42. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
The funeral was a quiet affair a few days later. It was sparsely attended by some of the nurses and a few of his former colleagues from when he worked at the Garda, so the church was almost empty as Father Murphy gave services. I didn’t mind it as I sat back and listened, my eyes not leaving the shiny black coffin that sat up on the dais.
“Are you all right, mo ròs?” Leith leaned over to ask, his fingers entangled with mine on my lap. “You didn’t eat this morning.”
I nodded, resting my head on his shoulder with a sigh as Father Murphy recited the prayer that signaled that it was nearly time for the processional to the graveyard.
My pack had offered to carry his coffin, but Finneas’s old colleagues shot that down and we watched as, together, they stepped up the dais and each took a side.
It was still raining when we left the church and my pack surrounded me like a wall to keep me from getting wet, Artie tucking his arm into my elbow with one hand as he held an umbrella in the other. Charm trotted just in front of us just like she was supposed to, though none of us would let Artie fall. Not again.
Glasnevin cemetery was a short walk from the church and was the same place that Mam was buried.
I hadn’t known it at the time, but while the dads had been able to bring their wives back for burial, Finneas was still technically married to Mam and chose to have her buried in the plot that they’d purchased when they were still happy.
It should have made me angry at him that he still got to pick where she was laid to rest forever, but as soon as we stepped into the cemetery I knew she would have loved it.
I’d never visited her grave before, and now as they set up everything for Finneas’s burial, I crouched in front of it, running my fingers along the groove of her name.
“Mona Callaghan,” Wiz read out loud. “We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with a sleep.”
“That’s from the Tempest, right?” Enzo asked as he hovered just behind me, ready to help me to my feet at any given moment.
I nodded. “She rewrote it for me and told it to me as a bedtime story when I was little. She loved Shakespeare.”
“Ms. Callaghan?” Father Murphy’s voice cut through my nostalgia. “We’re ready for the burial.”
Standing, we joined the rest of the crowd where the coffin now sat on a metal frame that would allow it to descend into the grave next to Mam’s. There wasn’t a headstone yet, but the funeral home assured me that there was one being made per his instructions.
Someone directed me to a chair and I sat down gratefully, my knees feeling a bit weak from it all.
Then Father Murphy began to read out the burial rites, but I was only half-listening as I watched him move around the coffin.
This time last year, there was no way anyone could have told me that I would be willingly sitting at my father’s funeral.
Then again, they also couldn’t have told me that a pack that I loved very much would be there to support me.
Even if the support was just verbal and physical. I hadn’t opened my end of the bonds yet—not because I was still angry, no that feeling had faded almost completely as they showed me that they were there for me when I needed them most.
I just didn’t want them to feel the sheer level of sadness that had settled into my chest ever since Finneas died.
He hadn’t been a good father by any stretch of the word and I had two dads who had shown me what a good father actually looked like. But he was still my last genetic link in this world—and my last connection to Mam—until the babe resting under my heart was born.
It was all so damned complicated that I didn’t want them feeling it all with me. Not until I figured out how to pick all of the feelings about my father and our relationship apart and put them back together in a somewhat coherent way.
Father Murphy finished his end of the rites and the small crowd that had gathered chorused the final farewell which ended in Amen.
Then, one by one, people dropped a handful of dirt into the grave before giving me a solemn nod and heading off into the rain.
There would be a wake at Finneas’s home later in the evening, but most had told me that they wouldn’t be able to make it.
“Ciara,” Enzo called, bringing me out of the haze that I’d been in since the burial had begun. My entire pack was standing in a line in front of the grave, each holding a handful of dirt.
With a heavy sigh, I stood and grabbed my own handful.
They all dropped theirs first before giving me some space.
I let the wet dirt crumble slowly out of my fingers, watching as each chunk fell onto the black coffin.
“Bye, Da,” I whispered before turning and finding myself absolutely stunned to be in the arms of Alexei and Maxim.
“Hey, sweetheart,” Alexei said as he tugged me in for a tight hug, freezing for a moment when he felt the roundness of my stomach before he breezed past it in favor of comforting me.
