I force my thoughts onto my parents, and closing my eyes, I let their meeting play out in my head—my mom rushing around on her bike, crashing into my dad.
If they’d never met…then I wouldn’t be here.
I would never have had the privilege of knowing and loving them.
But if they had never met, they would never have had me. I would never have been the cause of their deaths.
I don’t know which I would want more.
To have had my parents as I did, for the time I did…or for them to have never met.
But then Parker and Tess would never have been born.
And that is inconceivable to me.
I can’t allow myself to think those kinds of things. I can’t change what was.
But I can change what is to be.
So, I let my mother’s voice into my head, and I listen to her as she once again tells me their love story.
“You okay?” Liam’s voice is quiet beside me.
“Yeah.” I open my eyes and turn my face to him. “Just thinking.”
“About your family?”
I look away and nod. It’s too hard to stare into his eyes and talk about them.
“I’m sorry you lost them…your parents…and your brother and sister.”
I press my lips together and move my head forward slightly, acknowledging him.
Silence falls between us.
Liam breaks it. “My mother died when I was ten.”
His words surprise me. Because I had no clue. No clue at all.
I turn in my seat to face him. My knees press up against his thigh. I stare into his face.
Liam brings his eyes to mine. “I know what it’s like to lose someone you love, Boston. Maybe not to the extent you have…but I do know.”
“I’m sorry.” I reach for his hand, and he lets me take it. “I’m so sorry that you lost your mom. How did she…die?” I immediately regret asking because I’m prying.
When Liam asked me about my family’s passing, I tore into him.
“My mother was…” He looks away from me, his eyes focused on the grass beneath our feet, and he takes a deep breath. “She was murdered by her boyfriend.”
“Oh God, Liam. I’m so sorry.”
He shakes his head but doesn’t look at me. “The way she died…it was horrific and brutal…but the life she lived…” He brings his eyes to mine. I see the pain buried deep in them. “It was difficult.”
“Difficult how?”
He lets out a breath. “She was an addict—heroin—for as many years as I can remember. I don’t think she was in the beginning though when she met my father and got pregnant with me. I figure she probably used recreational drugs. But, after I was born, I guess things got worse. I know she had a hard time, growing up. She didn’t talk much about it, but she didn’t have anything to do with her family. However, her childhood was…I do know it wasn’t easy. When she met my father, she was twenty-one and working as a stripper.”
There’s clear bitterness in his voice. I don’t know if it’s because of the mention of his father or the fact that his mother worked as a stripper.
“My father liked—probably still does—to frequent strip clubs. Well, any club really. He likes the party lifestyle. My father was…what you might call rebellious. Charles Hunter, the son and only heir of Lord Hunter…had everything a man could want, and my father chose to piss his life away on women and alcohol and partying.”
“Lord Hunter? Your grandfather is a lord? The grandfather I’m going to meet really soon?”
“Mmhmm.” He doesn’t meet my stare.
Wow. A lord. I’m glad I put on a nice dress.
“I’m guessing my mother fell in love with my father,” Liam continues, a hard tone to his voice. “Or she fell in love with his wealth, maybe the life she thought he could give her. My father, on the other hand, fell in lust with my mother. She had a hard life, but she was a beautiful woman. The minute she told him she was pregnant with me, he was out of there.”
“What an ass.” The words are out before I can stop them. “I’m sorry.” I look at him, contrite.
“Don’t be.” He laughs. “You’re right. My father is an ass.”
“So…when your mom died, you went to live with your grandpa?”
“Yeah.” His expression warms at the mention of his grandfather. “My dad wasn’t really around, too busy traveling the world with whomever he was fucking at that time, moving from party to party.
“My grandpa has been involved in my life from the very beginning. He tried to get my mother out of that lifestyle. He wanted her to move to Oxford to be close to him, but she wouldn’t do it. She wanted to stay in London. So, he bought her a house in a nice part of London. Gave her an allowance to use to care for me. My father never gave us a penny. But I guess…no matter how much money Grandpa gave her or how much I…loved her.”
I hear the break in his voice, and it hurts. A lot.
He clears his throat. “Sometimes…whatever broke someone in the first place is embedded so deeply inside them that nothing can fix it or root it out, and all the love or money in the world isn’t going to change that. Maybe my father tossing her aside was the tipping point for her. And that’s where the drugs helped her…made her feel better when nothing or no one else could.” He looks at me with something so painful in his eyes that I feel his hurt like it’s my own. “She wasn’t a bad mother…not in the beginning…but she lost her way…with the drugs…and the dealer boyfriend who fed her addiction. Along the way, she forgot she had a kid to care for.”
My heart is breaking for him. For the boy who just wanted his mother.
My life might be as it is now, but my mother loved me and cared for me, as a mother should.
Liam should have had that, too.
“The money Grandpa gave her for me, she was spending it on drugs. When Grandpa would question my lack of clothes or the wear on my shoes, I would make up lies to cover for her. I lied because she was my mother. I loved her. And I guess…I was worried about what would happen if my grandpa found out where his money was being spent. I didn’t want him to walk out of my life. The weekends I spent with him at his house were…important to me.”
