Page 69 of More Than I Can Bear

“Let me know where you are first, and I’ll tell you whatever you like,” I replied. “I’m coming to pick you up.”

“In the gutter.” That sigh seemed to come from the depths of his soul. “Where I belong.”

“Stop feeling sorry for yourself,” I said, trying to hold back the bite in my voice and only partially managing it. “Adam, where are you? What pub?”

“The one with all the noise,” he said, forcing me to sigh.

I pulled away from my phone and then navigated over to the Find My iPhone app and then found my brother’s location.

“Adam, can you stay where you are, mate?” I asked him. “Don’t move, just stay right there and I’ll come get you. Stay right where you are.”

“Stay here.” He sounded drowsy and drunk. “Got it.”

I kept my brother on speaker phone as I drove to one of the suburban pubs. Jack and I hadn’t wanted to chance him running wild in the city, so we’d approved a more low-key establishment. But that meant I had to drive as fast as I dared to find him. I tried to keep him on the line talking, bringing up stupid shit from the past, just to hear his voice, but when I pulled up to the curb, I could see it hadn’t really worked. He was slumped over, head hanging between his knees, his phone on the road between his feet.

“Adam?”

“Still here…” he mumbled at the phone.

“No, Adam. Look up.” My brother was broken, I saw that in the dead stare of his eyes, even beyond the haze of inebriation. “Let’s get you home, mate,” I said.

“Home?”

The little boy who’d followed me fucking everywhere, daring to try all the shit the big kids were doing despite his age and small stature, he was here now, not the big, boofy football player.

“Home, mate,” I said, holding out a hand and not letting it fall until I had him in my grip, standing beside me. I had to grab him, the dickhead was swaying on his feet, but I had him. I always had him.

But I didn’t take him back to the place River and I shared with him, but to the home where that little boy had lived.

“This is a bad business,” one of my dads said, meeting me in the garage of the family home. “Look at your brother, Kaine.”

“I know, Dad,” I replied. “I picked him up out of the gutter.”

“Out of the gutter?” We both hissed as Mum came rushing out, taking the two of us in before going to Adam’s side. “What the hell has been going on? I know he did the wrong thing, but, seriously, Kaine!”

Of course, whatever happened to Adam was somehow my fault, just like when we were kids. I weathered Mum’s scowl, folding my arms across my chest.

“Adam is making amends,” I told her. “Jack and I—”

“Not like this.” She looked Adam up and down with concern, then was pulling his hair back when he made a gagging sound. “I know he messed up, but it’d be better for this girl to reject him outright—”

“Now, Toni…” Dad said.

“At least he’d know,” Mum said. “Not like this.” She turned to me. “There’s no guarantee this will even work to make a difference with Freya; that it’ll make up for what he’s done.”

“There never is a guarantee,” I replied, keeping my tone even. “You know that. Everything my dads did to get you to accept them, they had no idea if you’d choose them or not.”

“He’s right, love.” Dad reached over to push a lock of Mum’s hair behind her ear, but she shook him off.

“But this is different—” she spluttered.

“Because it’s your boy’s heart on the line,” Dad observed, then shot me a shrewd look. “Your boys’ hearts. So, what do you think, Kaine?”

My dads had been doing this, asking my opinion like I was an adult, before I’d even left school. I’d always felt both proud and oppressed by that honour. But now? It felt like I had three, no make that eight very different people to keep happy—my dads, my mum, Adam, River and Freya—and I had no clue how I was supposed to achieve all of that.

“Jack and I came up with this plan for a reason,” I told them. “And I think it’s still worth pursuing…” But whatever case I was trying to make, it was abruptly cut off as Adam staggered out of the garage to vomit in Mum’s rose bushes. “Just not exactly like this. We need to come to a decision. See if Freya’s open to even talking to Adam or whether she’s not…”

They both sucked in a breath, knowing what I meant. If she was to reject him outright. It’d put him out of his immediate misery. But long term? I frowned then, my mind starting to race at the possibilities, even as my mother stepped in to voice the fears that lurked in my heart.

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