he rasped in my ear, the way the world broke open when I came. I can’t believe that happened.
“So,” he says to me and gives me a quick grin as he looks me over. I prop myself up so I’m sitting beside him, both of us looking like a couple who always have coffee in bed like this together. There’s something so pure and wholesome about that thought that it makes my heart pang.
“So,” I say right back.
“I don’t want you to leave,” he says to me.
His words should surprise me, and yet somehow they don’t. Maybe because even though everything about him tells me he’s the kind of guy who is used to kicking women out of his bed after he’s done with them, I know he’s not done with me.
“I don’t want to either,” I tell him.
His eyes narrow thoughtfully for a moment as he looks at me. “When are ye leaving Ireland?”
I don’t want to think about leaving. I don’t want to think about facing my life. I remember what he said last night: You can’t avoid something forever. But I think you’re allowed to avoid it long enough for you to just get through it. And I’m not through it yet.
“On Thursday. So, a little less than a week.”
He sucks in his bottom lip and I’m nearly giddy at the realization that I know what that lip tastes like, what it feels like on my skin. “This is a trip for you and your sisters,” he comments.
I shrug. “Yeah. It has been. I mean, I’m a bit of a tagger on because I came so last minute.” But honestly, I don’t think they’d mind if I spent some time with Padraig, if that’s what he’s asking.
He looks like he wants to say more but he doesn’t.
“What?” I prompt. I want him to ask me to spend time with him. Coffee, drinks, just the day in bed, anything.
“Nothing,” he says. “I just had a really fucking crazy and inappropriate idea and I realized I’d be a wanker for even asking you.”
Okay, now he really has my attention. “What?”
He exhales through his nose and almost winces. “Last night was something good. I don’t want what I’m about to say to mess that up. To taint the memories. I don’t want ye going back to America with tales of the Irish weirdo.”
I raise my brows for him to just get on with it, though now I’m a little bit afraid of what he’s going to say.
“I have to go home tomorrow,” he says. “Back home to Shambles. To be with my father. To sort out what’s happening over there. I don’t know how long I’m going to be. Maybe a day. Maybe more. Maybe a lot more. I want you to come with me.”
I blink at him for a moment. “You do?”
He nods.
“Like for emotional support?” I ask. Because, if so, I totally get it.
“Not necessarily,” he says. There’s a caginess to his eyes and I can’t figure out what he’s getting at. “I want ye to come to Shambles and pretend to be my fiancé for a day or two, just to give my father some peace of mind.”
If I was merely blinking at him before, now I’m full on gawking. It takes me a moment to go, “What?”
“Ye don’t have to do anything but smile and nod.”
As if that explains any of this. “I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to repeat all of that, slowly, and then explain all of it, slowly.”
He holds the mug of coffee with both his hands and gives me a fleeting smile that disappears into his beard. “Right. You see, I’ve been up for a few hours now and my mind has been racing. About my father, about my health, about you. About a lot of things. I have to see my father, there’s no doubt there. I need to make amends with him and I truly don’t know what to expect. But I do know that if I showed up there with someone…”
I’m still not getting it. “How would that give your father peace of mind?”
A flash of pain comes across his eyes for a moment and I know there’s something so much more personal going on here that I can barely scratch the surface on. “If ye knew my father…” He pauses, licks his lips. “My mother died when I was sixteen. It’s just been us and we haven’t been the same ever since, our relationship to each other