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took a breath.
‘I married Flynn.’
‘You what?’ Zeke swore as he spilt boiling coffee over his hand. ‘Give a guy some warning for that kind of news, will you?’
‘Sorry.’ Helena flashed him a quick smile then turned her attention back to Thea.
Her sister’s eyes were wide and disbelieving. ‘Why? Did Dad make you? Or Isabella?’
‘It was my idea,’ Helena told her. ‘All mine. After you left, when I thought about actually having to go down there and tell everyone the wedding was off, this seemed like a better option.’ It sounded stupid out loud, Helena thought.
‘A...better option? After you spent weeks—months!—telling me to get out, that I couldn’t marry someone I didn’t love.’ Thea sounded outraged at the very idea.
‘I know. I know. But it was different for me.’
‘Different—how?’ Zeke asked, frowning. But Thea’s eyes had gone wide and sad, and she touched her fingertips to her lips as she said, ‘Oh, Helena. You loved him.’
Helena shook her head. ‘Not at the start. It wasn’t that simple. I mean, maybe I never got over that crush I had when I was fourteen, not totally, but I wasn’t planning on basing a marriage on that. I thought, since there was no contract, we could just get a quiet little divorce once the scandal died down. I knew he wanted kids and I...can’t think about that. So I knew it couldn’t work out. But then...he convinced me it could be more. That we could have a future together, have everything he was supposed to have with you.’
‘Want me to kill him?’ Zeke asked Thea conversationally. ‘I gave that man everything he wanted—the company, mostly, admittedly—and he took Helena too. I can kill him.’
‘I’d...rather you didn’t,’ Helena said. ‘Even after everything.’
‘Tell me about “everything”,’ Thea instructed. ‘And, Zeke, stop interrupting.’
‘I don’t even know how to describe it. I can’t say what changed. We talked a lot. I learned a lot—about him, about how he grew up. He bought me a ring.’ Her gaze jumped down to her left hand, where only the too tight wedding band remained. ‘I fell in love.’
‘So what went wrong?’ Thea asked. ‘Because, given that this all happened over the course of the last week and you’ve been crying pretty much constantly since I arrived, I’m figuring it has to be big. Tell me, so I can fix it.’
Helena gave her a watery smile. ‘You can’t fix this one, Thea.’
‘Watch me try.’
‘I couldn’t sign the post-nuptial agreement Henry brought over. It had a line in it...I had to swear that I had no children.’
‘Oh.’ Thea’s eyes closed as she listened.
‘So I had to tell him about...’ Helena swallowed. ‘I told him I was sixteen, I had a baby and I gave her away.’
‘What did he say?’ Zeke asked, his voice tense.
‘He called me a monster.’ Helena shrugged. She figured that covered the basics.
‘Okay, now I really am going to kill him.’ Zeke was on his feet before Thea grabbed his arm and pulled him back down.
‘Did you explain? What happened to you?’ Thea’s gaze focused so tightly on Helena’s face that she squirmed under the attention.
‘I didn’t get into details, no.’ Helena sighed. ‘I don’t think it would make any difference, anyway.’
‘If he knew you were raped?’ Zeke shook his head. ‘You’re wrong. My brother might be an idiot but...it makes a difference.’
‘Does it really?’ Helena wasn’t sure if she was asking them or herself. ‘I put myself in that position. I went there, I got drunk and they told me I said yes. And I know, in my head, that they were wrong—that they abused me and they committed a crime. I know that, I do. But...’
‘But?’ Thea pressed when Helena stopped.
‘But I was the one who couldn’t love that child, no matter how she came into the world. And that’s what I know he’ll never forgive me for.’
The tears came again then. Thea wrapped her arms around her, and Helena clung to her big sister like a lifeline.
Thea couldn’t fix this one, she knew. But maybe having her there would be enough to help her through it.
‘You need to tell him, sweetheart,’ Thea murmured against her hair. ‘He deserves to know everything.’
‘I know,’ Helena whispered back. Because not telling Flynn everything had got her into this mess. And maybe it wouldn’t make a difference—maybe she didn’t even want it to. But if she ever wanted to move past this, she had to get it all out.
And then leave it behind.
‘I’ll go with you,’ Zeke said. ‘We can pick up the rest of your stuff while we’re there.’
Helena nodded, grateful to have someone else making the decisions for a while.
‘You can do this.’ Thea tucked a finger under Helena’s chin, making her look up into her eyes. ‘And I will be right here for you, every step of the way.’
Helena gave another shaky nod. Thea was right.
She’d survived worse than this, with her sister beside her. And she’d survive it again.
She turned to Zeke. ‘Then let’s go and get this over with.’
FLYNN IGNORED THE knock on the door the first time. He’d already spoken to Henry at the office, dealt with his father and phoned his mother. Anyone else could go jump as far as he was concerned.
But, by the third knock, even Flynn had to admit that whoever it was didn’t seem to be going away.
He wrenched the door open and found he couldn’t even muster up any surprise at seeing his brother on his doorstep—or Helena standing just behind him.
‘We’ve come for Helena’s things.’ Zeke glanced at Helena, who seemed to shrink back further, then turned back to Flynn, his jaw set and eyes full of fury. ‘And while she’s packing, you and I are going to have a word.’
The anger that had never been more than a moment away, ever since Thea and Zeke had left, simmered up closer to the surface. ‘I suppose that’s logical. You run off with my fiancée on my wedding day, and you think now is the time to talk.’
Zeke stepped inside and from the corner of his eye Flynn saw Helena slip in behind him, heading for the staircase. He wanted to stare, to take her in one last time, but he wouldn’t let himself. He had to cut her out of his life completely. It was good that she’d come for her things.
‘Nothing about this situation is logical. Flynn—’ Zeke started, but Flynn couldn’t let him finish.
‘So what? You don’t like the mess you left behind so you’re here to whisk Helena away too? What’s wrong with you? Is one sister really not enough?’
He felt the punch before he saw it, the blossoming throb of pain radiating from his cheekbone as Zeke pulled his fist back. The surge of adrenalin had him wanting to return it, to break his brother’s face for coming here after everything that had happened, for acting so righteous. His hands balled up into weapons as he prepared to strike—
Until a small hand grabbed his arm and yanked it back.
‘Stop it. Both of you. Idiots!’ Helena’s cheeks had spots of red in them as she glared at them both.