Page 15 of Promise Me This

Something like a warning flashes in her wide blue eyes. “That’s not fair.”

“You know what’s not fair?” I growl, jamming a finger in her direction. “Thinking you’ve met your soulmate just for them to drop off the face of the earth without so much as a ‘fuck you, see you never.’ Next thing you know, that soulmate is getting married, and you realize they probably just moved on and didn’t have the courtesy to let you down easily. That’s not fair.”

Her head shakes nearly imperceptibly. “That’s not what happened.”

“What did then?” I demand.

Every atom in my body quivers with anticipation, with hope. Hope that I’ll finally get some semblance of closure. That I’ll be able to walk away from this moment with that angry gash from my past at least stitched up, if not entirely healed. But she falters. Her mouth—with those perfect pale rose-colored lips of hers—parts just to shut again. And I’m once again reminded that I’ll never get the truth.

Her hands come unclenched, instead moving to cradle her abdomen. Odd, that. She’s folding in on herself, and this ache to hold her expands rapidly through my veins until I know I need to retreat lest I find my arms reaching for her of their own volition.

I scoff at her silence and turn to leave, to find my daughter and go home, when I find the words for the warning I have to give. I may not be able to protect myself from these feelings resurfacing, but I can protect Niamh. I have to.

“Just don’t do this thing”—I wave a hand toward the desk chair where Niamh was sitting, and Leo’s gaze flickers in that direction, something like grief flashing across her face—“with Niamh. Don’t encourage her. She’s had enough disappointment in her life.”

Before she can respond, if she even wants to, I stalk out of the room and down the stairs to find Niamh sitting on the bottom step with my mother, the both of them suddenly busying themselves with studying a banister.

“See, it’s loose!” Mam says while attempting to wiggle the immovable wooden rod.

“We’re leaving,” I say, ignoring her while scooping Niamh into my arms in a way I haven’t since she was smaller. With every year that passes, she careens closer to wanting complete independence, while I struggle to find my footing in a world where she doesn’t need me for every little thing. As if she senses that I need this, though, she doesn’t object to being held. She simply lays her head against my chest and lets herself be carried to the car.

Once home, I go through the motions of dinner and the bedtime routine on autopilot, all the while floating somewhere outside my body. Leo’s words—or lack thereof—have left me unmoored. When Niamh finally drifts off to sleep, I strip out of the slacks and button-down that my uncle insists are necessary even from my home office and don a T-shirt, gym shorts, and the worn pair of Adidas tucked into the bottom cubby of my wardrobe.

I flick the light on in the garage, the slightly damp scent of the space filling my nostrils. Two neon-green kayaks are mounted on the far wall, with waterproof coats and wet suits strung up on the racks to their right. A small lawn mower sits in the closest corner to my left alongside the limited assortment of gardening tools left over from long-ago summers when my mother would come here with her parents and plant flowers in the garden that I now maintain.

In the opposite corner, a barbell and several plates sit haphazardly arranged in my excuse for a home gym. On good weather days—or hours, for that matter—I can go for runs along the rolling hills to get my heart pumping blood through my desk-weary veins. But some days the rain doesn’t let up or the night finds me unable to sleep, and I resort to lifting weights in the perpetually damp sanctuary of my garage.

After a few stretches and warm-up sets with just the barbell, I load a plate on either side and force my now-loose muscles to deadlift the weight. The burn that courses down my back and up the length of my thighs gives the unspent anger somewhere to go. It anchors me in my body. It empties me of thoughts of a brown-haired, blue-eyed woman that I can’t figure out how not to want—or hate.

I add another plate on each side and repeat the motions. Beads of sweat pool along my brow and run down my spine. My breath grows ragged, but I force myself through the desire to stop, to lie down, to wallow in these feelings that are resurfacing with a vengeance.

The first mistake I make is not listening to my body as it screams for rest. The second is adding yet another plate to each side. On my best day, this kind of weight is a personal record for me. Today is not my best day.

Pain shoots down my leg, and I falter, dropping the weight with a clang that’s nearly loud enough to wake Niamh clear across the house. I limp backward and collapse onto the stool in the corner while what feels like lightning strikes shoot from my right hip all the way to my toes. I glare at the barbell as though it’s to blame for my stupidity, before hobbling back into the house and all the way to my shower, which I make as hot as possible.

When I finally collapse into my bed, too tired and wrecked to even clothe myself, I focus on the feel of the sheets against my skin. On the shadows dancing across the ceiling.

I don’t allow myself to think of Leo. I certainly don’t let myself wish she were here.

But in my dreams, she is.

Chapter Seven

Leona

It takes no time at all for Siobhan and me to fall into an easy rhythm. Despite my fear that her son’s resentment will somehow leak into her feelings toward me, she remains steadfast and positive as I get my footing under me. Though I suppose I would, too, if someone suddenly took all the toilet cleaning off my to-do list.

Each morning she writes the day’s arrivals in the guest book on the console table in the foyer. I watch from my window until Callum has driven off, and then I make my way downstairs to check which rooms need cleaning. By that time the beautiful breakfast spread Siobhan prepares each morning has been thoroughly picked over by guests heading out early to continue on their road trips along the Wild Atlantic Way.

My stomach growls its disapproval as I gather my cleaning supplies.

The work is not glamorous by any means, but it’s simple and quiets my brain in a way that I start to crave in the hours after everything is finished. There are never enough rooms for all the thoughts I want to escape.

Which is why I find myself tiptoeing downstairs after all the guests have gone to bed, carrying a handful of rags and a bottle of furniture polish that I found buried in the back of the supply closet.

The midweek slump—as Siobhan calls it—is in full effect, meaning there were only two guests to prepare a room for today. Even after providing stay-over service to our other guests, I found myself with nothing to do come four o’clock. Which is unfortunate, because after last night’s warning from Callum, I needed the distraction more than ever.

Add in a lonely dinner eaten in my room and a lot of fruitless sulking until the light faded from the sky, and it’s no wonder I’m resorting to my late-night cleaning habits.

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