by Mignon Mykel
I didn’t want her hiding herself from me, so I reached out and pushed her hair back behind her ear. She may not give me her eyes right now, but I could at least see her face to a degree.
“When I was ten, I decided Mia was too…different from me to stay my friend.” Her words were choked. I could feel the disappointment in herself, behind her words. She was ashamed of herself and that had me frowning.
I reached for her chin to lift her face toward mine. “You were ten. It happens.”
Brenna shook her head and pulled back from my hand, her eyes sadder than I had ever seen them before.
And she had me sitting through some pretty gut-wrenching movies in our time together.
“No. It was incredibly mean of me. She was fat and I wasn’t, and the cool kids wouldn’t talk to me with her hanging around. So I pushed her away. I pushed her away so I could hang with the cool kids.” She took another one of those shaking breaths, her hands fisted so tightly together that her knuckles were pale. I reached for her hands and gently pried them apart, allowing her time to speak when she was ready.
“Well, the cool kids have a way of biting you in the ass and not giving a shit,” she said around a sad smirk. “I started smoking when I was twelve. I stopped, but it happened. I had more boyfriends than I could count by the time I was fourteen.”
The more she refused to meet my eyes, the more I realized I didn’t want this truth any more. I didn’t want to watch her break herself open.
“Brenna.” I tugged her close, glad when she willingly crawled into my lap. “It doesn’t matter. None of it matters, Angel.” I rubbed my hand up and down her back but she shook her head against my chest.
With her face buried into my shoulder, her body shaking, she gave me a truth I would have never guessed. “My tattoo isn’t because it’s pretty. It’s in memory of the baby I lost.”
Brenna
His hand froze on my back.
I knew it.
I just knew that if he knew the truth, he’d likely pull away.
I swallowed, begging in my mind for him to keep holding me a moment longer, to not let me go for just a little while longer.
I chose butterfly wings for the little girl that I named Nova. I didn’t have a lick of Native American in me, but the name meant ‘chasing butterflies’ and that’s what I wanted for the baby who wouldn’t ever see a birthday. I wanted to imagine her somewhere bright and happy, chasing butterflies and being a regular, beautiful little girl.
“Ok,” Grey broke into my thoughts.
That was it. Just ‘ok.’
I pulled my head away from him to frown up at his face, surprised to see it wasn’t contorted in disbelief or disgust, but rather…concern?
“So are you sad today because you ran into an old friend who’s pregnant? Or because of something else?” His question only held curiosity and had me pausing before answering him. When I still hadn’t, he started rubbing small circles over my back again.
I searched his eyes, but had a feeling I wasn’t going to find what I was looking for. I wasn’t going to find judgement from his man. Not once in the four years knowing him had I seen him being judgmental about anyone.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked instead.
Not really but, “I was seventeen. I couldn’t tell you who the father was.” I burrowed back into Grey’s chest, not wanting to have this conversation but knowing that because I started it, he deserved to hear the rest.
To learn why I needed to keep things from my brothers.
“My brothers thought I was some freaking angel, but really I was spreading my legs for any guy who smiled at me. Heck, they didn’t even have to smile.” My voice caught in my throat when Grey’s hand stopped yet again but rather than push me away, he hugged me tight.
It was his silence that urged me to go on.
“I lost her at twenty-two weeks. A spontaneous late miscarriage,” I whispered. “It was winter, so I could hide my belly behind baggy sweatshirts and no one thought anything of it. Well, except the kids at school. Someone found out I’d been pregnant and it was all over the school in the matter of a day. When I never showed, it didn’t stop the rumors from circling but every time I heard it, it crushed me.
“I wasn’t ready to be a mom, but I felt that me losing my baby so late was God’s way of punishing me. Or karma. Really bad karma.” I squeezed my eyes shut, picturing the day I had to deliver her. The day I delivered my dead baby, all by myself, not a single person who mattered to me, standing beside me. “I delivered her and held her. She was so tiny, but so, so perfect.” My breath hitched again. “Her tiny nose, her hands. She wasn’t any bigger than my hands but, in that moment, I knew what it was to love and lose, and I hated it.”
I took a deep breath and pushed back from my spot, wiping at my eyes with the palms of my hands before staring into Grey’s eyes yet again, still on his lap for as long as he’d let me stay.
“I got over the hurt by sleeping around more. When I was nineteen, I realized I didn’t like the girl in the mirror, so I stopped. I vowed to not allow myself to be that girl ever again, to not find comfort in a set of arms.”
Grey nodded, reaching out and wiping at my tears with his thumbs. “And your brothers don’t know.” He said it with such quiet calm.
I shook my head. “No. They don’t know who I was in those years. And they never questioned that I stopped dating, that I never brought guys around.”
“I think you should tell them,” he said, still without a drop of judgment on his face, only concern, as he looked into my eyes.
Still though, I shook my head. “No. I don’t want them to know. Ever.”
I was thankful when Grey let that sit. The mood was incredibly somber but I was grateful he hadn’t put me aside and left me here to deal with these emotions alone.
