An even bigger fucking arsehole.
He released her hands and dropped back into the sofa, arching his neck over the back of it as he looked to the ceiling.
If sex was out, what was left? More of the truth? Didn’t he owe her a little after all she’d told him?
‘My father was a drunk.’
The words resounded around the room, out before he’d even mentally agreed to them, the spoken confession so strange and alien.
‘Your father?’
He flicked his eyes over her, taking in her sympathetic beauty and wishing he’d buried his decency and gone for sex. It would be easier now that she knew who he was. Less complicated.
And that in itself was ridiculous. He had his rules for a reason: business and sex didn’t mix. And yet letting this personal exchange continue felt far more threatening.
‘You don’t need to listen to this.’
‘I want to,’ she said, leaning towards him, her palm coming to rest on the sofa between them, her compassion filling the air.
Christ, she was good.
And he didn’t have to tell her everything—just enough to make her feel he’d shared...
Resigned, he glued his gaze to the perfectly smooth white ceiling and linked his hands together behind his head. ‘My father wasn’t like Andrews,’ he began, matter-of-fact. ‘He was what you’d call a chronic severe alcoholic—one who liked to take his anger with the world out on me and then use alcohol as an excuse.’
‘My goodness—that’s awful,’ she rushed out, her obvious horror making it impossible for him to overlook the brutal truth of his confession, of his past.
But he wanted to. He wanted to forget it all save for the lessons it had taught him.
The hairs prickled on the backs of his arms and he clasped his hands tighter. ‘It is what it is.’
‘Was he always that way?’
‘No,’ he acknowledged, his stomach drawing tight as the chill continued to spread under his skin. ‘He was a Welsh miner. Life was tough, but he did all he could. He worked hard and he was well liked.’
Memories he didn’t want pushed to the surface, telling him of happier times—of Christmases, birthdays, eisteddfods, picnics in the park; all three of them happy and content. And then...
‘Everything changed when I was eight. My mother got sick, and by the time they detected the cancer it was too late. She was gone within a year.’
He felt Jennifer’s touch before he sensed her move—felt her hand curving over his thigh and soothing the chill directly beneath.
‘Oh, Marcus, I’m so sorry.’
He gave a forced shrug. ‘Dad never recovered. He hit the bottle hard and never came back from it.’
‘And he beat you?’
She sounded dazed, and her fingers were starting to move over him in a gentle caress. He looked to her hand and then to her face. Was she even aware she was doing it?
‘He was angry,’ he said simply.
‘But still...’
Her eyes watered and he snapped his own away, fixating on the ceiling.
‘It was hell for a while,’ he admitted after a pause. ‘But when I turned twelve my grandparents took me in. I was a scrawny misfit who’d borne enough bruises to make people aware of what was happening and they couldn’t sit by any longer.’
‘Did you live with them for a while?’