Page 29 of Fall

“Is it because of our kisses? I don’t want you to think you owe me anything. I get that you don’t want to be with me, but please don’t help me out of guilt. I plan to move out as soon as I can–”

“Stop,” he tells me, shifting on the bed so he can look at me, his eyes daring me to look away. “All I’ve wanted since our last kiss is to kiss you again. Every damn time I look at you. I haven’t stopped thinking about it, about you. I don’t want you to move out, but there is a month until my last fight.”

“When is the fight exactly? The date?” I ask, wondering if I can get him to tell me now, but at least I know it’s in a month, which isn’t long at all. Izzy said it was weird none of them had been fighting in the last few months. She said none of them would talk about it, and that’s suspicious enough. This fight must be something else.

“One last fight, and my family will be free. I just need to win it,” Harley says, but it is so quiet I’m sure he’s just talking to himself and not to me.

“Is that why you’re always working out?” I ask him.

“Maybe I just like to work out,” he suggests, but he doesn’t look at me as he says it.

“Who is this fight against?” I ask him.

“It doesn’t matter,” he says.

“Why doesn’t it? You told me you have never lost a fight, so you won’t lose this one,” I say, hope filling me that he may finally be free of his past. That he may eventually have a future.

“I might,” he says, the words causing me to go silent as I look at him, staring down at my daughter in his arms.

“No,” I reply quietly, and Harley doesn’t say a word.

Chapter Fifteen

Harley

“Why don’t you go and take her into the lounge, and I will get the bags?” I tell Tilly, who looks up at me with tired eyes.

I’m glad she is finally out of the hospital and is home again. The new baby has been struggling to sleep with the noise of the hospital ward, and I’ve been by her side, trying to help. She still hasn’t chosen a name for the beautiful baby she is holding, but we have all taken to calling her ‘baby girl’ for now. I know it’s difficult with a new baby, just from helping Maisy and Sebastian with Jake.

“Okay.” She nods, walking off, and I open the door to go and get her maternity bags out of the car.

I stop in my tracks when I see a man and an older woman standing at the door. The man is a little younger than me, with dark-brown hair and a serious expression. The woman has long, red hair up in a ponytail, and she must be in her late forties as her roots are going grey. When she looks up at me, I know who she is straight away from her eyes.

“You’re Tilly’s mum?” I ask, and she nods, putting her hands on her hips.

“Where is my bloody runaway daughter?” she asks.

“Tilly!” the man shouts, looking like he wants to try to push me out of the way, but that’s not happening until I know who he is. If this is Tilly’s ex, I’m going to kill him for turning up here, and I’m sure he can tell my thoughts from the strange expression he gives me.

“Devon?” I hear Tilly ask from behind me.

I move slightly so Devon can walk into the house, and he hugs Tilly. I look behind her to see the lounge door open, and I know Tilly must have put the baby in the Moses basket for a nap.

“Don’t you dare run off on us like that again. It took me ages to find you, sis,” he says, and she moves away. I watch as Tilly and her mum stare at each other for a long time before Tilly walks over and hugs her mum.

“I don’t believe a word you said over the phone, not a word, Matilda,” she scolds her daughter, and I finally learn her real name.

“Don’t call me that. Jesus, it’s Tilly,” Tilly says, rolling her eyes and making her brother laugh.

“We need to talk, and you have some explaining to do,” her mother says, and Tilly sighs. I walk over, placing my arm on her shoulder. She doesn’t stop me.

“I’m Harley King.” I offer a hand to Tilly’s mum, who shakes it firmly.

“Linda Fox.”

“I’m Devon Fox. Are you dating my sister?” Devon asks, walking over.

Something about his name sounds familiar. I remember Izzy telling me she dated one of Tilly’s brothers before we met her.

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