“What made you break your vow?” he asked, sometime later.
I could finally smile. “You. Just you.”
This Year
Brenna
It had been nearly a year since Grey moved in, a year since he learned my most heartbreaking secrets, but still our relationship was strong.
In that time, Conor became a daddy for the first time. Aiden Rory O’Gallagher was the cutest little button with his daddy’s hair and eyes. Watching as Conor went from playboy to loving boyfriend, even further to doting dad, was one of the best transformations I had the pleasure of watching.
In that time, Mia and I grew incredibly close again. I shared with her some of my past secrets, keeping the biggest ones to myself. The night I confessed them to Grey was one of the worst nights I’d ever experienced. More than once, I woke up in a cold sweat, crying from dreams I couldn’t remember, but could only imagine they dealt with Nova. Grey simply held me tight, kissing away my tears, and loving me back into oblivion.
While our schedules were all over the place, we never missed an opportunity to be in one another’s arms, a place I found I loved more than anything. The way Grey made love to me, owning my body and driving my needs to completion, had me falling for him in ways that scared me. And because of that, I started worrying that someday this wouldn’t be enough for Grey.
But, right now, it seemed like it was plenty for him.
He had me pressed against the counter, a hand kneading my breast over my shirt and bra, and his mouth on my neck, nibbling in ways that had goosebumps trailing up and down my body.
“Grey, my brothers are coming!” I said, trying to push him away from me. One of us had to be the levelheaded one. “You have to go.”
He groaned but pulled away. I shivered at the loss of his warm mouth on my skin, even though the distance was what I needed right now.
“Jesus, Bren,” he said. I knew he was annoyed with this part of the situation. He started talking about bringing us up to my brothers about a month ago. “Can’t we just tell them yet?”
I shook my head.
No.
My brothers liked Grey and if they found out he’d be
en sleeping with me, let alone living with me for the last year, they would surely blow a fuse. Both of them.
“We have to put your stuff away,” I said, my mind in frantic mode as I looked around the duplex for any signs of Grey.
He was all over.
He lived here; of course he was all over.
I stuffed things in the cubes under the coffee table, more things in the hall closet, knowing my brothers wouldn’t go in there. I barely noticed when Grey shook his head and headed to the kitchen.
Hopefully to remove any evidence he lived here in there too.
I ran down the hall to be sure all of our clothes were put away, then into the bathroom to move his products into the linen closet.
When I moved back into the living area, fifteen minutes before my brothers were to arrive, Grey was standing by the front door, his shoes on and shrugging into a jacket.
“I hate this, Bren.”
“It’s only for a little while longer,” I lied. I wasn’t sure when I would be comfortable telling my brothers.
And as much as I trusted Grey, cared for him, there was still a small piece of me that was terrified of what would happen to me when he decided he’d had enough of me.
When he decided to walk away.
At least whenever that happened, if my brothers didn’t know about us, he could go on living his life the way he had been.
“I want to tell them.”
My eyes flew to his. “Please don’t. Not right now.”
“Brenna, they deserve to know everything you’ve gone through.”
A mind of their own, my hands covered my flat stomach and I shook my head. “No.”
He stared at me a little longer before shaking his head sadly. Without a word, he turned and left the duplex.
I took a deep breath, trying to calm the racing of my heart.
However, the racing came from a whole different type of anxiety than my brothers finding out.
No, the racing was because suddenly I was very afraid of losing Greyson Stone.
“Isn’t that Stone’s?” Conor asked as he walked into the kitchen, pulling out a chair at my tiny table. He sat down with Aiden in his lap. I followed his eyes and saw what his had landed on.
Sure enough, Grey’s hoodie was in the corner, where he had thrown it off me earlier.
“Um.” I looked around frantically. “I borrowed it last night.” I refrained from nodding and looking like a crazed person. “When I left the pub, it was chillier than I anticipated and he let me wear it home.”
Thankfully, that answer seemed to appease my brothers, as the subject dropped and changed to the upcoming get-together we were planning for our parents’ return to San Diego.
Rory decided he wanted to order pizza, and the two of them stayed longer than I thought they would. By the time they left, Aiden had been napping on the living room floor for an hour.
I sent a text Grey, letting him know it was safe to come back home, but when he didn’t answer—when I went to bed alone—that earlier anxiety of losing Grey came rushing back.
Stone
Angel: They’re gone. You can come home now.
I stared at my phone, wanting above everything to just tell her off. I was sick of this.
Five years.
Five years I’ve known Brenna and have essentially been doing just this. Sure, it was ok at first, but shortly after moving in with her, things started to take a much, much more serious turn for me.
Five years was a long time to be with someone.
And it was mentally longer when you had to do it in secret.
I didn’t want to date her in secret any more.
What was I going to do, marry her in secret? Send her away on year-long vacations so she could have babies in secret?
Because that’s where my mind, my fucking heart, was right now.
