Page 50 of The Shape of my Scar (The Unbroken #1)

T he next day, Faolan sat across from a no-nonsense Sergeant Willis in the corner office of the precinct. The debrief was meticulous. Names. Descriptions. Contacts. She gave them everything she could. The most important thing, the children were safe. The ring had been broken.

They didn’t know about Anatoly and she didn’t volunteer.

But Malcolm had talked and given them names for a reduced sentence. He’d given up one final name that made waves in the system—Chief Assistant Constable Horiston. The man who’d been forging paperwork, turning blind eyes and unlocking the wrong doors.

At the tail end of the meeting, grizzled and sharp-eyed, Sergeant Willis had given her a long, hard look before nodding at the sapphire on her hand. “Thane Donovan?” he asked with a crooked smile.

She nodded once. “We’re getting married.”

He chuckled. “Your dad said this would happen. The Horsemen are hard men, but I guess there are cracks in their armour. You must be an exemption to their rule.”

Faolan tilted her head. “You sound oddly smug.”

He leaned against the doorframe on his way out and changed the subject “You think you’ll still be able to do this job? I understand he barely let you come here today.”

She smiled faintly. “He’ll just have to cope.”

But in truth, she wasn’t sure.

Thane waited outside the station the entire time, pacing slowly, a shadow moving across sunlit brick.

When she stepped out, he straightened immediately. His eyes swept her face, and the stress seemed to seep out. “How was it?”

“Fine,” she said. “Cormac was there. I told them almost everything. I am going to join narcotics.”

He nodded. “Good.”

That evening, they drove north.

A family dinner.

Faolan, who had once preferred solitary birthdays and muted holidays, now stood on the porch of a warm, semi-detached with her hand in Thane’s.

His mother answered the door first. She was soft-eyed and smaller than Faolan had expected, and the moment she saw her, she pulled her in without hesitation. “Thank God,” she whispered into Faolan’s hair. “We prayed that you were alive.”

Thane’s sister came next. She had his eyes but not his walls. She cried openly and hugged Faolan tight, murmuring, “Welcome home.”

Then came his father, with eyes just like Thane’s. It was like looking at an older, shorter version of him with grey in his hair. He awkwardly took Faolan’s hand, shook it firmly and couldn’t stop the tears. “Thank you,” he said hoarsely, “for saving our lad.”

She tried to reply, but her throat didn’t work.

His mother clapped her hands together suddenly. “Right. Enough of that, we need to eat.”

And just like that, the awkwardness dissipated like mist.

They ate stew and bread and peach cobbler, passing around wine until even Thane laughed, head thrown back, hand on her thigh under the table.

She glanced at the ring again. They had all “oohed” and “aahed” at it, and his mother was already planning the wedding.

It sat heavy and shining on her pale finger.

Hers…just like Thane.

The road stretched ahead of them, his parents’ house now a warmth in the rearview mirror, the sky blushed with the last hints of dusk. The silence between them wasn’t uncomfortable; it was the kind that held meaning, that let memory speak.

Faolan leaned her head against the window, the cool glass grounding her. Thane drove with one hand on the wheel, the other resting between them, palm up. Waiting.

She slid her fingers into his without a word.

After a long while, he spoke. “You remember ‘The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter’?”

Her eyes flicked to him. “Princess Kaguya?”

He nodded. “I used to think you were her. That you’d gone back to the moon and left me behind.”

She didn’t respond at first. The ache in her throat surprised her.

Then he said, softer, “I always wondered if I imagined you… If you were just a story I made up to survive.”

“Thane…”

He shook his head, a slight smile curving his mouth. “I’d like to go to Japan someday. See the mountains. The cherry blossoms. Walk through the temples.”

“You’ve never been?”

He gave her a look. “You know I haven’t.”

“You told me you wanted to go. You said you’d become a samurai,” she said, voice warm with the memory.

He grinned faintly. “You said you’d be the ninja who showed up just to mock my form.”

“I would have kicked your arse, for sure.”

They both chuckled, the sound soft and shared.

Then, after a beat, his voice turned serious again. “There are a lot of firsts I can’t share with you: my first kiss, my first time. All that messy, teenage coming-of-age crap. It wasn’t you. And that kills me sometimes.”

Faolan stayed quiet, listening.

“But I saved everything else,” he said. “The dreams. The plans. The future. Just in case I ever found you.”

She blinked hard, turning her head to him.

He glanced at her, serious now. “Come on this trip with me.”

She didn’t answer immediately, but then, she said, “Are you sure you don’t want to make it some kind of solo pilgrimage? I don’t want to be clingy.”

“I’m not sure of anything,” he said, “except for you.” There was no hesitation in his voice.

“You are my end game,” he murmured. “Nothing else matters.”

Faolan turned to the window again, watching the moon rise over the fields. And with her fingers still laced in his, she whispered, “Then let’s go.”