Page 56 of Ciaran

Ciaran body blocks Tanner, but my husband tries to get through again, and Ciaran shoves him hard in the chest. Tanner stumbles back a step or two, his hands in the air.

“I don’t want any trouble. I only want to talk to my wife.”

I groan as those close enough to hear—and considering Tanner has a big mouth, that means half the restaurant—suddenly realize they’re witnessing a rather juicy piece of gossip. Their gazes jump between the two angry young men close to a fist fight, and the horrified wife, and assumed cheater.

I tug at Ciaran’s arm, trying to get his attention. “It’s okay, Ciaran.”

“It’s not okay.” He works his jaw in a tight circle. “She’s already told you to fuck off, so what the hell are you still doing here, huh?”

“Like I said, I don’t want any trouble. I just want to talk.”

Callum joins us, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Ciaran while Laurella moves next to me, close enough that her silk top brushes my bare arm.

“I said everything I needed to say last Saturday, Tanner,” I tell him, my courage bolstered by the army of support.

Tanner beseeches me, an expression unlike the usual condescending, cocky one I’d grown to know, and hate.

“Five minutes. That’s all I’m asking. We can sit at the bar over there.” He points unnecessarily, then turns to Ciaran. “You can see her from your table.”

Ciaran doesn’t seem at all reassured by Tanner’s suggestion. He widens his stance, his chest thrust forward, arms crossed in front of him, and he shifts a little to the side, partly blocking my view of my husband. My knees weaken when I realize what he’s doing. He’s protecting me. A fluttering sets off in my chest, but this is my mess, and it’s up to me to fix it.

“Five minutes,” I say.

Ciaran’s head swivels so fast, I half expect him to reenact a scene from the Exorcist.

“You don’t have to speak to this clown.”

Sweeping a hand down his arm and ending at his fingers, I squeeze. “I know.” I move my mouth to his ear so only he can hear. “I need to finish this once and for all, especially now.”

I stride past Tanner toward the bar. When he doesn’t follow, I toss a throwaway, “Clock is ticking,” comment over my shoulder. I’m proud of myself. I’ve never talked back to Tanner before. No doubt Ciaran has a lot to do with my reclaimed sass. I owe that man an orgasm, as well as my eternal gratitude, for the amazing job he’s doing to rebuild my self-confidence. His belief in me has given me strength, and in turn, has loosened Tanner’s hold over me. He doesn’t terrify me anymore.

I pull out a chair at the bar and sit. Tanner joins me a few seconds later, looking a little stunned, as though he isn’t sure what’s happened to the downtrodden wife he pushed around for the better part of a decade. When we spoke in Central Park, I’d still been under his influence, to a certain degree, so I’d let him do most of the talking. But after the last week, and especially this weekend, everything has changed, because now I’m with Ciaran.

The bartender heads our way, but I gesture to show him we’re not ordering. Tanner won’t be here long enough.

Crossing my arms beneath my chest, I give him a cold stare. “What do you want?”

“I want you back.”

I sigh. So repetitive. “We’ve had this conversation.”

“I can change. I will change. I’ll do it for you.”

I almost feel sorry for him. Almost. Except Tanner is an expert at fooling people, apart from my parents. He’d never been able to pull the wool over their eyes, hence his successful campaign to estrange me from them. But everyone else—his friends, the young players he worked with, the coach of the football team—all think he’s the perfect husband, and that we have the perfect marriage.

“You had ten years to change, Tanner.”

He reaches for me, but I lean back.

“And you could have told me you were leaving,” he says, an undercurrent leaking into his tone. “But we all make mistakes.”

My eyes widen. “Mistakes? You call systematically trying to destroy me since I was eighteen a mistake?”

He huffs, his conciliatory mask slipping. “I can only apologize so many times. How long do you think you can punish me?”

Tired of the same conversation, I swipe a hand over my face. We’re getting nowhere fast. A thought comes to me. The earlier sense of unease at bowling, the prickling sensation I felt before I’d seen Tanner making his way over to our table, and something Ciaran said when Tanner first turned up after I’d met my parents for coffee.

“Have you been following me? Were you at the bowling alley?”

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