Page 76 of Accidental Groom
I nod once. No words, just confirmation, and Harry surges forward. Fury brews like a storm behind his eyes as he heads straight past me, toward George. I lunge and grab his sleeve. “Don’t.”
“You can’t be serious?—”
“I mean it.Please.”
He stops, his muscles taut like rope. “What happened?”
“He invaded my space,” I say softly, trying not to make the situation worse. “He pushed me into the wall. I handled it.”
“He could’ve hurt the baby,” he growls, his jaw ticking.
“But he didn’t, Harry.”
“I should drag him out by his collar. I should?—”
“Please,” I say, gripping his arm harder. “He’s drunk. He’s angry. He’ll just run again, you know that. If you do anything else, he’ll just be angrier at me.”
“He’s not a child.”
“I know,” I swallow. “But he’s still your son.”
He presses the heels of his hands to his eyes, trying to calm himself down, trying to push back some of the anger. I can’t help but worry just how much of that he heard — if he’d heard my admission or just the resulting commotion and shouting.
“How much did you hear?” I ask hesitantly, watching him warily.
He doesn’t lower his hands to look at me. He’s still shaking, still brimming with fury, trying to breathe. “Just voices,” he mutters. “Raised voices. Heard it was you and came running.”
My stomach knots. Part of me is glad he didn’t hear it, glad that my confession isn’t clouding his judgment and anger. The way I said it, unguarded and burning, isn’t how I want him toknow — especially not in the middle of a nightmare, not when his drunk kid just tried to attack his wife, not when his song is bleeding and the air feels thick with ghosts.
So I don’t repeat it. Not right now.
Chapter 26
Harry
There’s something uncomfortably nostalgic about the helicopter rotors cutting through this patch of sky, with these lakes and mountains beneath me. It forces me back into a time when I used to plan these weekends just to make my son smile.
Back then, it was about early mornings and freezing fingers, George swearing under his breath when he thought I wasn’t listening as he tried to tie a fly just right. Geraldine would pack us both thermoses, mine for coffee and George’s for hot chocolate, and she’d watch from the front porch as we boarded the helicopter, hand raised in that languid, gleeful wave of hers. She always looked like she belonged in a painting. Even when she was dying.
George sits beside me in the cabin of the helicopter, his legs stretched out, his hands shoved into his jacket pockets. His sunglasses are perched high on his bandaged nose, hiding his gaze from me even as he faces the window, and I can smell alcohol clinging to his clothes even with the wind whipping through the space.
He didn’t say a word when the chopper landed at Highcourt Hall this morning. I’d told him to pack a bag and get in, and he’dfollowed the instruction, walking out with his jaw set like this was a court-ordered retreat and not a peace offering.
I don’t know what I expected.
Maybe I thought the sight of the water would soften him, or that I could hit the nostalgia button until I could pull him back to the version I used to know. But when we land, it’s a different story.
“Can’t believe you dragged me here,” he mutters, and heads off toward the lodge without waiting for me.
There’s no thank you. There’s nothing except a single request: separate rooms, which is fine by me. The staff at the private lodge know better than to ask questions anyway, so when I request it from the front desk, a simple nod is given back to me from the host and they lead us to our suite. It’s rustic, over-decorated, with lines of antlers on the walls and the faux scent of tobacco and musk hanging in the air like someone lit a strange candle.
Geraldine used to hate these kinds of places.I don’t need a beaver pelt on my pillow to enjoy nature,she’d once said when I’d asked her to come with us one weekend. Her nose had wrinkled, scrunching up her whole face.Just give me trees and leave me alone.
I change into waders and a fleece-lined vest. It’s chillier here by the river, the late autumn wind nipping through the trees and setting my hair on end. I pull on a jacket as I watch the water, the sun hanging over it and sparkling like glass beneath the mountains. For a moment, just one, I remember why I used to love coming out here with George.
It’s not the quiet. It’s not the solitude. It’s the simplicity, the ritual of it.
I’m halfway through tying the first fly when George finally shows. He’s still wearing his sunglasses, and he’s wearing the wrong kind of boots. The jacket he’s got on is likely worth morethan the rod I handed him two years ago for his birthday. I’m fairly certain he never even opened it.
