Wordlessly, she stepped back and motioned him to come into the living room.
The front door creaked open, and she spun around. Michael stepped inside, his face a mask of false calm.
“Get the hell out,” Aisling snapped, voice sharp as broken glass. “We’re done. I don’t ever want to see you again.”
Michael’s brow furrowed, but instead of leaving, his gaze drifted past her. He squinted. “Wait a second... I know you. You’re that author.”
Patrick’s emerald eyes hardened to stone as he stepped forward, his voice low and dangerous. “You heard her. Leave. And if I ever hear you've come near her after today, you’ll never work in publishing again. Are we clear?”
Michael paled, his bravado cracking. He took an uncertain step backward and looked at Aisling as if expecting her to intervene.
She smiled coldly. “You heard him. Get out, or I’ll call the Garda. And trust me—I won’t hesitate.”
Michael paused just a beat too long, then let out a resigned breath and turned on his heel, leaving the door wide open.
Outside, the goat let out a defiantbaa. Aisling hoped it chased him all the way to the main road.
She shut the door with finality, threw the bolt, and turned back to Patrick—her breath still caught somewhere between relief and rage.
“Sorry about that. He just showed up out of the blue,” she said.Kinda like you…she wanted to add.
“Hopefully, he won’t bother you again,” he said.
Patrick Wright crossed into the room, hesitant, his weathered hands wringing the cap between them. His face looked like a map of regrets, every line carved by mistakes he couldn't undo. His emerald eyes, so much like her own, darted around the room, not quite able to meet hers.
“You’ve really changed your grandmother’s house,” he said.
He’d been here before. Of course, he had. Her mother must have brought him here to meet Noreen at some point.
"So," she said, arms folding tightly across her chest, holding herself together. "You finally decided to show up.”
Patrick flinched, the words hitting their mark.
"I deserve worse," he said, his voice rough and thick with guilt.
"You're damn right, you do.” Her voice cracked, but she didn't back down. "You left. You abandoned us.You abandoned me."
He nodded, swallowing hard like every syllable ripped at him.
"I did," he said quietly. "And I will regret it every day for the rest of my life."
Aisling stared at him, heart hammering against her ribs. She wanted to scream. To throw something. To weep. Instead, she stood there, frozen, daring him to lie to her face. So he had abandoned them. She had just assumed and wanted him to deny it, but the truth was much worse than fiction.
"Why did you come?” she asked, her voice sharp. "Guilt? Curiosity? Some pathetic stab at redemption?"
Patrick exhaled shakily, running a trembling hand through his graying hair.
"No," he said. “When I received your email, I decided it was time for you to know the truth. And I wanted us to talk in person. Not over email or a phone.”
Oh, how she’d longed to know the truth for so many years, but was his version the real one?
“Which is?”
“I didn’t know about you."
The world tilted slightly beneath her feet.
"Don't lie to me," she whispered.
