There with You (Adair Family 2)

Only weeks ago she would have turned and given him her glamorous smile and those appealing dimples.

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath and walked around her to sit down on her chair’s twin. “Hi.”

Regan drew her knees in even tighter. “Hey.” Her eyes dropped to the bag in his hand, and she stiffened.

“Robyn said this is from you to me.”

She tucked her hair behind her ear. “It’s just silly …”

Wanting to put her out of her obvious misery, and also intrigued by what the gift could be, Thane took the object out of the bag. It was thick and soft. Unwrapping it revealed a dark leather journal with an inscription on it. “Loyal Au Mort.”

“I … um … I noticed you have all these loose papers and sticky notes lying around the office, and a lot of them seem to be your thoughts on the same project.” She gestured to the journal as he opened the soft leather binding to reveal the lined paper inside. “It might be better for you to put all your ideas in one place so you don’t lose them.”

It was incredibly considerate, and he felt even more of a shit than before.

“Lachlan told me this is the Adair Clan motto.”

“Loyal Au Mort.” He traced the words embossed on the front. “Faithful unto Death.”

“I like it. It speaks to who you guys are. But … I don’t know.” She shifted uncomfortably again. “It seems stupid now.”

Because she saw him differently now?

Why did that prick his pride more than he liked?

“It’s not stupid,” he replied gruffly, his pulse thundering in his ears. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

When she wouldn’t meet his gaze, he knew he had to do major damage control, or he was going to mess up things between them for good.

“I’m sorry I’ve been such a bastard to you. You don’t deserve that.”

Regan shrugged and gave him a wide smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “It’s fine.”

She was lying.

Hiding how he’d hurt her.

Not wanting to be vulnerable with him.

And who could bloody blame her?

“Last week, the man my wife cheated on me with suddenly approached me at work,” he shocked himself by blurting out.

Regan’s reaction was physical. Her knees fell away from her chest as if her strings had been cut. “What?”

“No one knows. About any of it. Not even Lachlan.”

Eyes wide, she shook her head. “Thane, I won’t tell anyone.”

He sat back in the chair, the cold air nipping at his cheeks. And it all just spilled out, like he couldn’t contain it any longer. “It was before Eilidh was born. I didn’t suspect a thing. Nothing had changed between us. Not our family dynamic, not our relationship. There had been a rough patch before it. Fran seemed discontent and I couldn’t work out why. But soon enough, I thought something had clicked into place for her because she seemed happier than ever. I just assumed she was finally growing into family life,” he grunted, remembering the brutal wound of discovering the truth. “I wanted to surprise her at work for Valentine’s Day. She had been working late a lot at school, and I thought she deserved a wee break. So I packed a hamper with nibbles and champagne to take to her. Arro was babysitting Lewis.

“The school was near empty when I got there. Her door was open. No one was in the classroom. But I could hear muffled noises coming from within her supply cupboard.”

“Oh, Thane.” Regan dropped her head in sympathy.

He gave her an unhappy smirk. “Opened the door and found her colleague Sean McClintock fucking her up against the shelves.”

Regan squeezed her eyes closed as if she felt his pain. “I’m so sorry.”

“We had the prick and his wife over for goddamn dinner. He’d held my son in his arms. And it turned out for six months, they’d been cheating on us.”

Regan shook her head. “But you forgave her?”

Remembering the months of emotional wreckage Fran had wrought, Thane confessed quietly, “It wasn’t that easy. McClintock took off. Didn’t want to lose his wife, so he left for a school in Moray. I was still trying to figure out what I wanted, and Fran was desperately trying to convince me she loved me.”

“Then why cheat on you?”

“She said it wasn’t about not loving me. It was the thrill. After we had Lewis, she’d felt old. Said she was worried she’d missed out since she’d only ever been with me.”

“What the hell?”

“I know.” Fran’s confession had hurt like hell. True, she was a virgin when they met, and he had been with other girls before her, but few. And never had he thought he’d missed out by settling down with Fran. “But she said the idea of losing me woke her up. That she wanted only me. I was still deciding whether to give her another chance when she told me she was pregnant with Eilidh.”