Reaching Ryan (The Gilroy Clan Book 7) Read online

  Before I ask him another dumb, intrusive question or make another offensive comment about his mother, Ryan drains the glass he took from me and stands. “See you around, Cari’s little sister,” he tells me with a flat, polite smile.

  And then he walks away from me without a backward glance.

  Chapter Five

  Ryan

  There are a lot of things I hate about my life.

  I hate the way my gut clenches every time I look at myself in the mirror. That split second of disconnect when I see the gnarled-up mass of lumpy scar tissue that covers nearly half of my body and my fucked-up leg and I think Jesus Christ, get a load of that poor bastard before I remember that it’s me I’m looking at—I’m that poor bastard.

  I hate the fact that I can’t remember the names for things I’ve used my entire life. The words and names sit in my brain, taunting me, just out of reach because I know what a goddamned fork is, what to do with it, but when I reach for its name, I can’t remember what it’s called, not if someone held a gun to my head in one hand and a fistful of them in the other.

  I hate the fact that I wake up every morning feeling fussy and muddled. That I have to lay in bed for a while, mentally turning and shifting the past six months of my life. Broken fragments. Jagged puzzle pieces that don’t fit together right. That I have to force them into the right shape and when I finally get it right, when I remember who and where I am, my reward is to remember that I’m useless. Not even capable of performing even the most basic of male functions.

  Which brings me to the thing I hate most about my life.

  My dick.

  More specifically, the fact that it’s fucking broken. As useless as the rest of me.

  I know how that sounds. The fact that I’m more worried about my dick than my brain is ridiculous. That I’d rather have a fucked-up brain than a limp dick for the rest of my life.

  You’re physically intact, Sergeant O’Connell. While you’ve suffered extensive damage to your reproductive organs, our reconstruction was successful. Tests indicate that there is no physiological reason for your sexual dysfunction.

  The doctor didn’t come right out and say it, but his implication was pretty fucking clear, even to a guy with a head full of scrambled eggs, like me.

  The problem isn’t that I can’t get it up.

  The problem is that I don’t want to.

  Which is fucking bullshit.

  What guy wants to be impotent, for fuck’s sake?

  Not that it matters.

  Hard or not, any half-sane woman would run away, screaming, if she saw the equipment I’m sporting, anyway.

  When I told Tess as much last night, she said none of that would matter to the right woman. What she didn’t say is that she’s not that woman.

  She didn’t have to.

  I never had a real chance with Tess. Not even when I was 100% from head to toe, and the one slim chance I did have I let pass me by a long time ago.

  Declan just left.

  He came by to apologize. Ask me for forgiveness for the way things played out when we were kids. For turning me in. Getting me arrested.

  I told him the truth, that there was nothing to apologize for. That he did me a favor, turning me in. In the moment I was pissed—tell the truth I didn’t understand the gift I’d been given until I got accepted to Ranger school. That’s when it hit me. When I realized that by turning me in, Declan gave me a second chance. A way out.

  And yeah, it ended badly. I got blown up. My brain is scrambled, and I feel like my body is on fire most of the time. My leg is fucked up. I’ve got one nut and dick that won’t work but it could be worse. I could be in prison. I could be a fall down drunk like my old man.

  When I remember that, what could’ve been—would’ve been—if Declan hadn’t made that call, I remember that owe him.

  Someone knocks on my door. Three light raps before that someone eases it open slowly. “Ry?”

  Henley.

  I look away from the window to watch her poke her head through the opening.

  I look away from her and refocus on the window in front of me. “What are you doing here?” Looking at her is confusing because it’s hard for my brain to process. Difficult to connect the way she looks now with the Henley I remember. It’s easier if I focus on her voice rather than her face.

  “It’s Sunday,” she reminds me. “I’m here to pick you up for dinner. At the Gilroys’—I tried calling but you didn’t answer,” she says, moving in my peripheral toward my bedside table. Turning my head, I watch the stranger who is my sister pick up the cell phone she gave me on the advice of my therapist a few days ago, because warnings and reminders beforehand will make transitions and changes in his routine easier for him to process. “You know these things work better if you turn them on, right?” she says, flashing me her straight, white stranger smile.