“What are you doing here? Isn’t there a game this week?” I asked breathlessly as I looked over his shoulder to find the rest of my family standing a little ways away in black.
Brynn, Aurelia, and their families looked somber as they offered me soft smiles, their eyes going between where Maxim and Alexei were hugging me and the grave.
“You can thank Enzo for that,” Maxim told me as he pulled me in for a hug of his own. “He kept us informed about the funeral and we managed to get our bye week switched from the new year to this week so we could be here for you.”
I had no idea how they managed it, but I was so glad to see them that I almost immediately burst into tears.
“Whoa there, what’s wrong?” I heard Maxim say but I just buried my face in his chest.
“She’s been doing that a lot—crying I mean,” Wiz’s voice was muffled as Maxim and Alexei enveloped me in another tight hug. “The baby is making her pretty emotional on top of everything else these days.”
There was an audible gasp from the crowd. “Did you just say baby?”
Then the Peterson twins were being yanked away from me by Brynn and Aurelia as they got their first look at my little belly.
“Holy shit!” Brynn squawked, her blue eyes wide as she took it in.
Aurelia, whose belly was much bigger than mine, just looked like she was about to burst into tears herself.
“I’m so sorry, Ciara, that we didn’t tell you about the payments,” she said, her words wobbly as she reached up to grab my hand.
Leaning over, I wrapped my arms around her shoulder and inhaled her familiar vanilla rose scent.
“It’s all right, I’m just glad you’re here now,” I whispered into her ear.
“There’s nowhere else we’d rather be,” she insisted as we rejoined the rest of the family and I was passed around for hugs.
Enzo was last and I tucked an arm around his back and pressed a kiss to his cheek.
“Thank you for doing this for me.” I told him, watching as his dark eyes grew bright and he nodded.
“Anything for you, Ciara, you know that.”
I did, especially now.
“Could we maybe take this party out of the rain?” Nash asked as he tugged Birdy’s raincoat hood more firmly over her head.
Leith held up a bouquet of flowers, reminding me of the second thing that I wanted to do today before the wake. “Did you still want to do the thing you were talking about earlier?”
I did, especially now that Brynn and Aurelia were here.
The rest of the family waited on one side of the bridge as Aurelia, Brynn and I walked to the center.
“I never came here,” Aurelia murmured softly over her shoulder at me as I pushed her. “The dads refused and I never had the courage to do it on my own.”
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Brynn asked worriedly as we approached the middle. She had the least memories of the day our moms died, but I could still tell she was agitated as we turned in the spot where the car had gone over the side.
The guard rail was still scarred fifteen years later and I wasn’t sure if I was imagining it or if I could still pick out bits of paint from where the rental car had hit it.
“I don’t want to do this,” I told her as we stood staring over the edge at the river that, even today, ran at a fast clip below. “But I think we need to.”
Separating the bouquet that Leith had bought into three, I handed each of them a part of it.
Sucking in a deep breath, I finally told them why I wanted to come here.
“I’ve always felt guilty for what happened here.”
Aurelia opened her mouth—probably to comfort me and tell me that it wasn’t my fault—but I didn’t let her speak.
“Just let me finish,” I said, gripping the stems of the white lilies a little bit tighter. “It was my fault that they were even driving on the bridge that day and I think the guilt has been eating me alive for fifteen years. But I can’t let it. Not anymore. I can’t repeat the cycle again for this little one’s sake and for their sake too.” Glancing down to the end of the bridge where my pack was still standing, I sucked in a deep breath. “So, I’m letting it go here, where it all started.”
Cupping my belly I dropped my flowers over the edge of the bridge and watched them plop into the water below before the current took them.
Brynn’s sniffle was quiet as she stared at her own flowers. “I feel bad that I don’t remember them as well as you two do. Hazy, happy memories are all I have of my mom. But I’m glad that I got to grow up with you two. Where else would someone get two built-in best friends and sisters all wrapped up into one?”
Brynn leaned over the edge and dropped her flowers in.
Aurelia was last and looked the least like she wanted to say anything, her blue eyes bright with tears.
“Aurie?” I bent over so I could see her face more clearly.
Aurelia turned to me, her chin wobbling. “If I do this, it really means saying goodbye, doesn’t it?”
