Here With Me (Adair Family 1)

“Jesus.” I hadn’t known that about my grandfather. I didn’t know much at all about my dad. More sadness seeped through me. “I’m so sorry.”

“We were close. My mum took off just after I was born, so I didn’t know her. But Dad couldn’t shake his addiction, and it got worse over the years. He wanted to kick it. We tried to get him help, but drugs are a massive problem here. Anyway, the withdrawals were so bad, he couldn’t stand it. When he died, his mum took me in, but she was already caring for my aunt and her two kids. We were crammed in a small high-rise flat, and I was left to my own devices. I fell in with the wrong crowd, and we did some not-very-nice things.”

He lowered his eyes, but I’d caught the shadows in them. “Gran eventually stepped in, knowing I would eventually either end up in prison or dead. She contacted my uncle who’d moved to the States years ago. He had a garage in Boston, did all right for himself. He agreed to take me in but told me if I started any nonsense, I’d be out on my ear. Not long after arriving there, I got your mum pregnant.

“I knew as soon as she told me that I wouldn’t run. I wouldn’t do to my kid what my mum had done to me.” He grimaced. “But I did it eventually, to my utter regret.”

“Mac …”

He shook his head. “Anyway, my uncle said I had to get my shit together, needed a goal, a proper career. He had a friend on the police force. Told me if I went to community college, worked for my GED, that I could eventually apply to the academy when I was twenty-one and he’d help me get in. So I worked in the garage for my uncle, and I studied part time. Then you were born.” His eyes filled with a light that took my breath away. “For the first time in my life, I had purpose. You, Robyn. I have never loved anyone the way I love you. Those have never been easy words for me to say, except with you.”

I remembered.

He used to tell me all the time he loved me.

Renewed tears slipped down my cheeks.

His sad eyes tracked them. “I tried to make things work with your mum, but we were just too different. And she never forgave me for lying about my age.”

“Did she love you?”

“Aye, I eventually realized that she did. But she was also caustic and argumentative and controlling. I brought out the worst in her. And I … I was still so young. While I’d never been allowed to be a kid, looking back, I realize emotionally, I was. I was just a kid. Still, as scary as it was, I loved being your dad. But I wasn’t ready to be a husband. Stacey and I didn’t last long. We were only together for about a year after you were born, and then I got you every other weekend and alternating holidays.”

“I remember.”

“I met Seth a few years before I joined the police academy and introduced him to your mum and everything was better for a while. They got pregnant with Regan quite quickly, but Stacey was different. Happier.” His features tightened as he looked over my shoulder, lost in his memories it seemed. “I’d been training in jiujitsu since I was eighteen, and I started RBSD during my time on the force. I was pretty good at the former—I don’t know if you remember?”

I remembered. Dad was being modest. He’d won the US national championship in jiujitsu three years running and had wanted me to learn, but Mom was against it. Said I was too young. As for the RBSD training, I hadn’t known about that. Reality-based self-defense was a style of martial arts originally developed by a soldier turned cop for close combat situations. I was sure it, Mac’s police training, and his championship wins looked good on a résumé for someone in need of a bodyguard.

Mac continued, and I understood why he was telling me all this. “I realized I didn’t want to be a cop, but I felt suited to protecting people. When a security position came up for a senator, I applied. I got it. From there, I worked as a bodyguard for a few wealthy clients. I was on a work trip in Los Angeles and quite by chance was introduced to Lachlan. His first big film was a huge hit, and his face was everywhere. He was looking for a permanent security team. At first, we were just two Scotsmen happy to be in the company of a fellow Scotsman, but then we realized we got along well, and I accepted his offer to join his team.”