“I don’t think he would have left you. It sounds like he loves you a lot.”
“Yeah.” He gives a sad smile. “I know that now. But, back then, I was a kid who didn’t know better. Just before she died, my grandpa grew suspicious. He turned up early one Saturday morning to pick me up, and he caught her drug dealer boyfriend leaving the house. My mother always made sure not to have him around when my grandpa came for me. She didn’t want him figuring out where his money was going and cutting her off. But Grandpa saw him. He’s not a stupid man. That’s when the problems began. I remember my grandpa asking me questions about Russ, my mother’s boyfriend. I tried not to give anything away, but the seed of doubt was there…and I guess he figured out the rest.
“The following weekend, my grandpa came to collect me, but he came early again, said he wanted to talk with my mum in private before we left to go to his house. I was told to go to my room. But I sat on the landing and listened in. They were arguing. Grandpa told her that he knew she was a junkie. He said she either stopped using, cleaned herself up, and dumped her dealer boyfriend, or he’d have Russ arrested, and he’d take me from her. He told her that he wouldn’t have her putting me at risk like she was. My mother told him that he couldn’t have me. Grandpa said to her that no court would stop him because of her drug use and the danger she was knowingly placing me in. My mum called his bluff. Told him to get out, that he would never see me again.
“I remember the panic I felt when I heard him leaving the house. I ran down the stairs and out of the house after him. I caught up with him at the garden gate. I pleaded with him not to leave. I could see how much it was hurting him in that moment. I didn’t want him to leave. I was hanging on to his jacket, but my mother pried me off of him. Before she dragged me inside the house, my grandpa knelt in front of
me, took my face in his hands, and told me that it would just be this one weekend that I wouldn’t see him. He promised me that he’d be back the following Saturday to pick me up. Told me that he loved me, and he’d always take care of me. Then, he hugged me, and he got in his car and left.”
I discreetly wipe away the tear on my cheek. “He came back,” I whisper. “He kept his promise.”
“Yeah, he did.” Liam’s expression softens. But then his eyes harden. “But I didn’t see him for three months. My mother kept her word and wouldn’t let him see me. I knew he was fighting her for access. I saw the letters from the lawyers. I might have been ten, but I knew he was fighting for custody. And…I hated my mother for keeping me from him.” His voice catches.
I look at him, and I can see the agony clear in his eyes.
“I told her I hated her.” His pained gaze comes to mine. “I argued with her a week before she died. I told her that I hated her for keeping my grandpa from me. I didn’t speak to her for a whole week. I ignored her, pretended that she didn’t exist. And then…she didn’t anymore.”
I catch another falling tear, rubbing it away with the back of my hand. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“My last words to her were my fault. They were in anger, yes, but a part of me meant them at that time.”
“You were ten, Liam.”
He lifts a shoulder, like that doesn’t matter. “My mother died, thinking I hated her. I never got the chance to tell her that I didn’t.”
“She knew you didn’t hate her,” I say the words softly.
In my opinion, his mother didn’t deserve his love. She didn’t deserve him, period. But he did love her…still does, I think, and it’s important to him that she knows that even though he thinks she doesn’t.
And I understand needing those you loved who are gone to know just how much you loved them. How much they meant…still mean to you, and just how sorry you truly are for everything.
I’m willingly, without regret, giving up my life to show the ones I love how sorry I am for the way I hurt them.
“She was a lot of things…but she was my mother, and I did love her.”
“She knew, Liam,” I emphasize the words to push them home. I want him to know this.
He shakes his head, like he’s clearing it of those thoughts. “Things were crap in those last three months without my grandpa around,” Liam says quietly, the ache painfully evident in his voice. “I mean, they were never particularly great before, but they got bad. Grandpa cut my mother off financially after she’d stopped him from seeing me. I know now that he was trying to make her see sense. But cutting her off meant he cut me off. I didn’t eat well in those three months.” His eyes slide to the ground. “The money she did get from the government would go straight into the needle that went into her arm.
“I didn’t see my grandpa again until the day my mother was murdered. That morning, I’d gotten up, gotten myself ready for school, and left the house. She hadn’t gotten out of bed, but that wasn’t unusual. And, from what I know, from what the police told us, Russ turned up at our house at lunchtime. They got high on heroin. Then, they got into an argument. Russ had been accusing my mother of cheating on him for a while now. I’d heard and been witness to the fights—some physical.” He meets my eyes. “They argued that day about the same thing…him accusing her of cheating. Guess the drugs were fueling his paranoia. When Russ was arrested, he said they were arguing, he hit her, she fought back…and the argument…got out of hand. Then…” He trails off, lifting a shoulder.
“Was she cheating on him? Not that she deserved to die because of it,” I quickly add, worrying how that could sound to him.
Liam shakes his head. “No, I don’t think she was cheating. But, that day, Russ believed she was. And he stabbed her to death in our kitchen. Our neighbor heard the commotion, saw Russ running from our house, covered in her…blood.” He exhales harshly. “My grandpa got the call. He was actually listed as my mother’s emergency contact. I guess he was the only family she had. Me, too. I was still at school. The teachers made me stay after everyone had left for the day. I was sitting in the headmaster’s office. I remember the way he kept looking at me. I knew something was wrong. Then, my grandpa turned up and took me straight to his house. He sat me down and told me what had happened to my mother. He hugged me for what felt like forever. I stayed at his house, and I never left.”