“I don’t see it that way.” I shrugged, but slipped my fingers into hers anyway. “But you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”
“No—” she hurried to say. “I want to. It’s just hard. I spent so long angry at my mom because nothing I ever did seemed to be good enough… and then she was gone and I looked for the next person to make me feel that same way and we all know how that ended.”
“With you having children who love you and a pack that would walk through fire for you?” Brynn asked dryly, making Aurelia give her a watery smile.
“Yes, that. But I do think you are right, for the sake of the ones that we love I think it’s time to move on.” Aurelia glanced down at her swollen belly. “Especially because this little girl deserves a mom who thinks she can do anything.”
“That’s the spirit, sister-cousin-mother,” I joked, my grin widening as Aurelia let out a soft laugh at the use of our long-standing inside joke.
“Thank you sister-cousin-daughter, for doing this for us even though you’re going through the roughest time today.” Aurelia squeezed my hand and together we moved to the edge of the bridge and watched as the last bundle of lilies fell into the water and was gone in a whoosh.
“That’s that then,” I said, feeling lighter than I had when we walked onto this bridge. “Now, who wants to go to a wake?”
“Do you want me to open it?” Wiz asked as I stood on the little front stoop and stared at the black-painted door that I hadn’t walked through since I was twelve years old.
I shook my head and held up the key again. “No, I just need a moment.”
The rest of my family was waiting at the bottom of the steps and I could hear Birdy and Theo starting to get fussy as I waffled about unlocking the door to Finneas’s house so that we could go in and set up for the wake.
Finally, I sucked in a calming breath and put the key in the lock and opened the door.
My last memories of this place had been unpleasant to say the least and I wasn’t sure what we’d been walking into.
Before Mam came back to get me, Finneas had let the house fall into disarray. It had been messy and dingy, the yellow wallpaper on the walls peeling because he never had the energy to replace them between his bouts of drinking.
But the house I stepped into now was a far cry from those memories.
For one it was completely clean in a lived-in sort of way, all of the furniture second hand but well taken care of.
Then there were the photos on the walls.
Finneas had ripped them all down in a fit of rage a few days after Mam left, but they were back up now in new frames. Pictures of me, Mam, and the three of us as we grinned cheekily at the camera.
A little meow came from under the couch as an orange cat crawled out.
I crouched down to give him scratches, pleased when he started to purr.
“Orla told me all about you,” I whispered to him. “Riley, isn’t it?”
The cat let out another plaintive meow before he seemed to realize that it was more than just me coming into the house. Then he was off like a rocket, scurrying up the stairs and out of sight.
“Ciara,” Colt said as he stepped inside of the house, his phone to his ear. “What time do you want food delivered?”
He’d taken over as soon as he saw how overwhelmed I was by the wake as I’d never actually planned one and it was the one thing Finneas hadn’t left instructions for.
“An hour or so?” I wasn’t sure how many people would actually show up, but if they did there would be something for them to eat at least.
As the rest of the family settled in, chatting and laughing amongst themselves, I slipped upstairs by myself.
I’d been putting off coming here ever since we came to Ireland, worried that the memories would be too much and send me into a spiral that I didn’t need on top of everything else.
But there was no avoiding it now.
My childhood bedroom door was shut, but the sign my mam had painted declaring it as my room still hung on it. The flowers had faded over time, but her handwriting was still clear as I reached up to touch it.
Gripping the door handle, I slowly opened the door and gasped because it looked exactly the same as I’d left it.
Someone had clearly come in and dusted things pretty regularly, but everything was just as it had been fifteen years ago down to the red hooded jumper hanging on the bedpost.
Stepping inside, I let the door swing shut behind me as I skimmed my fingers over the cream duvet that I could still remember going to the shop to pick out with my mam.
I’d wanted a bright purple one, but she’d insisted that I would thank her in a few years when I wanted a more grown-up set.
She would have been right, of course, because only a year later in Minnesota I refused to use any sheets or blankets that seemed too babyish.
Even the old television that I’d sat in front of and watched my movies every day was still sitting on my dresser.
My eyes moved from the television to the still plastic wrapped DVD that was sitting next to it with a sticky note stuck to the front.
