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“Oh bullshit,” Cal said with some disgust. “That’s an excuse, you fucking idiot. I know what you’re feeling — hell, I felt it myself when Isabel told me she loved me — but you’ve got to see past those excuses. If you think you’re not worthy of her, if you think you’re too broken for her, then what about if you weren’t? What about if you tried to be a better man for her? Grow some balls, Atlas, and be the man she needs.”

I opened my mouth to tell them what assholes they were, and yet what he’d said somehow got caught in my head.

Grow some balls and be the man she needs…

I knew what Rowan needed. Someone to fight with her, to argue with her, and someone to hold her, support her. Be the person helping her reach for her dreams not the one holding her back.

The anvil on my chest got heavier and heavier.

“And apart from any of that,” Ten said, disapproval loud and clear in his tone. “You have a child to consider. Please tell me you’re not going to leave both of them in the lurch.”

I put down the scotch bottle heavily on the tray and turned round. One set of black eyes and one set of blue were regarding me and passing extreme judgment.

“What am I supposed to do?” I heard myself say, like a fucking child. “She deserves better than?—”

“Didn’t I tell you that was an excuse?” Cal interrupted impatiently. “Of course she deserves better than you, but she loves you, right?”

Every muscle in my body tensed. “Yes,” I bit out.

“Then grow the fuck up and be the man she needs,” he said without mercy. “I’m not going to tell you it’s easy. It’s in fact the hardest thing you’ll ever do in your life, but I can tell you right now that’s it worth it.”

“And so is she,” Ten said in the same firm tone.

She is. She’s worth everything.

Don’t let him win, Rowan had told me, and she was right, wasn’t she? Because that’s what I was doing all these years later, letting my father control my life the way he’d controlled it back then. Even worse, I was using him as an excuse to distance myself from her, telling myself I was protecting her, doing it for her own good.

How is hurting her for her own good?

And of course I’d hurt her. I’d seen the flicker of pain in her eyes beneath all that strength. Fuck, I was no better than him in the end, wasn’t I? Hurting the woman who loved me because I was too fucking scared to man up. And she didn’t deserve that. She deserved so much more than that. She deserved everything.

That leap of faith, I had to make it and make it now, because I couldn’t stand the thought of hurting her more than I already had.

You love her.

Yeah, fuck, I did. She was right about that too. Love was the roaring feeling in my heart the possessiveness, the savagery. The protectiveness too. My love wasn’t soft and gentle and it would never be. It was wild and angry, and consuming. But Rowan was equal to it. Hell, she fucking matched it.

I put the scotch down and turned.

“Don’t tell me,” Cal said.

“He’s going to see a man about a dog,” Ten said.

“Fuck off,” I said striding to the door. “I’m going to go get my wife.”

33

Rowan

I sat at the bar with Isabel and her silver-haired friend, Zara, and stared at the shot glass full of vodka that Isabel had just ordered. Both she and Zara had gallantly decided to drink for me, since I couldn’t have any alcohol, and apparently three shots was the bare minimum needed for a really bad heartbreak.

“It’s medicinal,” Isabel said as she picked up the shot glass.

“And you can blame the alcohol when Isabel and I present you with Atlas Blackwood’s head on a silver platter,” Zara offered.

I hadn’t really had friends before, but somehow, in the space of half an hour, Isabel and Zara had managed to get me to spill my guts about Atlas, then they let me have a good cry before pulling me over to the bar for some vodka, so I could drink with them in spirit.

Their sympathy and understanding had made me feel better, especially when they shared with me their experiences with the two difficult men they were currently with. Isabel vowed she’d get Caleb to give Atlas a lecture, and Zara said she’d float the idea of beheading with Tennyson. That made me laugh at least, and by the second round of shots, we’d all agreed that life without men would be better.

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