I didn’t play along with this game for five years just to say goodbye to her, no. I played along because I knew she was it for me.
The four hours that I wasn’t allowed in my own fucking place, I mindlessly drove around the Bay. I spent a good amount of time at La Jolla, sitting and watching the seals sunbathe.
I still hadn’t answered Brenna’s text when the sun started to sink over the horizon but she hadn’t tried to get back to me, either.
I stood from my perch on a rock and headed back to my car, squeezing the bridge of my nose.
Knowing Brenna, she was probably mentally preparing for me to say goodbye to her. Whenever she revealed a piece of her past, it was like she curled herself into a coat of armor, waiting for me to decide I was done.
As if her past did anything other than make me love her more.
Did I hate that she kept her life so far apart from her brothers? Yes.
But I admired her for the things she shouldered, for the things she went through—alone.
The fact that I waited so long to respond now—well, to not respond—probably had her head in some insecure headspace.
God, I loved her so much and I physically ached for her and the pain she went through by herself for so many years. I wanted her to open up and tell her brothers. I wanted her to take that weight off her own chest.
She had nothing to be ashamed of.
Me: I’m on my way home
I pocketed my phone before I could talk myself into waiting for her response.
Brenna
I was already in bed by the time Grey came home.
I didn’t roll over, didn’t greet him. I could feel his frustration the moment he cleared the loft stairs though.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I forced my body to relax. I could hear as he moved around the room, discarding his clothes before walking into the bathroom to brush his teeth and get ready for bed.
The lights clicked off in the bathroom and his footsteps fell softly on the carpet. I felt the bed dip behind me and I fully expected him to turn his back on me, to sleep apart from me.
I understood why he was upset.
It wasn’t the first time he’d asked me to come clean to my brothers, about my past, about us.
But I was terrified.
Absolutely fucking terrified.
If my brothers knew what a slut I was growing up…
I couldn’t bear to think of what their faces would look like.
And then, if they found out I’d been a pregnant teenager? Oh my God, Conor would probably be most pissed for that offense alone.
And like I thought earlier, if they knew about Grey and me…
Grey didn’t deserve the wrath of Conor and Rory.
But what did that mean for Grey and me?
I was going to have to force him to bow out. I was going to have to convince him he didn’t like me anymore, to get him to move out and away.
I stifled what would have been a sob. It ended up being more of a muted hiccup. I squeezed my eyes shut, hopeful Grey wouldn’t notice.
The good thing with what Grey and I had been doing was that when he walked away, we could just continue going on like we had been in public. No one would know the difference.
He’d still flirt with everyone in a skirt, with a special brand for me, and I’d still give him eye-rolling hell.
And I could cry in private, because it was going to hurt to tell him goodbye.
Tomorrow.
I’d have to do it tomorrow.
I couldn’t keep doing this.
I parted my lips to take a deep breath, releasing it shakily.
Resigned to my plans, I cuddled deeper into my pillow, willing the tears that threatened to stay at bay. It would do me no good to cry right now. I could do it tomorrow after Grey took his things and left.
But when he reached toward me, pulling me into his bare chest, I nearly lost my resolve. The tears that had been a mere threat before were now burning behind my closed lids, threatening to spill.
And when he pressed his lips to my shoulder, the words he spoke absolutely shattered my soul.
“I love you, Brenna.”
When I crawled into bed with Bren last night, I knew she’d been awake, but she put on a good game.
I didn’t know what was going through her head, but her slight trembles and shaky sighs fucking killed me. I knew right away I shouldn’t have stayed away so long.
Fuck. I shouldn’t have gone in the first place.
When I woke, Brenna was no longer in my arms. I looked around the room, not noticing any signs of her but seeing the door to the bathroom closed. Focusing, I could hear the shower running.
I didn’t have to be in to the pub for a few hours, but Brenna had an early shift. I could get in the shower with her, save water and hopefully save whatever was crumbling in our relationship, but I had a feeling Brenna wouldn’t be completely open to that at the moment.
With a resigned sigh, I rolled out of the bed and pulled on yesterday’s jeans.
“Brenna, you’re not listening to me.” I’d been trying to get through to her since the moment she stepped out of the shower. When it was time for her to leave for the pub, I refused to end our talk at the standstill where it was currently at. She fought it, but eventually allowed me to drive her in to work.
Not that we got any further in our standstill.
“We aren’t telling them, Stone!” She pushed out the Jeep’s door and my heart tumbled not just her hasty retreat, but by her calling me Stone.
She never called me Stone when we weren’t at the pub, putting on a disguise.
“Brenna, it’s been five fucking years!” I slammed the door after I exited the Jeep.
“If it’s too much for you, then you can take your things and leave.” She stomped up to the front doors of O’Gallaghers, pushing through them.
I had to quicken my step to get to her before she got into the back. If she did, that was going to be the end of this conversation and, potentially, the end of us.
I wasn’t about to let that happen.
I didn’t date her in secret for damn near five years, living with her for one of those years, for this to all just go and disappear.