“Your father…”
He shakes his head. “He didn’t even come home for her funeral. He and Grandpa haven’t spoken since.”
“What about you and your dad?”
He lets out a laugh, a sardonic-sounding one. “I fund his lifestyle. Grandpa cut him off, and his trust ran out. I was a man by that point, and my business was doing well. He came begging.” He shrugs. “My father has never worked a day in his life. He wouldn’t even know how to earn money. I might have my issues with him…but he’s my father, so I couldn’t see him on the streets.”
This is the exact moment I realize just how deep my feelings run for Liam. And it frightens the hell out of me.
He looks at me, his lips lifting a touch. “The day I met you on the plane, I was supposed to be meeting him for dinner. He needed more money. He’s living in Boston at the moment. His latest squeeze is there. She’s about your age.” He rolls his eyes.
“I was there on business. He must’ve heard because he called me up the day before, asking me to meet him. Being the sucker I am, I went. I pushed back my flight a day. I waited at the restaurant for him. He didn’t show—unsurprisingly. Then, I got a text as I was leaving the restaurant, saying he couldn’t make it, something had come up, and asking if I could just transfer some money into his account for him. So, I decided to fly home early. Caught the next flight out. And there you were.” His eyes focus on mine, warmth in them.
“There I was.” I smile. “And I’m glad I was.”
I mean that. More than I can say.
Even if having Liam in my life is causing me inner turmoil, I don’t regret a second of the time I’ve spent with him because the thought of never having met him seems inconceivable to me now.
I don’t have forever, but I have this point in time. And that’s what matters. Spending my remaining time with him.
Because he matters to me.
“I’m glad, too,” Liam says, giving me the look that always makes my skin tingle and heat.
Sitting forward, I curl my hands around the edge of the seat. “What happened to your mother’s boyfriend?” I ask softly. I hope he went to prison for a very long time.
Leaning back, Liam looks away and pushes his hands into his pockets. “He hung himself in his prison cell before his trial.”
“Good,” I say, and I mean it.
Without warning, Liam gets up from the bench. “We should go.” Staring down at me, he pulls a hand from his pocket and holds it out to me.
I slip my hand into his and let him pull me to my feet.
He holds my hand all the way back to the car, breaking from me only to get inside. Then, he’s back to holding it again. Holding it like he has to, and I know the feeling because, right now, I need him just as much.
Liam starts the engine. The song playing on the radio is James Blunt’s “Goodbye My Lover.”
Liam pulls away from the university, my hand safely in his.
I touch my free hand to the flower still in my hair. I pull it free and press the peony to my nose, inhaling. It’s sweet but not overpowering.
I put the flower back in my hair and watch the buildings pass by as we leave, and I have this feeling of letting go.
The only problem is…I’m not sure what I’m letting go of.
“You grew up here?” My eyes widen to saucers as I take in the place. “It’s a castle. An actual castle. Is that a moat?”
I squint, trying to see the water around the huge-ass castle in front of me, as Liam drives us down the tree-lined driveway, which is longer than the street I grew up on.
Liam chuckles. “Technically, it’s not a castle. It’s called Hunter Hall. No, that’s not a moat. It’s a lake that encircles the back of the house. It doesn’t come around the front. To be a moat, it has to totally surround the house. And, yes, I lived here for the better part of my life.”
The better part of his life.
That sentence alone makes me want to wrap my arms around him and hold him tight. After learning how his early years were, the feelings I have for him have grown. Knowing how hard he had it in the start of his life to where he is now—where he’s brought his life to be—makes me admire and respect him even more.
And like him more.
It’s not good, I know that, but it is what it is. And, as long as I keep my feelings to myself, which I intend to do, then everything will be fine.
I can’t stop thinking about his life, how he was raised in two completely different ways.
Thank God for his grandpa.
I was already looking forward to meeting him. Admittedly, I feel a little intimidated after discovering that he’s a lord. An actual freaking lord. And he lives in a castle. I don’t care what Liam says. It’s a castle. But after learning everything his grandpa has done for him, I’m more than looking forward to meeting him.
“So, what do I call your grandpa? Lord Hunter or just Lord? Or, like, Your Royal Highness.”
Liam laughs loudly. It’s a really good sound to hear after the intensity of today.
“Boston, Royal Highness is reserved for the monarchy. Kings, princes, that kind of thing.”
“So, he’s not actually royalty? I thought lords were royalty.” Not that I know much about lords or anything to do with the British monarchy—except the Queen is cool, and Prince William and Kate produce the cutest kids ever.
“My grandpa’s title was given to him by the Queen. And he is distantly related to the royal family but way, way down the line. Tenth cousin once removed or something.”
“But he’s actually related to the Queen?”
“Technically, yes.”
“That means you’re related to the Queen.”
He chuckles. “Well, no…”