to just being your boss, and you take care of those kids. Don’t let him put you off the ancestry visa.”
“I told you I’m thinking about it, and I won’t let him put me off. That’s not a decision I’m going to make based on a guy.”
“No. Just make it based on your sister who wants you here to help plan her wedding and see her get married and be there the day she finds out she’s pregnant and the day you become an aunt and—”
“I get it.” My eyes filled with a different emotion.
“I don’t want to miss those things either.
I’m just … what kind of life could I have here?
It’s not the remoteness that bothers me, or the small town.
It’s just … I still want to meet someone, eventually.
Someone who wants me in return.” I looked down at my sneakers. “If he’s out there.”
“He’s out there, Regan. You just need to stop renting space in your head to Thane Adair. You’ll see things clearer once you do, and I promise, I was kidding before. No more pressure from me. Stay or don’t stay, I just want you to be happy.”
With my sister’s advice fresh in my mind, I braced myself for Thane’s return from work that night.
Determined not to stop with my icy response to him until he apologized, I kind of got myself worked up about it.
Even more so when I picked up the kids from school.
As I started the engine, Lewis announced, “Eilidh and I know what we want to do for Dad’s birthday. ”
“Oh, yeah?” I asked, staring at them in the rearview mirror. “What’s that?”
“Dad talks to us about the bird show at the castle that looks like a fairytale castle. Dad said he would take us next summer, but we thought we could go at the weekend.”
A fairytale castle? I didn’t know what castle he was talking about. “I’ll mention it to your dad.”
“You have to come!” Eilidh said, kicking her legs with the words.
Inwardly, I grimaced. There was no way in hell I was spending a day out with Thane. Trying not to wince at the lie, I replied, “I can’t, honey. I have plans this weekend.”
“What plans?” She crossed her arms over her chest and jutted her chin sternly at me.
“Noneuhyurbusiness plans,” I singsonged.
She giggled but a quick glance at Lewis revealed he wasn’t laughing. He stared out the passenger window, his brow furrowed in thought.