  I look away from her without smiling back. “So I’ve heard.” I’m being a dick. I know I’m being a dick, but I can’t seem to stop. To be perfectly honest, I don’t really want to. I like it when they’re mad at me, like to keep them that way, because when they aren’t their tone changes. The way they look at me is different.

  When they aren’t mad at me, I can see their pity. I can feel it. Hear it in their voices.

  And it makes me want to eat my gun.

  Which probably makes it a good thing they took mine away from me.

  I listen to her sigh. Open and close the drawer on my nightstand to retrieve the charge cord she stashed there and plug the phone in. “I ran into Declan in the hallway,” she asks, moving toward me. “What was he doing here?”

  “I dunno.” I shrug, watching her move from my peripheral into my direct line of sight. “Can’t remember.” It’s a lie. I can remember but I don’t want to talk to her about it. She doesn’t know what happened after she left when we were kids and she doesn’t need to. She hates Declan enough without me giving her a reason to blame him for what happened to me.

  She eases herself into the chair next to me. “You don’t remember?” She sounds concerned when she says it. “Ry, he was just here.”

  I give her another shrug.

  Her stranger face crumples a little under the weight of her worry. “Maybe I should call—”

  “Jesus.” I lift a hand and swipe it over my face. “Look—I can’t remember is my polite way of telling you to mind your own fucking business, okay?”

  “Oh.” She sounds both relieved and hurt when she says it. “Okay. I was just worried that—”

  “What?” I ask her, forcing myself to look her in the face when I say it. “Worried that big, bad Declan Gilroy came here to hurt your retarded, crippled brother?” I look away from her. Back toward the window, just in time to watch Dec’s truck pull out of the parking lot. “In case you haven’t heard, I might be retarded, but I can still take care of myself just fine.”

  Yeah, against a few soft-bellied orderlies maybe, but against someone like Declan you wouldn’t stand a chance, Ranger. Declan Gilroy would have absolutely no trouble with ripping out your spine and shaking it in your face.

  “Don’t call yourself that.” Her tone is hard again when she says it, telling me I’ve finally managed to piss her off.

  “Call myself what?” I scoff at the window and shake my head. “Retarded or crippled?”

  “Either.”

  Laughter slices it’s way up my throat like a rusty blade. “Well, what would call it?”

  “I’d call it a TBI.”

  TBI.

  Traumatic brain injury.

  “Same fucking thing, Hen,” I shake my head at her like I feel sorry for her. Like she’s delusional. “Call it what you want but it’s the same fucking thing.”

  “It’s not.” She wants to shout it at me, I can tell. The Henley I knew, my real sister, would’ve. She would’ve shouted it in my face and probably bloodied my nose for good measure. The Henley she is now, dignified and refined, whispers it. Her ankles crossed, hands clasped toget
her in her lap like she’s having tea with the Queen of fucking England. “The doctors say you’ll get better. You just need—”

  “I know what the goddamned doctors say.” I look away from her because I can’t stand the way she’s looking at me.

  Time.

  I need to give it time.

  I need to be patient.

  And I need treatment.

  But there’s a waitlist with the VA that doesn’t get me in to see a specialist for another six months and when Patrick offered to find one who would work with me privately, I flat out told him no. I’ve taken enough from him as it is. “You know, for someone who keeps insisting that I’m not retarded, you sure to treat me like I am.”

  She doesn’t say anything, her lack of response pulls my gaze away from the window. She looks as angry as she sounds, her jaw clenched tight, one hand clutching the other in a white-knuckled grip that’s probably the only thing keeping her from punching me in the face.

  Good.

  Finally, she speaks. “Get dressed so we can go.”

  “Look—” I’m about to tell her I don’t want to go. I never want to go. Always make excuses for why I can’t but she still shows up, week after week, hoping that this will be the week I decide to act like an actual human being. Before I can give her my usual song and dance, she talks over me.

