Prologue #3
“Um, excuse you? Don’t tell me what to do. You want out of what, Cillian?” Ollie demands, and…am I smiling?
“This. What we do. This life. It’s not a big deal,” Cillian tells him.
“What the hell are you talking about, it’s not a big deal!
Yes, it is.” Ollie turns his anger on me next.
“What did you do? How did you talk him into that?” He pokes his finger into my chest. “You don’t get to take this away from him!
To push him away because you’re not strong enough to deal with your emotions and regrets about how you treated him! ”
My jaw tightens, but the kid isn’t wrong. Still, it takes everything inside of me not to break his fingers for putting his hand on me this way.
“Jesus, Kitten. Don’t do that.” There’s an edge of fear in Cillian’s voice as he comes toward us.
“I will. Someone needs to wake him up.” Ollie gives me his attention again. “You can’t take his family away from him. I won’t let you do that. I won’t let you hurt him anymore.”
I’m caught between being angry, sad, and amused, but I do my best to hide it, testing the boy further. “And what will you do about it?”
“Whatever I have to.”
Good for you, is what I want to tell him, but I control my tone and say, “Lower your hand. Speak to Cillian about this. I didn’t force him to do anything. I gave him a choice, and I did it for you…for both of you.”
“I don’t need you to do anything for me!” Ollie shouts. “I need you to fucking love him! All he’s ever wanted is for his father to love him! That’s what he needs, and that’s what I want for him!”
It’s not often that I lose control, not often I can’t keep the things I want inside, but this is one of those times when it bursts free. “Why do you think I’m doing this? I love my son.” I’ve done a shitty job of proving it, but I’m trying now.
“Show it in other ways, not this one, not telling him he can walk away from his life, from the people he loves. And maybe you should try telling him sometime, fucking talk to him once in a while, not because you have to, but because you want to. He needed you!” Ollie cries, not even trying to hide it, unashamed of his show of emotion.
“He needed you, and you left him alone, and I know you’re hurting.
I can see it, but he’s always going to be my first priority. You should try to make him yours too.”
“You don’t think I live with that every fucking day?
” erupts out of me. I can’t keep my gaze from my son’s anymore.
He’s blurry, the emotion I’ve worked so hard to bury breaking free.
I haven’t cried since…since I lost her. “I hate myself for it every fucking day, but I don’t know how to change it.
How to fix it. I hurt you…worse than I did her.
I was so broken when she died that I left you to live in that same emptiness alone, and that will forever be the biggest regret of my lifetime.
I just… How do I fix it, son? How can I be what you deserve?
” Because I want that, want it so fucking much.
What I did to us is slowly killing me every day.
“You try,” Cillian says. “I just need you to try…and I’ll be better about trying too.”
I swipe at my eyes and nod. “I can do that.” I push my hands into the pockets of my slacks.
“I want to do that. Hearing about the two of you these past few months…well, it put things into perspective. You’re growing up, you’re in love…
and I’ve let all this time pass. You’re right here, so close, yet I’ve let it pass.
She would never forgive me for that, but as true as that is, it’s not just for her.
All the shit with Sloan, the way he was to Tiernan before he died.
I don’t want that to be us.” I know the truth of Sloan’s death, even though they think they’ve kept it from me.
I know it was Fia who killed him after he kidnapped his own son and threatened both Tiernan’s and Dean’s lives.
“I don’t want it to be us either,” Cillian replies.
“Good. Okay. It’s a start.” I’m shaking, trying so damn hard to hold it together, when I look at Ollie. “You’re good for him. I had my doubts, but you are. Brave and maybe a little dangerous too.” Because what he just did to me should be a death sentence.
“I’m the dangerous one?” Ollie asks.
“For him, you would be. Just…don’t go around doing what you did with me to everyone. They won’t be as understanding.”
“I can’t help it. I love him. I will always defend him.”
The way Moira would have always defended me. My son couldn’t have chosen a better person to walk this path with. “I’m glad to know he has that.” Then to Cillian, I say, “I’ll let the two of you talk. I won’t take your answer from a few minutes ago as gospel. Let me know what you want me to do.”
“I will. Thank you,” Cillian replies, and for the first time since Moira died, I feel some of the weight leave my chest…and I feel some hope.
“You’re very welcome. And I’m sorry.”
I turn, go into my office, and once I’m behind the door, for the first time since my wife died, I break down and cry.