Conquering Conner (The Gilroy Clan Book 4)

by Megyn Ward

  Nothing good can come of you being here.

  Nothing has changed.

  She isn’t going to stay.

  My backpack is sitting on her dresser. The one I gave her when we were kids. The one she refused to carry because it has my name on it.

  She’s carrying it now.

  I don’t want that to matter.

  Can’t really afford to.

  Behind me, she shifts across the bed, moving closer to me. I’ve got my back to her, but I know she’s waking up. Her breathing pattern changes. She’s realized I’m not in bed with her anymore.

  I know she sees me sitting here.

  Trying to make myself leave.

  “I didn’t.”

  “You didn’t what?” she says it softly, like she’s afraid she’ll spook me.

  “Fuck Kaitlyn. Ever.” I rub a hand over my face, the sound of my palm rasping over my three-day beard. “We’ve had coffee five times. She’s come to the library to hang out with me twice.” I don’t tell her that I broke things off. That they ended the second I saw her again.

  “Are you happy?”

  “No.” I answer her honestly. “But I’m trying to be. I want to be.”

  She sighs softly. “I want you to be.”

  Then stay with me.

  It’s what I want to say but I can’t. I’ve asked her too many times to be considered healthy, so I say the only other thing I can.

  “That night you came to my parents’ house—I was reviewing Jeremy’s trust fund. All it says is that he has to be married by the time he’s thirty—not that he has to be married to a woman. The provisions were written in 1995—I doubt his ultra-conservative, homophobic parents even considered for a moment that same sex marriage would be legalized in the state of New York, where the trust was written, or that could produce a gay son.”

  I look at her. She’s sitting up in bed, sheets pooled around her waist, Bradford’s diamond weighing her down like cement. It would be so easy for me to say yes.

  Yes. marry Bradford.

  Yes, I’ll wait for you.

  Yes.

  I regretted not saying it the moment I realized she was gone. The second I realized I lost her again.

  I want to say yes, but I don’t.

  I can’t. Not if I want a chance at being the kind of make she needs me to be.

  The kind of man that deserves her.

  “I needed you to know that you don’t have to marry Bradford to save his trust fund, if that’s what this is really about.”

  “The money was for my mother.” She chews on her bottom lip for a moment, choosing her words carefully. “It was never for me. I thought… I thought maybe if I gave it to her, I could finally be free of her.”

  For some reason I think of those documentaries about animals raised in cages their entire lives. When their cage doors are finally open they don’t even recognize it for what it is.

  Freedom.

  “I love you.” I shrug, shaking my head slowly. “I’ll never stop… but I have to move on, Henley, I have to try, and you have to let me.”

  Sixty-eight

  Henley

  I don’t see Conner again.

  Even though I knew I wouldn’t, it didn’t stop me from hoping.

  I see Kaitlyn every day. She’s a nurse at Sojourn, which explains how she and Conner became involved. She’s never anything but kind to me. Smiles at me when I walk in to see Ryan in the morning, waves goodbye to me when I leave after Ryan’s therapist comes to take him for his session in the afternoon. Even though she knows who I am, she’s nice but I guess she can afford to be.

  She’s the one who gets to have coffee with Conner. Gets to hand him screwdrivers and laugh at his jokes.

  Ryan tells me to leave every morning. Tells me he doesn’t want me here. I tell him if he wants me to leave, he’s going to have to get up and physically throw me out.

  That usually shuts him up.

  Finally, on my last day here, he breaks. “She fucked us up, pretty good, didn’t she, Hen?”

  I nod slowly, pretending to study the checker board between us when what I’m really doing is trying to close the gaping wound he just cleaved into my chest. “I don’t think she wanted us to know how to love people. What it felt like to have people love us back.” I push one of my checker pieces across the board. “I think she knew we’d be stronger if we did.” I look up from the board to find him looking at me. “But we don’t have to let her win.”