  “Conner proposed last night, and I accepted.” She looks down and smiles at the cheap silver ring on her hand, a far cry from the five-pound rock she was wearing on that same finger a month ago. “We’re making the announcement tonight, after dinner. It would mean a lot to me if you’d be there.”

  “Why?” I’m not trying to be a dick this time. It’s a real question.

  “Because you’re family, goddamnit.” She shoots up out of her seat to glare down at me. She doesn’t look like a stranger anymore. She looks like my sister. “You’re my family and I—” She sighs. Smooths her fingertips along the edge of her fancy skirt. She looks up at me, a forced smile sitting on her face. “Please, Ryan. Conner and Patrick will have their family there. Cari’s parents and sister will be there for her and I just want—”

  Grace.

  “Okay.”

  My agreement to go drops her jaw for a few seconds before she remembers her manners and it snaps shut. “Okay?” The hope and gratitude I hear in her tone is enough to make me what to drive a railroad spike through my temple. “You’ll go? You’ll—”

  “Jesus fuckin’ Christ.” I take another disgruntled swipe at my face before planting both hands to push myself out of the chair. It’s rough going. So painful I have to clench my jaw and grit my teeth against the sudden, familiar fire that erupts in my muscles and bones. When I’m finally standing, I turn my head to glare down at her. “That’s what I said. I mean, it’s not every day that my little sister admits she even has a brother, much less wants to trot me around like a show pony. I better take it where I can get it, right?”

  “We’re family, Ryan,” she says firmly, showing me a little of the Henley I remember. “We’ve always been family.”

  We’re not family.

  We’re strangers to each other. Have been for a long time now. The thin, tenuous bloodline we share doesn’t change that.

  She abandoned me.

  Left me behind, and even though I did a pretty good job of fooling myself into believing that it didn’t matter, didn’t hurt, being forced to look her in the eye every day of my goddamned life has made me realize it was a lie.

  It did matter.

  It did hurt.

  She chose our mother—and when our mother cut me out and cast me aside, Henley let her. She walked away from me without a backward glance. Pretended I didn’t exist because it was easier that way. Because I didn’t fit into the fairytale past my mother constructed when she left my father for her new, billionaire husband.

  Even though it’s the truth—how I really feel—I don’t say it out loud because the truth of the matter is if our mother had chosen me instead of her, I would have done the exact same thing. So, I don’t say it. I just look down at her and sigh.

  “Whatever—go wait in the lobby so I can change.”

  Chapter Six

  Grace

  I’m staying in Boston.

  I’ve been on the fence about it since Cari asked me to move here a few weeks ago. Not because I didn’t want to. No. The second she suggested it, I felt something I haven’t felt in years. Excitement.

  About my life.

  About the possibility of it.

  I realized I’ve been settling. Resigned to a life of living with my parents and raising Molly. Working at the post office. Picking up the odd shift at the local bar when a bill is past due, or Molly needs new shoes.

  The fact that I can have more never occurred to me. Not until Cari changed everything with four little words.

  Come with me, Grace.

  As soon as she said it, I knew I wanted it. A life of possibility. Something better for Molly and me. But I also knew how my parents would react when I told them.

  That’s why I’ve been on the fence. Because there’s no way they were going to be supportive about it. No way they were going to say, This is your life, Grace. You’re a grown woman and have every right to live your life the way you see fit. We trust you to do what’s best for you and for Molly.

  Because the past has painted me as someone who is irresponsible. Incapable of making good choices. Unworthy of trust.

  The way they’re looking at me right now all but proves it.

  “You’re not serious.” My mom bounces a look at my father before shifting her gaze past me, toward Cari’s studio where she has Molly occupied with some paints and paper. “What are you saying? For god’s sake, Kathrine Grace, you can’t just move to Boston.”

  It’s Sunday morning and we’re sitting at the kitchen table at Cari and Patrick’s. He left earlier to coach one of his league games for his non-profit, Boston Batters. Cari stayed back to offer moral support while I broke the news.

