Page 20 of That Reunited Feeling

She blows out a long breath, indicating exactly what she thinks of that.

“Okay, well, at least take a seat and enjoy your drink while I sort out all this.” I wave my glass at the array of Tupperware containers, suggesting it’ll be a big job—one long enough to get her to think better of me. I do not want to wake up to another day of having to tiptoe around the house avoiding her.

Remarkably, she takes a seat, then places her glass on the counter, staring at it as she turns the base in circles.

I return to the task of doling out Maggie’s feast. “I keep hearing you singing all the time. Are you still in bands?”

“Nope.”

“No?” I glance over my shoulder. “What a waste of your voice. How come?”

“Why do you think?”

Oh, good. We’re back to the snippy tone.

I turn to face her, a plate of meat and cheese resting on the palm of one hand. “I don’t know, Hannah. I truly don’t. But I would like to know. I genuinely would.”

I put the plate on the counter, step toward the island and lean on the edge. I might not be touching her, but I’m touchingthe same thing she’s touching and that’s probably the closest to a connection I can hope for right now. “I get that I hurt you. And I’m so very sorry. I can’t turn back the clock and not be a wanky sixteen-year-old. But I wish I could make it up to you.”

“You can’t.” Keeping her head bent over the wine glass, she moves just her eyes, raising her gaze until she’s looking at me under her knitted brow. “That time’s all gone. It’s lost.”

I clasp my hands against the cold marble and drop my forehead onto them.

Christ, how is it possible to have caused someone so much hurt and been so unaware? So stupid, so selfish, so ignorant, so fucking unaware.

When I decided to stay in London, I’d thought I was leaving behind my own pain at my parents’ death and the pain I’d caused Maggie and Jim by behaving like a total twat after they’d been generous enough to open their hearts and home to Walker and me. I never thought for a second I might have left a whole other bunch of pain behind in Hannah.

“I had to stop being in bands when I had Dylan,” she says quietly.

I raise my head and rest my chin on my hands. “What?”

“That’s why I’m not in bands anymore. I had Dylan. And I had to look after him. Alone.”

I push myself back upright. “Why alone?”

“Because his shithead of a father vanished when Dylan was six weeks old. And my parents had already stopped speaking to me because they were ashamed.” Her blue eyes, shiny with emotion, meet mine. “You know what they were like.”

Jesus. What total fucking bastards. “I do. And I wondered about that the second I knew about Dylan.”

Her parents were dicks. Controlling, all about appearances, her mom constantly trying to impress by having lunch with thismayor or that congressman’s wife, her dad constantly vying for a seat on the city council, but never quite winning.

My heart aches for her—cast aside by an arsehole guy and her parents. Alone with a baby. And I had no idea.

Drawn by instinct to protect her, to ease her suffering, I slowly make my way around the island, dragging my hand along the edge.

“Dylan’s thirteen, right?”

She takes a sip of her wine and nods.

“So you had him when you were twenty.”

“Hey.” She looks up at me as I get closer, a hint of a wry smile on her delicate, sad face. “And you used to be so bad at math.”

I reach her side. My hand is just inches from where she puts down her glass. “I sometimes have to use spreadsheets now.”

“Who’d have thought it, huh?” She makes a microturn toward me in her seat. “Rebellious Tom, with the guitar-playing, and the pierced ears, and the hair, running a billion-dollar company.”

“Not me, that’s for sure.” I rest my backside against the counter. As I look down at her, my heart pumps a wave of hot blood through my veins. “Nor anyone else who knew me.”

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