“What? You heard? How? My father just called, and the dean told me. Well, my dad did, in the dean’s office. Oh, Roman, what will we do? So, who told you?”
She’s talking fast, a sign she’s upset and stressed.
“No one told me.” I answer that question first. “As soon as you said you didn’t know how to tell me, I guessed. I fucking killed a man, Ophelia, and I did so in a pretty deranged way.” I sigh and then give her my truth. “I don’t care if I get hurt in this. I don’t want you taken down with me, or the others. I think I should go alone and face the music. It’s been hanging over me.”
Standing, and, pulling her hands from mine, she takes a step back. She plants her fists on her hips and stares me down.
“What did you just say?”
I blink at her no-nonsense attitude. “I said that?—”
Holding one hand up, she silences me. “I know what you said. I’m not stupid. It was rhetorical. Don’t you dare, Roman. Don’t you damn well dare. You made us do that ceremony with the binding and all the other things to bring us closer together, and protect us, and now you’re just going to go and sacrifice yourself. It makes a mockery of it.”
Doesn’t she understand? I did the ceremony to save her, Cain, and Mal. They can survive without me. If Cain had left us, this would have fallen apart, and I do believe the same with Mal. But me? I’m not as important to the whole that is us.
Ophelia is watching me, and her face darkens like a storm cloud passing over a patch of blue sky.
The atmosphere between us grows heavy.
“You don’t think you matter,” she whispers. “You don’t fucking think you matter?” This time it’s a shout, not a whisper.
She turns and storms to the stairs, taking out her phone.
“What are you doing? I ask.
“Calling Cain and telling him to haul ass back here, then fetching Mal. We’re having a house meeting. First to address your frankly ludicrous levels of self-sacrificing, and second because I think I might have a solution.”
She stomps up the stairs while holding her phone to her ear, leaving me reeling.
I think I just got called out on my shit, and what did she mean by there’s a solution?
Leaning back on the couch, I run my hands through my hair and blow out a breath. I don’t know if she’s right, about me being self-sacrificing. Maybe. I just know I need to face the music, and I’m tired of running.
Ever since I killed that guard, it’s felt as if a monster is breathing down my neck. One I can’t tame and can’t escape.
A part of me is tempted to follow her, but I also know she needs to talk to Mal first, and they deserve some privacy. So instead, I wait.
Sure enough, it isn’t long before they both reappear, then Cain bursts through the door in much the same way Ophelia did. He’s shirtless and sweating and stops to stare around as though he expected to find the water tower on fire.
“What the fuck’s going on?” he demands, raking a hand through his damp hair. He locks eyes on Ophelia. “You said it was urgent.”
Her expression is grim. “It is.”
She fills him in on everything.
“Fuck,” he curses when she’s done.
I get to my feet. “I think I should be the one who deals with this. None of the rest of you need to be involved.”
“No,” Ophelia snaps. “You’re not going, and definitely not alone.”
Cain nods. “She’s right. You definitely can’t go, Rome. It would be fucking stupid to put yourself in the line of fire.”
Mal folds his arms across his chest. “If you’re all going, I’m coming with you.”
“None of us are going,” Ophelia states. “Enough is enough. I won’t have it. Vani’s dad—Jack-the-blood McGrath—is in town with some of his men, and it looks like he’s staying for a while.Vani thinks that if we offer them a decent sum, they’ll take care of this for us.”
I exchange a glance with Cain and Mal. Ophelia doesn’t sound as though she’s screwing around.