  “Why?” I shake my head. “Why can’t I? Cari did. When she left for college you guys were supportive. You even took out a second mortgage on the house to pay for her tuition.”

  “That was different,” my mom says, instantly defensive. She looks toward my dad for help and when he doesn’t offer any, she refocuses her attention on me. “You have responsibilities back home. A job. Friends. Molly’s starting pre-school in the fall.”

  “I have a part-time job at the post office that will be filled about five minutes after I quit,” I tell her, reminding her that like opportunities, jobs are in short supply back home. I don’t mention the cocktailing job at the Slide Inn because I don’t want this discussion to devolve into a screaming match about my irresponsible choices in front of Molly and that would be the fastest way to do it. “And I don’t have friends. I haven’t had any friends since I had Molly.” It’s true. As soon as they found out I was pregnant and had decided to keep the baby, my so-called friends scattered like I had a contagious disease. “And Molly can just as easily start school here—we both can.” I take a deep breath. Let it out slowly. “I think—”

  My mom’s mouth sets in a hard, stubborn line. “I think you’re being selfish. You’re thinking of yourself and not your daughter.”

  “I disagree.” I can feel my face fall into a mirror image of hers. “I’m doing this for her. For both of us. So I can be someone we can both be proud of.”

  “I think we both know this isn’t about doing what’s right by Molly.” She scoffs softly and shakes her head like I’m being flighty and childish. When I don’t answer her, she sighs. “Fine. Your father and I will keep Molly with us and you can come home when you’ve run this ridiculous notion out of your system.”

  “No.” I shake my head because leaving Molly has never and will never be an option. “Molly is my daughter. She stays with me.”

  “Do you really think you’re equipped to raise a child on your own?” There’s fear in her tone. Real fear. Finally
, we’re getting somewhere. The real reason she’s fighting this so hard. It’s because she doesn’t think I’m capable of taking care of Molly without her help. Doesn’t see me as her mother. Not really. I knew she felt that way but hearing her pretty much say it out loud still hurts. Still stings.

  “I’m as prepared as you were when you had Cari—maybe even more so since I was two years older when I had Molly.” It’s a shitty thing to say but I’m past playing nice.

  “That was different. I had your father to help shoulder the responsibility,” she reminds me in a pointed tone that digs up an old bone of contention. She’s never forgiven me for not naming Molly’s father. Holding him responsible. She always viewed my refusal to point fingers as some misguided attempt at martyring myself when all it really did was cause gossip and fuel rumors. What she doesn’t know, what I’ve never said out loud is that the truth of Molly’s paternity would do more to fuel rumors and gossip than my pointing fingers ever could.

  “You keep saying that—that my situation is different from yours and Cari’s and you know something—you’re right.” I plant my hands on the table between us and stand. “It is different. I never got the opportunity to go to college. I don’t have someone to help me raise my daughter. I have to do it on my own and you know what? That’s okay, because it means the only person I have to answer to for the choices I make is her.” I glare down at my mom and shake my head. “I’m not asking you for permission, Mom. I’m telling you—Molly and I are staying in Boston. I’m going to school and we’re going to live with Cari and Patrick until I find my feet.”

  Fear flickers across my mom’s face again. “Doug—” She looks at my father. “Say something. Talk some sense into her. God knows she’s never listened to me.”

  My father looks at me from across the table, his silent, blue-eyed gaze narrowed on my face for so long I fight the urge to start squirming like when I was a kid and got caught throwing mud at cars in the church parking lot after Sunday morning service. Finally, he sighs. “She’s right, Ellen. She deserves a chance to make something of herself just as much as Cari did—maybe even more—and if moving here is a part of that then we have to stand aside and let her go.” My father’s declaration is met with stunned silence as my mother and I stare at each other because neither of us can believe what we just heard. “Besides,” he continues when neither of us say a word. “She won’t be alone. She’ll be here, with family.”