Page 88 of Swim To Me

But I don’t want to hide in plain sight.Delilahdoesn’t deserve to be hidden away, and I’m too selfish to let her go.

Something’s got to give. I’ve got to make a decision; notifto tell Delilah, butwhen.

I thought I’d have a bit more time to plan how I was going to say it, how I was going to break the truth to her without breaking her trust…

But apparently not.

Chapter 22

Grey

“I’m cooking for Delilah tonight,” I say to Hudson over my morning cup of coffee and his flavoured protein shake.

“Here?”

“Yep.”

“Do you need me to make myself scarce, or…”

“It’s up to you.”

I don’t exactly want to tell my brother to make himself disappear from what is now his home too, but Delilah and I haven’t discussed meeting the family yet, so I don’t know if she’ll be expecting my younger brother to be sitting down on our date with us.

I’m heading towards her answer being no.

Hudson unlocks his phone, already typing out a message. “I’ll see if August’s around…”

“Appreciate it.” Taking my mug to the sink, I rinse it out, giving my brother my back so I can’t see his reaction to my next bombshell. “I think I’m going to have to tell Delilah about the whole swimming thing?”

“The swimming thing? Oh–you mean being Grey Millen?”

I chance a peek over my shoulder to find Hudson’s face purposefully blank. “Yeah… being Grey Millen.”

“I thought you weren’t going to mention it yet?”

“I wasn’t,” I say, and then instantly feel like a dickhead. I never meant to lie to Delilah… just omit the truth for a while. I know that’s bad enough in itself, but I had my reasons…

“So, what’s changed?” Hudson asks.

“I got spotted yesterday.”

I run through the interaction with my brother, watching him begin to nod his head slowly.

“Yeah…” He grimaces. “If you really see this going somewhere you’re going to have to tell her.”

A tidal wave of nerves I haven’t felt since I walked through the swim tunnel, heading for my last competition, surges through me.

“Do you think she’ll take it badly?”

“It won’t be good,” I admit, sensing it deep down in the pit of my stomach. “Would you react well if you spilled your guts to the person you’d been seeing… sleeping with… kissing… only to find out they’d been keeping a lie from you? The exact kind of lie, which is the reason you broke up with your ex in the first place?”

“Yeah…” Hudson kisses his teeth. “I wouldn’t be too happy.”

“Me neither.”

“How are you planning on breaking it to her?”

“I’m thinking we’ll have dinner and then I’ll tell her before it gets too far.”

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