  He looks out the window. Something he does when things get to be too much for him. When we were kids, he’d just leave. Stay gone. Avoid the mess. Leave me to deal with it. Not because he didn’t care but because he didn’t know how.

  Yeah. She fucked us up pretty good.

  “I love you, Ryan.”

  I watch his throat work, bobbing against the torrent of emotion that seems to be drowning him.

  Finally, he turns and looks at me, his mouth open, on the verge of saying something when an orderly comes in to take him to his therapy session. Whatever he was about to say, it’s too late.

  Time for me to go.

  I find the place on my own and when I walk in, the only person who pays me any attention is the bartender. Same guy as before and when he sees me, he automatically looks toward the door like he’s waiting for Conner to follow me through it. When he doesn’t, the bartender’s relief is palpable. Jerking his chin at a corner booth, he goes back to ignoring his customers.

  That’s where I find him, sleeping it off, his head wedged into the corner of where the back of the booth meets the wall. Tipped back, mouth open.

  Sliding into the booth across from him, I watch him sleep for a moment. Try to remember the steps. What it was like to live with a drunk. It comes back way too easily.

  “Dad.” The word snags on the back of my throat and I clear it. “Dad, I need you to wake up.”

  I ain’t your dad, Henley Rose. I never was.

  “Jack.” It feels wrong calling him that. Disrespectful somehow. “Wake up, Jack.” Reaching across the table, I give his shoulder a rough shake before pulling back quickly.

  As soon as I make contact, he jerks awake, head snapping up with a start to stare at me with wide, panicked eyes. That’s when I realize I look nothing like him. I always thought we had the same chin. Maybe the same eye-shape, but we don’t. I don’t look like my mother either. She’s naturally beautiful. Perfectly-shaped nose. Full mouth. Flawless skin. Ryan is the perfect blend of Jack and Lydia O’Connell, but not me. I don’t look like anyone.

  “What are you doing here?” He slumps back in his seat, like the bartender, he looks around for Conner, seems confused when he doesn’t magically appear. “Where’s the kid?” Thankfully, he seems mostly sober.

  “I came alone.” I press my hands flat on the table between us. “I need to tell you something.”

  “Is this about last time?” He scowls at me. “I know it was—”

  “I forgive you.” I cut him off because I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want him to pretend to be concerned. To care. I just want to say what I need to say and get out. “I forgive you, Dad.” I call him dad because good or bad, that’s what he was. He’s the only father I knew for a very long time.

  He just sits there and looks at me, like he can’t figure out why I’m here. Why I keep showing up, uninvited. Unwanted.

  “I—” I clear my throat and nod, starting to scoot my way across the bench seat. “Okay—well, I just wanted you to know that. I’ll leave—”

  “I was a shit father. To both of you.” His words pin me down. Freeze me in place. “Never gave you what you needed. Was never there for you. Drunk all the time. Let your mom…” I hear the rasp of his hand, passing over his face. “I was glad when she took you. Not because I don’t love you, but because I wanted more for you than a lifetime of cleanin’ up after some drunk old man.” He smiles at me, pats the back of my hand. “You and Ryan… you turned out good. Better than you had a right to.” His smile fades, his j
aundiced gaze finding mine. “I know that ain’t because of me, but I’m proud just the same.”

  I sit here, stunned for a moment before I know what to do. Sliding out of the booth I lean over the table and kiss his cheek. “Bye, Dad.” I give his hand one last squeeze before I let him go

  Sixty-nine

  Conner

  It’s been a shitty fuckin’ week and I’ve been a raging dick, ever since I left Henley’s apartment. Because doing the right thing sucks balls. It hurts like a bitch and I’m content to make everyone suffer with me.

  She’s called me every day, letting me know when she’s going to be at the center to visit Ryan, so I can avoid running into her.

  I never answer but I listen to every one of her messages. I don’t really care when she goes to see her brother, how long she’s going to be there. If they played checkers or Crazy Eights. I listen to her messages, so I can hear her voice.

