It’s a warning. I see it as clear as day in his eyes.
Don’t make me have to kill you.
I take a moment, hold eye contact with him, but replay every single interaction I’ve had with him, every time he’s held Maggie, where he’s shown kindness, where he’s been ruthless.
“I don’t know if soulmates are real, Eian, and I know you and I will probably only ever see eye to eye on two things—family is everything and the innocent deserve to beprotected—but what I do know right now is that you’ll protect me. You’ll protect Maggie.”
“With my life,” he swears, and the severity has me swallowing hard.
“I will never betray you.” I sign my life away, and the only thing I feel is relief.
There’s no question, no doubt anymore. There’s only certainty, and safety in Eian’s arms.
But somehow, he makes me feel even safer.
“I love you.”
“This is insane,”I whisper, and hold Maggie closer, rocking her from side to side.
Twenty minutes ago I was getting dressed with a huge smile on my face. I felt like Eian and I could take on anything that came at us, that we’d somehow take the mayor and Lucian down and would live happily as fuck ever after.
Then reality came crashing down.
“It’s only a precaution,” Eian says for the hundredth time. “There’s no way either of us will have our heads in the game if there’s any doubt that she’s safe, Colby. You know I’m right.”
A tiny voice in the back of my brain berates me for basically promising Eian forever, but that guy’s a wuss.
Cowards don’t get everything they’ve ever dreamed of—sure, Eian and hislifestylemight be a different package than what I thought I’d find in my forever man, but the inside is what counts.
“I’m going with them,” Celly adds from behind Eian and smiles sadly at me. “I’ll make sure she’s happy as a clam, and you know Bran loves babies too, as does Nan.”
“Yeah, you told me,” I say, emotion clogging my throat.
Eian might not ever shed a tear, but I’m... let’s just say it doesn’t take a lot to make me cry. Well, I rarely cry when something happens to me, but a good book, movie, or touching moment in the fucking mall and I bawl my eyes out.
So when I kiss Maggie’s head again, I might leave a wet spot, who cares? I’ve never been apart from her—while conscious at least.
I wipe it away with my fingers and then set her down in the car seat Bran brought in. Apparently I can’t go out to the car because Eian’s aunt, the mysterious Nan, is in the car and as Eian said, now’s not the time for more revelations.
“Please send me updates.” I sound pathetic as I step back from her, and don’t give a single fuck.
“A picture every hour or two,” Bran says with a kind smile that looks foreign on his face. I know that’s what Eian looked like when he was young, though I know he probably never smiled like that. Eventually I’ll be able to separate those two. I’ll get to know Bran well enough that they won’t even seem like they look much alike anymore.
That thought finally calms me down.
We’re going to make a plan and we’re going to live through this. Even if I have to spend a few days apart from Maggie.
I haveno idea why Eian ordered all of us out of the house, but no one asked any questions, so I didn’t either. The roller coaster of emotions is getting to me, and I can’t let it.
As I walk behind him through the gardens I’ve barely had time to see, we pass a big house and see men milling around, so my guess is that’s where the guards stay, but we walk past it.
I see the big wall that surrounds the property behind the house, but there’s a good sized gap of grass between them, and then in front of us there are a lot of trees. Big trees.
Rory, Duffy, Mac, and Blake all look like they know exactly where we’re going, but I don’t, until about fifteen feet in there’s yet another house. This one’s a lot smaller, more like a cabin, and if it has two rooms, I’ll be very surprised.
Eian walks in without knocking and I see a rustic but cosy open space. A small but practical kitchen, a living room with only one couch. At the far end, there are two doors only, and Eian opens one.
“Wait here,” he murmurs, then walks down... stairs leading to a basement? He leaves the door open, so I can hear when he opens another door then speaks again. “Everyone’s here.” I hear a murmured answer but can’t make out any words. “Yes, Colby as well. It’s time, Seamus.”
