The Secrets She Must Tell - Lucy King Page 0,54

virtually forced him into going to bed with her by following him into his room the night he’d told her to put on a dressing gown and whipping her top off? Ditto when she’d pressed the condom into his hand at the party last night and told him she wanted sex. He hadn’t even planned to take her to Paris. The invitation had been last-minute and he’d only asked her because of what they’d been getting up to after dark.

And then take this evening, when he’d finally opened up to her about how he felt about his parents and the revelations surrounding his adoption. He’d only done that because she was there. Because she was convenient. He hadn’t particularly wanted to talk to her.

He’d volunteered nothing willingly, she could see now. He obviously didn’t see her as an equal in this relationship. Maybe not in anything. They weren’t partners in any sense of the word. They were nothing. She was nothing. And so, frankly, what was the point in them continuing with this ridiculous charade?

CHAPTER TWELVE

FINN SPENT THE torturous hours following Georgie’s departure railing at himself while ploughing through half a bottle of Scotch. He’d been a fool for telling her everything. He’d made himself insanely vulnerable and unacceptably weak. He’d invested too much in the power of her response, and, unlike any other he’d ever made, that investment had badly backfired. The hurt and disappointment that roared through him when he recalled how carelessly she’d left him were precisely why he didn’t share. How could he have forgotten that? At what point had he recklessly decided to ignore what he knew to be true—that other people’s behaviour was incalculable and that the only person he could rely on was himself? What had he been thinking?

All in all, he was glad she’d gone. He had a hectic schedule over the next couple of days and he needed to focus. He did not need extra stress and he did not need Georgie. He was perfectly capable of working through everything going on in his head on his own. It might take some time, but he was going to let it play out and eventually he’d get there. He had to obliterate the ridiculous feelings of rejection and abandonment, and regroup.

However, with increasing frequency, he found himself revisiting their conversation, assessing what Georgie had said and stripping the words of emotion. Grudgingly, he came to the conclusion that she’d had a point. Possibly even more than one. Because the truth was that, however hard he looked, however much money he threw at the investigation, he may never get the answers he sought.

So what was he going to do? He couldn’t spend the rest of his life being bitter and resentful. He had to accept that he’d become the man he was now because of Jim and Alice, who had been his parents in all ways that counted. The memories he had of his mother were warm and happy. The photos they’d taken of him had filled dozens of albums. His father had not once let him down while alive. He’d been an unfailing tower of strength. Only in death had he turned out to have feet of clay. But as neither of them was around to defend or explain their actions and decisions, what had gone before was beyond Finn’s control.

How he went forward, however, was within his control. Whatever the reasons for his adoption and the subsequent secrecy surrounding it, he had to forgive his parents, his father in particular. He could understand now a paternal determination to protect a child to the exclusion of all else. To not let anything upset the status quo. Whatever else he might think, he had to understand that none of it was anything to do with him and believe it. His parents had done their best and they’d been good people, and Georgie was right: he had been lucky. It was all right to regret that his father had never got to meet Josh and it was all right to resume the grieving process that had been interrupted with the discovery of that certificate.

He had to let it go and focus on the family he did have instead of chasing relentlessly after wisps of the one he may or may not have elsewhere. He had so much to appreciate. So much to value.

Especially Georgie.

Who, despite her apparent rejection, despite his attempts to put her out of his mind, he was missing more than he