  Today is going to be my last visit for a while. I’m leaving this evening. I’ll call Patrick or Declan and let them know when I can plan another trip… thank you for taking care of him. Goodbye, Conner.

  I gave her an out.

  Opened the door to her cage.

  That’s all I can do.

  I can give her wings, but I can’t make her fly.

  Can’t make her choose me.

  Like I said, it sucks balls.

  “I’m looking for the owner?”

  I pop my head up, looking around the hood of the car I’m working on to find an older man, probably in his sixties or so. Gray hair. Broad, friendly face. A suit even fancier than the ones Cap’n likes to wear. I’ve seen his face before. I know who he is, and my stomach does a hard flip. “That’s me.” I step out from the front of the car, pulling a shop rag from the back pocket of my jeans to wipe down my hands in case he wants to shake hands, although I can’t imagine that a man like him would stoop low enough to exchange pleasantries with a dirty mechanic like me. “What can I do for you?” I automatically look past him, looking for the car that brought him. On the tarmac in front of the garage is a sleek Maybach Mercedes, a uniformed driver posted at its fender, at the ready. Not my usual flavor as far as cars go, but it’s a nice piece of machinery.

  “You’re Conner Gilroy?” His gaze remains neutral, but I feel judged all the same when it flicks over me. My tattooed neck. The ink on my arms. The grime on my hands. The dirt under my fingernails.

  “That’s what I said.” I give up trying to make myself presentable and toss my shop rag on my work bench. Nothing I do is going to gain this man’s approval. Nothing I say is going to change whatever preconceived idea he has of me. So I just stand here and wait.

  “I’m Spencer Halston-Day,” he says when I don’t say anything else. “Henley’s step-father.”

  The pride I hear in his voice when he says it loosens my jaw a bit. “I know who you are… want a beer or something?”

  “I’d love one,” he says, giving me a short head nod. “Thank you.”

  It takes me a few minutes to find something in the shop fridge that I think a multi-billionaire might like. Pulling a couple of Trilliums from the stash of premium beer Tess keeps in the crisper, I carry them back into the garage to find Henley’s step-father under the hood of the car I was working on when he walked in.

  Hands dug into his pockets, he’s leaning over, looking at the engine I have ripped apart. Hearing me, he straightens and turns to look at me. “Yours?” He says, wagging his chin at the ’67 Cuda I’ve been in the process of gutting all day.

  “Yup,” I use the side of my workbench to pop the top on his beer before offering it to him. “Bought her this morning.”

  He nods his head at me, looking around the garage. Assessing. Judging. His gaze hits the stairs that lead up to my shitty apartment. “You live here too.” It’s not a question. It makes me wonder how much he knows about me. What he thinks of me.

  “Yes.” I don’t qualify the answer. I don’t try to explain. My family owns half of Boston. I could live anywhere I wanted. I live here because this place is mine. I bought it. I earned it.

  When I don’t say anything else, he takes a drink of his beer. “How’s business?”

  “It’s alright,” I say answering him honestly. “Probably be better if I chased business. Might make a profit if I charged more.”

  He nods again. “So you don’t think building your business is important?” Again, his tone is neutral, but I sense judgment. Conclusions being drawn.

  “I like working on cars.” I shrug. “I don’t necessarily like to charge people money for it.” Truth be told, if Tess didn’t write the invoices, I wouldn’t make a dime. Suddenly, I’ve had enough. “If you’re here to offer me money to stay away from Henley, let me put you at ease.” I set my beer down, unopened, ready for this to be over. “I already broke it off, so you can put your checkbook away.”

  “You broke it off with Henley?” His brows lower just enough to tell me I hit a nerve. He sounds angry. Looks at me like I committed some sort of mortal sin. “So, you don’t love her.”

  I cross my arms over my chest. “I never said that.”

  “She’s engaged you know,” he says, taking another drink. “Sniveling little shit got down on one knee and everything.”

  His assessment of Bradford surprises me. “That would be on the list of reasons I broke it off.”

