“It wouldn’t?”
“No.” He reached out with a trembling hand to touch my knee. “I’d go back to the day of her funeral. When I opened the bottle of Johnnie Walker thinking it’d get me through it. I’d go back and pour it down the sink, then I’d go to you. To give you the cuddle you needed. To promise you I’d be there. That you might not have a mum, but that I’d be good enough that you wouldn’t feel like you were missing out.”
There was no stopping the tears rolling down my face now. There was no urge to push his hand away either.
“But I can’t,” he whispered. “I’d give anything to do that, but all I can do is be there for you in the future. Inany way you’ll have me. I’ll never force my company on you or have any expectations. I’ll accept whatever you decide to give me, even if it’s just the chance to have this one conversation. And I’ll be fucking grateful for it.”
I tensed, but before I could berate him, he held up a hand. “I’m not asking for a decision now, Dominic. The ball is in your court, and I mean that. The only thing I’ll ever ask you for is to try not to hurt Ryan.”
The fight left me as I slumped back in my seat. Here, in my childhood home, it was hard to muster the confidence and determination that usually dogged me where Ryan was concerned. He’d been right when he said there was so much I didn’t know about him. This visit here showed that.
“I won’t hurt him. You don’t need to worry about that.”
“I don’t think I need to worry about him hurting you either.” Frank gave me an encouraging smile. “That boy still loves you, Dominic. Mark my words.”
“You can’t be sure about that.”
“I can. Maybe you should ask me when the one time he mentioned you was.”
I waved a hand impatiently.
“It was the night you were injured.” His eyes found the scar on my neck. “I phoned him as soon as I got the call.”
I stiffened. “That must’ve been in the middle of the night.”
“One thirty-seven a.m. on Thursday the sixteenth of July,” Frank said quietly. “Ryan was at a conference in Cardiff. I thought he was back already, but I was mistaken.”
My jaw dropped at the fact that Frank remembered the date. The exact time. “That’s when he asked about me?”
“First thing he did before getting in his car and driving straight here.” Frank shook his head indulgently. “I hate tothink how many speeding tickets he got, but he somehow shaved almost an hour off the journey. All because you were in danger.”
“And because he didn’t want you sitting, waiting for news, alone.”
“Don’t be daft, Dominic,” Frank said, not unkindly. “None of this was about me. If there’d been any feasible way for that kid to find his way into the military hospital, he would have.”
“He was what I thought of,” I whispered. A distant part of me couldn’t believe I was here, let alone sharing this with Frank, of all people. “When I lay dying in the dirt. All I could think was that I wasn’t going to get a chance to make things right with him. That all this waiting and growing up was going to be for nothing.”
“But it wasn’t. You’re here now, Dominic. Don’tletit be for nothing. Ryan loves you, he’s just scared to open up to you again.”
He wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t already know, but somehow, hearing it from him made it real. Unlike me, he’d been here for the past ten years. He knew this version of Ryan better than I ever could. “He’s getting married.”
Frank snorted and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, to Kate. If they know anything real about each other then I’ll walk naked down Farnborough High Street. Trust me, nobody wants to see that.”
“You’ve met her, then?”
“A few times.” Frank picked his cup up from the table. I debated doing the same, but it was probably cold by now. “Don’t get me wrong, she’s lovely. Kind, warm, funny. Beautiful, of course. But completely wrong for Ryan.”
I didn’t disagree but… “How can you be so sure?”
Frank thought for a minute. “Because he doesn’t come alive around her. There’s no joy in his eyes. It’s almost likehe’s with her because he can be. Because he thinks heshouldbe.”
He got to his feet suddenly and plucked the photo of us at the bonfire from the wall. “See this? That right there? How he’s looking at you? That’s love. There’s none of it there with Kate. Not once have I seen him look at her the way he did you.”
I took the frame from him, my heart in my ears as I stroked Ryan’s face through the glass. “I just need more time, Frank. He’s meant to marry her in three weeks.”
“You can do it, Dominic. Don’t play fair now.”
A plan started to come together in my mind. “You’re okay with me playing dirty?”