“Smells good,” he murmurs, brushing a hand down my spine as he passes. The touch is light. Familiar. A casual kind of intimacy that hurts more than cruelty ever could.
“I made breakfast,” I say. My voice sounds steadier than I feel. “And tea.”
“Proper Irish wife material, so you are.”
I force a smile and hand him a mug. “Shut up and drink, Cill.”
He grins against the rim, sips, then sets the mug down to steal a bite of toast off my plate like it belongs to him. Maybe it does. I busy myself with the eggs on the pan, because if I look at him too long, I’ll break again.
He lingers behind me, arms circling my waist, mouth brushing the curve of my neck. “You okay, dove?”
I nod. Lie. He kisses my cheek.I don’t deserve it.
We eat quietly, the kind of silence that would feel comfortable in any other life. I make more tea. He talks about the morning—meetings at the docks, something with the Russians that makes my stomach tighten. I nod along, half-hearing, half-drowning.
Because I know the code. I’ve always known it. My birthday. His lock code. My name inked in blood. And I’m going to steal it.
We get dressed slowly, like neither of us is in a rush to leave the bubble. He buttons my coat. I fix his collar. Our hands touch too long. Our eyes hold too much. He leans in, brushes a kiss to my mouth like a promise.
“Be good while I’m gone,” he whispers. “And maybe I’ll come back and finish what I started.”
I swallow. Nod.Lie, lie, lie.
“Don’t get shot.”
He smirks. “Smile pretty for the cameras and don’t bite their heads off..”
“No promises.”
He taps my nose, then turns for the door. I watch him go, heart heavy. Spine splintering. Because in less than an hour, I’ll be sitting across from my contact with the code already memorized. And if I hand it over… I lose him.
Themanoristooquiet. I sit at the piano in the music room, fingers still aching from last night. From him. From everything I swore I’d never want again.
The room smells like old books and varnished wood. Dust motes dance through the beam of sunlight slicing across the keys. I should play something. I should fill the silence. But I’m too aware of the weight in my chest. The clock ticking toward something I can’t undo.
And then— click. A soft groan of old mechanics as part of the wall shifts. A door I didn’t know was there creaks open from behind a tall shelf. I don’t move. Not at first.
Then he steps through. Tall. Hooded. Coat too plain to be unnoticeable. Gloves. Eyes I can’t see beneath the shadow of the hood.
“You’re late,” I say, even though I’m the one who waited.
“What’s the code?”
No small talk. No softness. No threat, either—just cold purpose. His voice is sharp, but not familiar. Not someone I’ve met before. I hesitate. My stomach turns. My hands grip the edge of the bench.
“I need more answers,” I say.
He doesn’t flinch. Instead, he pulls something from inside his coat. A red ledger. The ledger. The cover is cracked, the corners worn. He opens it without a word, flipping pages with surgical precision until he finds the one he wants. And then he lays it open in front of me. A photograph. Faded. Taped to the page. My mother.
Smiling in a summer dress. Next to her name. And a number. One I don’t recognize. A code of some kind. Below that—Cillian’s father’s name. And one word in red: “Cillian.”
The man speaks again, soft this time. “There’s more. Much more. And it all goes back to your precious Dublin Devil.”
My heart stutters.
“What is this?” My voice barely works. “What does he have to do with her?”
“He was there.” He taps the photograph.