  “It’s a business deal. So he can access his trust fund. Kid’s gay and his parents are assholes…” He tips is bottle at me. “but I suppose you already know that.

  I nod.

  “Do you love her?”

  Bradford asked me the same thing once and I nearly killed him for it. “Yes,” I tell him. “I love her.”

  He studies me for a moment before he nods and sets his beer down like I just told him everything he needed to know.

  He holds his hand out and I shake it. He doesn’t grimace at the dirt. Doesn’t immediately reach for a monogrammed handkerchief in his breast pocket, after the handshake ends. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Conner,” he says. “Thanks for the beer.”

  Seventy

  Henley

  Something my dad said to me has been eating at me.

  You deserve more than a life of cleaning up other peoples’ messes.

  He’s right.

  I do.

  That’s why I’m not going to marry Jeremy.

  He can have his money and his happily-ever-after with Gregg or he can keep living his lie to please his family.

  He’ll have to make a choice.

  He’ll have to be brave.

  Because I can’t do it for him.

  Not anymore.

  I call my mom.

  “Where are you?” she says. “Spencer called earlier. He said—”

  “I’m not with Spencer. I’m in Boston.”

  My confession is met with silence. I decide to go for broke. “I’m not marrying Jeremy and I’m not coming back to New York.”

  “Henley Rose,” she says, biting my name in half. “Don’t be ridiculous. We’ve already discussed this.”

  “We’ve discussed nothing,” I say, sharpening my tone. “You attempted to blackmail me, and I’ve decided I don’t care for it.”

  “Jeremy will be devastated.” It’s a veiled threat. A reminder of what she promised to do to him if I don’t go through with the wedding. “And your friend, Dr. Deaver. He’ll also be sorry that you’ve changed your mind.”

  “I don’t think so. I think Jeremy and Gregg are going to be just fine… you forget, I know things about you too. Things that I don’t think you want your rich society friends to know about.”

  “Those things cut both ways,” she reminds me. “You would be just damaged by the truth as I am.”

  “Yes.” That used to matter to me. I used to worry what would happen if the people I associated with found out that I wasn’t who I claimed to be. Not anymore. “The difference between you and me is that I know longer care.”

  “You little bitch,
” she hisses at me like a snake.

  “Don’t you mean bastard?” I say. “I mean, that is what you call someone who doesn’t know who their biological father is, isn’t it?”

  The silence on the over end of the phone is deafening.

  “You’re going to leave Jeremy and Gregg alone. You aren’t going to say a word to anyone about anything and you’re going to let me go.”

  “Let you go?” She laughs but it sounds strangled. Forced. “I’m your mother. Where would you be without me?”

  “Happy,” I tell her, sad because it’s true. Because she’s never going to love me. Because nothing I give her will ever be enough. “Without you, I’ll be happy.”

  I hang up the phone and I feel something I’ve never felt before in my life.

  I feel free.

  I wait for Spencer in the lobby. I’m nervous. I’m afraid of what he’ll say when I tell him I’m staying. The fear of disappointing him is a weight in my gut, cold and heavy. Without him, these last eight years would’ve been unbearable. He loved me, even when I didn’t really understand what that meant.

  What it felt like.

  Now that I do, I’m grateful.

  When walks through the door and sees me, he smiles. He always smiles when he sees me. No matter what I’m wearing. No matter what I look like. Spencer loves me.

  “Ready to go, Sparkplug?” he says, stopping in front of me. “Your mother’s been in my ear all day about so dinn—”

  I throw my arms around him, burying my face in his chest. “I love you, Spencer.”

  We’ve never hugged. It’s always been small, the affection between us. Proper. Appropriate. A pat on the cheek. A hand on the shoulder. This is none of those things. It feels big and messy and I’m suddenly terrified that I’ve crossed a line. That he’ll set me away from him and tell me I’m being ridiculous. That I’ve embarrassed him.

  And then I feel his arms around me and he holds me to him. “I love you too, Sparkplug.” He presses his lips to the top of my head before. “You’re not coming home, are you?”