Chapter 26
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
NICK
Mads’ silent treatment lasted far longer than I’d expected.
Long enough to let me know something was seriously wrong.
As the hours passed, Chloe was ventilated, scanned, X-rayed, loaded with antibiotics, and transferred to ICU for monitoring as she slowly roused from the effects of the Valium and her temperature recovered.
But her lungs remained a soggy mess, ripe for infection.
She was stable but by no means out of the woods and only time would tell if her brain had been starved of oxygen too long, or if the frigid waters and her low body temperature had helped protect her. No one was game to predict the outcome.
By the time we were updated on her condition, I’d been assessed, X-rayed, my shoulder strapped, and my body warmed under a space blanket.
I’d been grilled by Detective Wright, told that he’d visit me the next day for what I could only assume would be more grilling, and informed that both Austin and Belinda had been arrested and were busy throwing each other under the bus.
I’d had strips torn off me by Samuel and then faced the same from Gazza and Lee, who had a great deal to say about my so-called recklessness. All of which was more than a little pot kettle, if you asked me. But nobody was. Asking me, that is.
Jerry and Lizzie were a little more circumspect but not by much, and after being on the receiving end of multiple tirades, I was done with my so-called support network.
Friends and family were hugely over-rated.
When I hung up from the final call, I glanced over at Mads, who was stretched out in the hospital recliner watching me with a look I’d never seen on him before.
He’d asked me what had happened and listened without interruption.
But he hadn’t looked happy. And he’d barely spoken since.
“You’d think they’d just be pleased that I’m alive,” I grumbled, sliding my phone onto the hospital locker. “I saved Chloe’s life, didn’t I?”
The pain and hurt that flashed in Mads’ eyes hit me like a physical blow. He said nothing, just looked away, his lips set in a thin hard line.
Not long after the call, I was discharged and sent home. The continued silence felt like a raw, aching hole between us and I hated it. Just fucking hated it.
By the time Mads helped me through the front door, I knew it wasn’t only a stress reaction. It wasn’t simply shock or even anger, and it wasn’t just going to pass.
Mads wasn’t taking his stress out on me. He was worried and fearful for my safety and Chloe’s, for sure. He was frustrated, irritated, and generally pissed off with the world, and especially with me. But more than anything else, my dense brain finally clicked in, Mads was hurt, deeply, deeply hurt.
He was hurt by the choices I’d made. Hurt that I’d chosen to risk us, risk our future when I hadn’t needed to.
We both knew I could’ve done things differently.
Made better choices. Safer choices. I could’ve taken ten minutes to drive to a farm and find a phone.
I could’ve talked to him. We could’ve worked out a plan.
I could’ve at least let him know my intentions and not left him worried out of his mind.
Yes, Mads would’ve done the same for Shirley, but I knew damn well he would’ve found a way to let me know first.
The inescapable reality was that if I’d been in an older car, like Madigan’s Toyota, and not a rental, they might not have found us in time.
In fact, they might never have found my body at all.
Chloe could be dead. I could be dead. And the life Mads and I had hoped for would’ve been over before it even started.
I grabbed Mads’ arm as he passed by me in the hallway. “Can we please talk? Please?”
He stilled but didn’t look my way. “I don’t know if I’m ready.”
“Mads, please,” I begged. “I can’t do this. I need you to talk to me.”
“You need?” He pulled free, making for the small lounge with me following.
“What about what I need, Nick? Where was the concern for my needs in what you did today? Yes, you saved Chloe’s life.
But there were other options that could’ve led to the same outcome at much less risk to you.
If you’d found a phone and called us rather than just follow them into the hut, then Belinda would’ve likely assumed you missed the turnoff to the trail, and we might’ve been able to catch them still at the hut. ”
I couldn’t argue with that. I took a seat on the sofa and studied him. “I’m sorry. I fucked up—”
“I’m cold.” He turned his back and busied himself making a fire before collapsing into one of the armchairs and staring at his hands, effectively putting a wall between us.
I had to fix this. Somehow, I had to fix this.
I leaned forward, with my elbows on my knees. “I’m sorry, Mads. I hurt you. I realise that. What I did was selfish and reckless. I could’ve done things differently and I should have. I didn’t think it through.”
“You didn’t want to think it through. You acted like you always do.
Like a lone wolf. Like you don’t have to consider anyone.
Like you’re this fucking island with only yourself to consider.
Well, you’re not, Nick. Not anymore. I’m here too.
It’s us, not just you. Every time you do shit like this, you take me with you.
I’m also at risk because I don’t know how I’d survive without you.
Someone needs you, and you step up. It’s one of the things I love about you most. But I need you too, Nick.
And for us to work, I need to know that you’ll balance that alongside everything else, or that you’ll at least try. ”
Panic gripped my heart. Was he thinking of leaving? “I, ah, I—” I stumbled over my words. “I promise it won’t happen again.”
Mads finally looked up. “You can’t promise that, Nick.
Shit happens. I know that. I can deal with that.
