Page 165 of An Unholy Affair
She reached for his hand. ‘Did Estelle tell you?’
‘Tell me what?’
‘That I was ill.’
His face tightened. ‘I was there. You called me about five minutes after we…’
‘Dad said Estelle called him.’
He looked completely wrung out. ‘She did. I didn’t have the passcode for your phone.’
‘Jack, I’m so sorry.’
‘What—’
She squeezed his hand. ‘For not taking better care of myself and not accepting help more readily. For ignoring your concerns, and for making you and everyone else worry so much.’
Jack briefly closed his eyes, then fixed her with a look that stopped her heart.
‘Eveline. I’m the one who’s sorry. For everything I said to you last night. I’ve been in a really bad place, and when… When you met Antoinette, something inside me snapped. I spoke without thinking where my words were coming from… After you left, I spoke to Kieran, and—’
‘KieranMitchell?’
He nodded.
‘I don’t understand… You only met him, what… once?’
Jack’s thumb moved over the back of her hand. ‘I did a “you”…’
‘A “me”?’
‘I was walking back from Foxbrooke Haven after Si—after a certainsomeonetried to get me kicked out, and asked God to give me a sign. Two seconds later, a woman dropped her car keys as she entered the Baptist Chapel and didn’t notice. I picked them up and followed her inside to find Kieran about to start an AA meeting.’
Eveline’s eyes filled with tears.Thank you, God, thank you.
‘Please don’t cry, angel!’ He passed her the box of tissues.
‘I’m happy, not sad.’
‘I wasn’t ready to tell you. It just felt like another way I’d failed.’
‘No! That’s the opposite of failure! It takes bravery and humility to take that step. I’m so proud of you.’
He shrugged, as if to brush off her compliment. ‘Kieran said that it wasn’t my place to make decisions about what you wanted.’
Her heart beat faster.
‘And the reason I said we… we couldn’t be together, was because it was safer to live without love than to open myself up to it.’
She nodded.
‘Kieran said I should stop punishing myself for the way my dad treated me, and what I did for a job. And allow myself to be happy.’
‘Would you be happy with me?’ she whispered.
He lifted her hand and brushed his lips over her knuckles. A shiver ran down her arm.
‘So much it terrifies me,’ he said, his voice tentative. ‘The moment your eyes met mine in that bar, it was like a lightning bolt tore through me, cracking my world apart. I fell in love with you then, but didn’t want to name the feelings. From that night, you just became this constant presence in my life, behind all my thoughts and dreams. But I never thought I would ever see you again.’
