CHAPTER 123: FIRST FIGHT

**OLIVER WEST**

"Kieran calm down!" His mother spoke but he ignored her. He walked towards me and his hands shot out to grip my shoulders hard enough to bruise, forcing me away from the couch and his mother to face the full brunt of his fury.

"Is everything you both discussed true? Tell me!" Each word was like a lash, and I flinched at the harshness in his tone.

"Don’t be so upset..." I reached up with my free hand to touch his face, hoping to calm him somehow, but he jerked his head away. The rejection hit me like a blow, sending spikes of pain straight through my heart.

"Yes, it is true, your dad is ill and waiting for treatments" I managed to say, my voice barely above a whisper.

Tears were starting to burn behind my eyes, but they were nothing compared to the pain I could see reflected in his. And also his mom, she had just taken her blood pressure medication, this confrontation was the last thing her heart needed.

Kieran exhaled raggedly, his grip loosening as he took a step backwards. Away from me. The distance felt like a void opening between us.

"Your mom didn’t tell you because she didn’t want to upset you..."

"What’s wrong with him? Why does he need surgery?" Kieran cut through my words, I watched his mother’s shoulders sag with defeat.

"It’s advanced leukaemia that spread to his liver," Her voice was steady but hollow as she told him about the tumour in his father’s liver, the surgery which was complicated by the leukaemia and all the treatment options that had all been exhausted.

I watched Kieran’s face as she spoke, and saw the flash of anxiety when she mentioned the percentage success rate. For a moment, just a moment, he looked like a scared little boy who didn’t understand why this was happening.

Then the anxiety vanished, replaced by something harder and unforgiving. His eyes found mine again, dark and accusing.

"You knew about this! You knew, and you said nothing,

Since when did you start discussing things with her and keeping them from me?" He pointed at his mother, who looked ready to collapse on the couch. But he wasn’t finished yet. And I was shocked as hell to discover that Kieran’s anger seemed to stem more from the fact that I’d kept a secret from him rather than his father possibly dying.

"Kieran, your mother is ill? Can we talk about this outside?"

"Don’t!" He warned, "You don’t have to show concern for her! I bet she only pretends to care now because they had always been absent from each other’s lives as they faced their careers, and now it looks like he might leave forever. Didn’t you use to hate him, Mom? You always compared my unacceptable character with his, it should make no difference to you if he died. You can just forget you had a husband like you forgot your daughter!" The sneer in his voice made his mother gasp, she clasped her chest, her face contorted with pain.

"Kieran, she’s still your mother! You can’t say such things! Your dad will be fine - he’s going to get better." My own voice was shaking now, both of us breathing hard in the charged atmosphere.

"Of course, I can say whatever I want! Now I understand why she never left, you only came back for me not because she cared, but out of panic because if her husband died, she would have no one left. Isn’t that right, Mom? If you fear abandonment so much, why did you do it to us!"

His mother staggered from the couch, her face going paler and paler. She looked ready to faint, and Kieran was being cruel to all of us - but mostly to himself.

The fear of his father’s surgery, combined with all his old wounds about being abandoned, was tearing him apart from the inside and he was projecting, onto everyone.

I couldn’t let this continue.

When he opened his mouth to say something else, I shoved hard against his chest.

"Stop it! Please don’t say anymore - I’m begging you!"

He stared at his mother and me for a long moment, his chest rising and falling rapidly. Then he turned around and stormed toward the door, each step crushing my heart a little more.

I couldn’t let him leave like this. Not with everything broken between us.

I ran after him.

He was walking away from the house at a furious pace, his shoulders rigid with anger and pain.

"Kieran, stop!" I panted, trying to keep up with his longer strides.

He didn’t slow down.

I caught up and grabbed his arm, my fingers wrapping around his wrist.

He stopped then, but only to shake me off like I was nothing more than an annoying insect. When he turned to face me, I expected to see anger. What I found cut so much deeper.

His eyes were red-rimmed and swimming with hurt.

"I understand everything she said now. Did you only agree to be with me because she asked you to?" His voice was quieter now, but somehow more devastating. "Is that why you suddenly forgave me that day? Because she told you to? All your care was done because of her request and not because you care!"

The pain and suspicion in his gaze made him look dangerous, even as he took a step closer to me.

I stared at him, baffled by the conclusion he’d drawn. He was wrong about that!

"Tell me - did she ask you to spy on me and report back to her? Do you like me or not!" The words came out in a rush as he grabbed my shoulders again, his fingers digging in painfully.

This was his fear talking - the voice that had always whispered that everyone would eventually leave him.

Before I could answer, before I could tell him how wrong he was, he shoved me away hard. I stumbled, barely managing to keep my balance.

Then he was gone.

Walking away without a backwards glance, leaving me standing there with my heart shattered into pieces on the ground.