Page 105 of Hold On

“It was a disaster I hadn’t seen coming, but then do we ever? Trouble sits unseen on our shoulders all the time. Mostly, even when it digs in its claws, it doesn’t knock us off our feet. How many times do we miss getting hit by a car, or a falling rock, or avoid a knife in the stomach when some murderous guy bypasses us and chooses another victim. Disaster is always waiting to happen and most of the time we’re lucky and it misses us. It didn’t miss me.” It hadn’t missed Ren.

“You were in Marsden.”

So Will had said something. Unless someone had rushed onto Google and checked Dominic out.

“I was…a bad person.” Not now, not then, but what he’d done had defined him whether he liked it not.

“Were you? Or were you someone who did a terrible thing when they were mentally unbalanced? No one is all bad. Ren sees something in you that appeals to him. He’s always had a kind heart. He was the one who’d try to help baby birds who’d fallen from the nest, not his brother. Do you regret any of what you did?”

Dominic’s mouth was dry. “I regret not finding a way sooner to end what was happening to me. I don’t regret protecting my brother. I’m not sorry our parents are dead, though I wish I hadn’t felt I had to kill them. But there’s no point wishing things were different, regretting what I did, mourning those lost years. That can’t be changed. All that matters is how I tackle the future.”

“With my grandson.”

“I’ve tried to walk away from him. I’ve tried to do the right thing.”

“Maybe walking away isn’t the right thing. What are you looking for? What do you want from life?”

“For no one to be hurt because of me.”

“But what do you want for yourself?”

“To hold on to what makes me happy. To let go of what makes me sad. I want peace.”

“Where do you think you’re going to find that?”

“I’ll make it myself. Everywhere I am. Peace isn’t a place where there’s no noise or trouble. It’s where I don’t notice those things, where nothing matters to me or those I’m close to, not even what I did when I was fifteen.”

“Do you think you’ll ever find it?”

“I know that I’ll always keep trying.”

Ren came running over and Dominic stood up.

“I won.” Ren wrapped his arms around him and kissed him.

“He always does,” Edward said. “He’s very determined.”

Dominic was glad when Ren decided they’d leave after the cutting of the cake. It was hard not to think that people were looking at him and judging him. Maybe no one else knew but he’d had enough today.

The three-tier cake was covered in mathematical formulae and Eliso gave them slices to eat on the train, along with a bottle of champagne.

“Come again soon.” She kissed Dominic on the cheek.

Maybe shedidn’tknow.

Eliso went to the front of the house with them when the Uber was close.

“Precious boys,” she said quietly. “Look after each other.”

Ren hugged her.

“The past doesn’t matter,” she said. “Make your own future.”

Maybe shedidknow.

Chapter Fifteen

Ren woke with a jolt, then exhaled when he saw Dominic in bed beside him.

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