Chapter 1
I was dying, and my husband was busy planning a lavish welcome-home party for his true love—my stepsister.
For years, I was the despised "country girl" who ruined their perfect romance. So, I decided to finally give him what he wanted: divorce papers, and my quiet disappearance. Let them be happy.
What Cillian didn't know was that my terminal illness was the fatal price of a brutal lie—an organ stolen from my body years ago to save her life.
By the time the bloody truth unraveled and he tore the world apart looking for me, I was already gone.
But the final countdown of my life—and the death of our bitter marriage—all began on the day I received my death sentence...
When I stepped out of the hospital, the sea wind hit me in the face, sharp enough to make my head throb.
I gripped the diagnosis report in my hand and stood on the stone-paved main street, suddenly at a loss. Terminal liver cancer. Dr. Lorcan said I had about six months left.
Just as my mind went blank, I heard hoofbeats coming from the direction of my parents' place—the Kavanagh ranch. A young lad from the neighboring farm rode up and reined in right in front of me.
"Mrs. Brennan," he panted, "your mother sent me to find you. Miss Aisling came back from London today—she wants you home. Right away."
Then he added, repeating my mother's words as if he were delivering a verdict, "It's been years. Don't you have anything to say to your sister?"
My nose stung. The hand holding the report started to shake.
"Oh—and Mr. Brennan's there too," the lad said. "He told me to pass this on: ‘We're welcoming Ash home. Get back early.'"
Ash. Such an intimate nickname.
My husband, Cillian Brennan, never called me anything but my full name—usually with a faint edge of impatience. People in town liked to say I'd forced him into marrying me. And Cillian himself seemed to believe it, too: that marrying me had been sheer obligation.
Aisling—my stepsister—had left for London heartbroken and hadn't come back in years. And so Cillian, with no one left to compete for him, became my husband.
But time hadn't worn away what they felt for each other.
Just imagining them together, I could almost hear Aisling's bell-like laughter—and Cillian answering her with a warmth he'd never once shown me. That easy happiness, that soft, genuine smile… it had never belonged to me.
No matter how hard I tried to please him, the best I ever got was a token curve of his lips—never reaching his eyes.
From beginning to end, I'd been the villain. The interloper. The woman who tore apart a love story—like the most loathsome character in the priest's moral tales at church.
So maybe dying like this was God's justice after all.
"Fine," I said, my voice dry and scraped raw. "Tell my mother I'll be home soon."
It felt like it took everything I had just to get the words out.
It had been a gamble from the start—one with an ending already written. I'd never been able to measure up to Aisling. My parents loved her. My husband did too. The only person who'd ever truly been on my side—Gran—had died years ago.
Thinking of Gran steadied me, just a little. She used to tell me everyone had a purpose in this world. Even the smallest life mattered.
But maybe my purpose was simply to make room for other people's happiness… and then leave quietly.
With that thought, death didn't seem quite so frightening. At least in heaven, Gran would be there, waiting for me.
In the end, I didn't go to the welcome-home dinner for Aisling. Call it guilt, call it cowardice—I didn't want to care what anyone said anymore.
Just this once, let me be selfish.
Maybe the diagnosis had frightened all sense out of me, because I spent the whole night sitting in the old chair in the sitting room, staring blankly at the weak glow of the fire.
After midnight, Cillian still hadn't come home. Gran's old grandfather clock ticked on and on, like it was counting down the seconds of my life.
The familiar pain spread upward from my lower abdomen until I was drenched in cold sweat. Somewhere in the haze, I thought I heard the lock turn.
I forced myself to focus—only to realize there was nothing. Don't think about Cillian again, I told myself, shaking my head.
Saoirse, without you, Cillian would be better off.
I closed my eyes and leaned back, letting memories of him drift in. Most of the time, he wore that distant, unreadable expression—never much feeling in it. But he could be gentle. Patient.
He'd drive his battered old Ford to the cliffs to watch the most beautiful sunsets on the coast. When I'd pricked myself on thorns, he'd clean the wound carefully, then pull me into his arms and soothe me until I stopped shaking.
Cillian was successful, handsome—every girl in this town's idea of the perfect husband. He would always be a good man. A good husband. A good son-in-law.
And I was just the woman who stole what wasn't hers—an unforgivable woman, covered in scabs and bruises, still stumbling toward him, desperate to be pardoned.
But I wanted to be loved too.
Maybe it was the pain, maybe it was something else, but my consciousness slowly slipped away. When I finally came to, the sun had only just risen.
Sea air crept in through the cracks in the window, cold and damp. I shivered as I opened my eyes.
Cillian hadn't come home all night.
That wasn't like him.
From the day we started dating to the day we married, he'd never stayed out overnight.
And now, sitting alone in the freezing dawn, I realized my marriage had died before I did.