Picking it up, I read the note, scrawled in Finneas’s familiar chicken scratch were the words ‘I’m sorry.’
Somehow, even after death, Finneas still managed to apologize to me.
Lifting the sticky note, I sucked in a shocked breath when I realized what I was looking at.
It was Ice Castles. My favorite movie from when I was younger.
I’d lost my scratched up copy in the accident and Finneas seemed to have bought me a new one.
Pressing a hand to my mouth I choked down the sob threatening to escape and opened the DVD.
There wasn’t time to watch the entire movie as someone would definitely come looking for me soon, but I knew the exact scene I wanted to watch.
The television still turned on and I used the old remote to skip forward until the very end where Lexie is just finishing up her flawless performance despite her blindness.
Settling back on the bed, I glanced up, looking at the familiar mildew stain on the ceiling, the same one I used to stare up at while trying to sleep.
Then with a deep breath, I pressed play and watched Lexie wave to the crowd with a big smile as they began throwing teddy bears and flowers onto the ice.
My heart squeezed as she moved to skate off of the ice but a rose tripped her, sending her falling to the ice in front of everyone.
A sob rippled out of me as I watched Nick hurry to her side and kneel down next to her, a little grin on his face.
“We forgot about the flowers,” Nick joked to Lexie and my mouth moved with his, mimicking his line.
Then the credits began to roll and I was alone again… but I didn’t have to be.
Slowly, I began to ease my end of the bond open. It had been over a month and I was half-scared I wouldn’t know how to do it anymore.
And then they blinked into existence, green for Leith, pink for Artie, blue for Enzo, and finally a dazzling gold for Wiz.
I could feel their surprise down the bond and it made me smile despite how sad I was feeling and soon enough I heard their footsteps just outside of the door.
“Gorgeous?” Wiz led the way as he opened the door to my bedroom and they all peered inside. “You know you’ve opened your end of the bond, right?”
I nodded, wiping at my cheeks. “I didn’t want to be alone.”
That was all my guys needed to hear. They all came inside without another word and piled onto my little twin bed which creaked precariously beneath the five of us.
“I don’t think this bed is load bearing,” Enzo muttered as he settled in next to me, pulling me in close.
“It was meant for a little girl, not a bunch of oversized alphas,” Artie sniffed as he laid his head on my lap with a sigh of satisfaction as he pressed his face into my belly—a habit he’d taken up over the past week since they came to find me and Wiz.
“What were you watching, mo ròs?” Leith nodded at the television where the credits were still rolling.
“An old favorite of mine,” I murmured, combing my fingers through Artie’s hair. “I thought I lost it in the accident, but it looks like he—like Finneas bought it again like he was waiting for me to come back here to watch it.”
My pack remained quiet, waiting for me to continue. Now the bonds were completely open, they could feel my confusion and my grief.
“Is it okay for me to still hate Finneas but also miss him?” I asked, leaning my head on Enzo’s shoulder.
Over the past month it felt like the Finneas from the hospice home and the Finneas that I’d lived with until I was twelve were two completely different people.
I was crying again, I realized when droplets of moisture fell onto the hand that was still caressing Artie’s face. I always seemed to be crying these days. If it kept up I was going to make the guys take me to California and maybe my pregnancy hormones could solve their drought.
Wiz was the first to answer as he reached across the bed and put a hand over mine. “…I think that something like this isn’t supposed to be simple and it’s not something you can figure out in a day.”
“I know that,” I said, frustrated by it all. “But shouldn’t it be at least a little clearer?”
“Maybe it’s good to separate them. The Finneas you knew and the one you met in that hospice. They were, after all, two very different people,” Leith murmured softly.
I settled into them after that, inhaling their scents deeply as we sat in a comfortable silence.
“Do you want to watch the movie with me? From the beginning this time?” I asked, holding up the remote.
“Will you describe it to me?” Artie asked, his eyes already starting to flutter shut for the nap he always took whenever we watched movies.
Leaning over as best as I could, I pressed a kiss to the side of his head.
“Always,” I said before restarting the movie.
It would be the first time I wasn’t watching it alone, and that in of itself made me smile.