I’m talking about the way you tend to deliberately put yourself in harm’s way when there are other options.
When I first wanted to go to Kettleworth to help Lee, you didn’t want me to.
You were worried you’d lose me too. That it was an unnecessary risk.
But it was child’s play compared to what you did today, Nick.
All I’m asking is that you don’t make decisions that knowingly put your life in danger when there’s a chance you can avoid it.
I know you’re considering the whole private investigator thing, but I’m telling you now, if this is what that’s going to look like—you running half-cocked with no backup into a dangerous situation—then I don’t know if I can do it.
I don’t want to lose the love of my life over a stupid decision. Were you like this with Davis as well?”
The question caught me off guard. And the way Mads was clearly fighting to hold back his tears broke my heart. I’d done this to him. To us. It had to stop.
“I don’t know what to say except you’re right, but with Davis—” I was about to deny that bit, but something made me pause.
I thought back to Belinda’s scathing commentary on my life issues and instead said, “I was never faced with physical danger like this when we were married, but now that you ask, yeah, maybe. If I’m honest, I’d say I’ve taken more than a few unnecessary risks in my life.
The fights I got into as a kid when I should’ve just walked away.
Times I taunted my father, taking some kind of sick pleasure in his cruel words because it at least got me some attention, right?
Even at work, when we were hot on a money laundering trail, I’d become angry and obsessed with the chase, slipping into chat rooms without official permission, looking for information, for a lead, pushing, sometimes taunting, risking exposure of not just myself but the entire operation.
” I hesitated, then admitted, “Davis even caught me using my own computer once.”
Mads gaped. “Jesus, Nick.”
Heat flooded my cheeks. “I know. I know. Davis was furious with me when he found out. Told me I’d completely lost perspective.
That I’d put him at risk too. That I needed to take a step back.
I’d scoffed at the time, but something happened in the hut today.
Something Belinda said that’s made me question why I do that shit.
” I hadn’t realised I was crying until Mads left his chair to sit beside me.
He took my hand and said, “Tell me.”
I scooted sideways so we were facing each other. “When Belinda said they were going to kill me and make it look like suicide if my body was found, I wanted to laugh in her face. I wanted to tell her that no one would believe that.”
I expected Mads to agree, but he remained worryingly silent.
“But then she spouted all the stuff she’d learned from Chloe about my childhood and what I’d been through.
How lonely and angry and worthless I felt, and how finding and then losing my mother again could be enough to tip me over the edge, opening the floodgates on all those feelings.
Abandoned . . . again. How people would hear my story and get it, even though they hadn’t seen it coming. ”
“And do you finally see it too?” Mads brought my knuckles to his lips.
“Yeah.” I nodded. “I see it. Maybe for the first time. Or perhaps it’s just the first time I actually believe it. Davis saw it, though. He knew. You saw it too, right?”
Mads nodded, a single tear sliding down his cheek.
“Quite soon after we met. All that bravado, that courage, those thick walls you carried around with you. They had to be protecting something. I figured out early that you took risks because you didn’t value yourself enough to care what happened to you.
And you didn’t trust that others did either.
You didn’t trust their love. Davis’s love. My love. Our love.”
I couldn’t hold his gaze. “He said the same, but I couldn’t see it at the time. Couldn’t, or wouldn’t. I think he was hurt because of that. Like he felt he wasn’t enough reason for me to change.”
Mads lifted my chin and kissed me softly on the lips.
“I think maybe you simply weren’t ready.
Timing is everything. Maybe you had to grow up a little more.
Experience what you have these last two years.
Get intimate with grief and anger and how easy it would be to lose your own life. Which only leaves one question.”
I waited, already knowing what that question was.
Mads’ bright green eyes searched mine. “Are you ready now? Are you ready to value and protect your own life and the one we’re going to create together?”
I cradled his face and brushed my lips over his. “Yes. I’m absolutely ready to open that can of worms and try and change. You’re worth me trying, but more importantly, and maybe for the first time, I think that I’m worth it too.”
Tears flooded Mads’ cheeks and he kissed me hard. “You are so fucking worth it.” He pushed me back and crawled into my lap.
It felt so good to hold him again, I couldn’t speak for the longest while, content to just feel him in my arms and know I hadn’t blown our future together.
Finally, I tried to explain what I was feeling.
“We went through a lot, Mum and I, and I deserve a life free of my father’s constant voice in my head.
I’m not soft or weak or unworthy, or any of the things he tried to stuff into my brain, and it’s time I started living like I actually believed it.
” I buried my lips in Mads’ hair and he hummed in agreement.
“I love you, Madigan Delaney Church, and I want to live a long, long life with you at my side. I love you, and I’ll spend every waking moment making sure you know that you .
. . that we . . . are my number one priority.
He doesn’t get to win. My father doesn’t get to win.
” I tipped Mads’ chin up so I could see his eyes.
“We do, baby. We get to win. You and me.”
Mads pressed his lips softly to mine and then he smiled. “I love you too, Nick Lucas Fisher, and that’s all I needed to hear.”