Page 53 of Never Tell Secrets

“I know. Sometimes it’s easier to stay in our pain. It’s familiar to us, we feel safe there. But look at what it’s done to you. What it’s done to me. It’s time to let it go.” I squeezed his hand. “Just breathe and let it go. It’s time.”

We stayed there for a long time, standing together as Alfie soaked in his nightmares. They tortured and taunted him, doing their best to drag him back under, but for the first time, he didn’t sink. He didn’t push me away or hurt himself, he didn’t lash out or turn himself to stone, he let his demons do their worst until they got tired and began to fade.

I could almost feel it when the change happened, his breathing came easier, his grip relaxed, humanity came back into his eyes. Eventually, he let go of my hand and rested his forearms on the balcony, sighing. He looked over the edge, staring down at the ground where his brother’s body had once lain, crumpled and bloody.

Alfie stared down in the same way I’d stared at the river years after my mum’s death when the guilt had finally eased. It was just a river. This was just a house. For years my mum had been a mottled corpse haunting the river, wet and choking on reeds. Charles had been a skull-crushed ghost wandering these hallowed halls, cursing his brother’s name.

But it wasn’t true.

Our guilt had just made it up. And we had nursed the lie until it grew and grew and became truth. The difference was, I had been surrounded by love. My gran and Keira, they had eased it away, and my ghost, my mum, she had loved me, so how could she want to hurt me? Forgiving myself had been easier for me.

But Alfie? His ghost wanted to flay him alive and eat his bones. And his family? There was no love there. Only cold indifference, a pain worse than hatred, just two women wringing him out like worn out silk, making him drip money into their greedy hands.

Yet I didn’t hurt for him. I was happy for him. As the tension released from his shoulders and he breathed easier, I was proud of him. I didn’t trust him, probably I never ever would, but I was glad he was free.

I leaned on the balcony too, mimicking him. He looked at me, a faint shimmer of humanity in his eyes that would never fail to penetrate me to my core.

“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”

I didn’t answer, I didn’t know how to, not when he was looking at me like I was rain on his drought-dry earth. Not when I knew I was just a temporary shower.

He straightened, looking down at me, and I straightened too. “My little ghostbuster. You’ll never stop coming through for me, will you?”

I stiffened, resisting as his tendrils crept towards me.

“You got the job done yourself, Alfie.” I tilted my chin, shaking his endearments away. “Are you done in here?” His shoulders dropped a little and it pained me to see it, but I had to remember my boundaries. I could only go with him so far, far enough to heal us, not far enough to fall back into his whirlpool.

“Yeah. I’m good.”

“Okay, we should get back.” I turned to leave but he stepped into my space before I could move.

“I know you need to shut me out now, I get it. But I want you to know that I’m grateful for this. Thank you, Lo.”

“You’re welcome, Alfie.” I sighed, feeling the need to address my own elephant in the room. “I’m sorry that I can’t connect with you the way you want. There’s too much…but for these three months, maybe we can work on being friends? I would really like that.”

His eyes glinted in the moonlight as his brow set in a frown. “We aren’t friends, O’Connell. We’re never going to befriends.”

“Alfie, I?—”

“If you call me your friend one more time, that collar never comes off. We clear?” With his words, everything south clenched deliciously against my will.

A strange realisation hit me then. I had no idea what kind of man Alfie was without his demons controlling him. I had no idea how much of the man I knew was who he really was and how much was a result of his pain. I had to get to know him all over again. But I guess I knew one thing–his dark possessiveness was a built in trait that wasn’t going anywhere. It was a fact my psyche feared and my body yearned for.

I swallowed my nerves, my rising temperature, and nodded.

No friend zone for us. Got it.

Nineteen

“You sure you want to do this?” I asked Alfie as we wound back through the halls, the noise from the party growing ever louder. “That was pretty heavy back there, I wouldn’t blame you if you needed some time to yourself.”

“Time to myself is the opposite of what I need right now. Besides, bringing you here wasn’t just about me, Lo. I wanted you to experience the club. Within reason, anyway.” He gave me a smirk that I wasn’t sure I liked.

“Within reason?”

“Yes. You can watch but you don’t touch anyone and no one touches you.”

“What if I see something and I want to try it out?” I asked, only half-teasing.