“OK.” I didn’t know how to respond. I could see he had something on his mind.
“Why don’t you just tell me everything on your mind, Hudson. Let loose, it would do you good,” I coaxed softly, placing my fingers on his arm. His eyes found me, and I knew that look; he was hurting.
After a moment of silence, Hudson’s fingers laced through mine. His mouth shifted into something not quite a smile.
“I know you hate me, but you can talk to me.”
His expression twisted, almost like my words had caused him pain. “I don’t hate you, Molly. Far from it. I hateme.”
His dark gaze was so intent and certain that it almost took my breath away.
And. Something. Shifted.
I could see temper and pain and something far darker in his gaze. There was a harsh light in his eyes.
I squeezed his hand so tightly, searching his face. And then he spoke. It was so quiet I hardly heard it.
“I found out my father died. He just died in prison, and I should be happy about that. But I’m not. I feel like I failed again.”
There was no disguising the bitterness in his voice.
“Why should you be happy he died?”
“He wasn’t a good man.”
As Hudson said those terrible words, his head dropped, and he pulled his hand away, using it to itch his face.
I remained silent. I intended to listen. He shifted into a better position, stroking Roger, who had come to lie beside him.
Hudson was sitting on my bed with his back against the headboard, his knees up.
I touched his leg lightly and moved closer towards him. I knew he was struggling, but didn’t know what to say. The urge to wrap my arms around him ran deep.
“I’m so sorry. I lost my mother, too.”
This brought Hudson’s head up, his brow furrowed as his eyes latched onto mine. At that moment, he looked at me like he could see into my soul.
“I know, I heard.”
In that split second, I knew I wasn’t ready to talk about my mother. I had been blinded with grief ever since that night, and to open up at that moment felt wrong, so I added, “Yeah. It isn’t easy, no matter how they go.”
A thousand thoughts flashed across his face as his features twisted before he closed his eyes. He leaned his head back against the headboard. “But have you ever been thankful that they are gone?”
“No.”
“Then you could never understand how wrong and decaying that feels,” he rasped, clearly exhausted.
“So why don’t you tell me how that feels. Help me to understand your story.”
“But that’s the point, right there. You’re the princess of it, Molly—and me,” he faded out that sentence, almost like he didn’t know what he wanted to say.
“Yes?” I said, nudging him with my elbow and swinging my body beside him.
We were now side by side on my bed. Our legs stretched out next to each other. I wore my PJs and Hudson, just his jogging bottoms.
I placed a hand on his leg in a gesture of reassurance.
“Hudson? And you?” I prompted as he threaded his fingers through mine again. Holding me fast. He placed his head on my shoulder, and I inhaled the scent of his musky shampoo.
