“Well, your one still likes cinnamon toast,” she says, popping a piece in her mouth and moaning around it just to torture me. “Which you clearly remembered.”
“How could I forget?” I lean against the counter, arms crossed. “I built this place for you.”
The words hang there too long, and I see it — the way her fingers twitch on the edge of the mug. Her eyes drop, then rise again, calm but wary. She’s playing a part. She’s always been a better actress than she lets on.
“So,” I say, pushing gently, “why’d you come back, dove? And don’t give me the gala line again. I know you too well.”
She freezes for a beat. Then laughs softly, playing it off like it’s a harmless question. “I came back because your father offered me a stupid amount of money to play six events and smile for the camera.”
“You don’t need the money,” I say.
Her jaw tightens just a little. “You don’t know what I need.”
“I always know what you need and I know when you're lying.”
That gets her. She sets the mug down carefully, then meets my gaze full-on. “You think I flew across the ocean in the middle of winter just to flirt with you over tea?” she snaps, though the heat in her voice doesn’t match the cool calculation in her eyes.
“I think,” I say, stepping closer, “you’ve got a reason. And I think it’s not about music. Or galas. Or even that prick in New York.” She stiffens.Bingo. “I’ll handle him, by the way,” I add, voice lowering. “When the storm clears.”
“I don’t need you to handle anything for me,” she snaps, standing.
“You came back, Siobhán.” I move in, crowding her space now. “But not to the manor. Not to the family. You came straight here. To this house. This stable we used to dream about when we were kids. You broke in, made yourself at home, and waited for me to find you.” Her breath hitches. “That wasn’t about the music,” I say, voice soft now. “So what is it? Why are you really here?”
She looks at me for a long moment, jaw tight, chest rising with shallow breaths. I see the battle in her — the truth clawing at her throat, the lie trying to keep it caged.
But then she smiles. Sharp. Wicked. “Maybe I missed the way you beg,” she whispers, brushing past me.
Fuck me.
She walks off like she didn’t just tear something open in me. I give her five seconds, maybe six, then follow. Quiet steps. I know this house better than my own name. I find her in the bedroom, standing in front of the open closet like she belongs there.Because she does.
Her fingers trail over the clothes hanging neatly in rows — silk, cashmere, wool. Every piece hand-picked. Every one in her size. Some with tags still on. Some from designers she used to drool over in magazines, lying on our backs in this very stable, years before it ever had a roof. She doesn’t turn to face me when she speaks.
“You didn’t know if I was ever coming back,” she murmurs, fingers ghosting over a deep green sweater. “And yet here you are. Filling closets. Building homes.”
Her voice isn’t mocking, but it’s not soft either. It’s something else entirely — like awe laced with accusation.
I take a step closer. “You say that like I ever stopped waiting.”
Now she turns. Her eyes find mine, sharp and shining. "Don’t romanticize it, Cillian. You don’t wait. You prepare. You stockpile. You plot."
“You make it sound dirty.”
She raises a brow. “Isn’t it?”
“I call it faith.”
She scoffs, just barely. “You’re not a man of faith.”
“No,” I admit, moving in until the closet doors frame us both. “But I am a man who knows exactly who the fuck he wants. Always have been.”
That gets her. Her breath hitches, but she covers it by brushing past me again, pacing toward the bed like she didn’t just swallow a damn thunderclap. “This place was our dream,” she says over her shoulder. “I used to talk about it like it was a fantasy. You… you turned it into a shrine.”
“Not a shrine.” I follow. “A promise.”
She whirls on me now. “A promise to who? I left. I disappeared. I didn’t write, I didn’t call—”
“—and still, I knew you’d come back.” I cut her off, voice low. “Not for him. Not for the fucking gala. For this.”
