Saint cut him off from somewhere behind me. “No. Water.”
Rubi’s brows rose. “What’s happened to activate Nurse Malone?”
“Shut the fuck up.” I walked away. Hesitated as responsibility bore down on me and turned me round again. “Get Saint in dry clothes and warm him up. Ranger needs some food before he gets his head down, but check on him later. He took a knock to the head tonight.”
I ranked Rubi too. The orders were mine to give and his to obey, and for once in our lives, I made sure he knew it.
The blinds were drawn in the chapel. I let myself in, making enough noise that Cam heard me coming. Sometimes he sat alone too long and forgot where he was.
Tonight, though, I found him present and waiting, dark brows knotted as he took in the royal state of me. “You didn’t call in any drama.”
“There was none.”
“Why do you look like you rolled through the Somme on your way home then?”
I flopped into a seat, mine, for the first time in a while, a heavy sigh my only answer.
Cam rose from his throne—a tatty plastic office chair—and disappeared into the tiny chapel kitchen.
He came back with the bottle of rum Saint had refused me. Coffee too, as dark as his O’Brian gaze. “You hungry?”
“No.”
“You need to eat?”
“Probably.”
Cam wandered off again. If he came back with a giant plate of food, I was going to lose it.
He brought me my favourite sandwich—corned beef and Branston pickle.
Love him.
He watched me eat, keeping his O’Brian impatience at a manageable simmer. Poured me a rum that I sank before I wrapped my hands around the coffee mug. “Better?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“You’re unhinged when you don’t eat.”
“Saint gave me a KitKat.”
“That ain’t a meal. Now tell me what the fuck happened out there.”
Despite my reluctance to exist in this moment, I told him everything, from the years-old conversations with Rocco to the scars on Locke’s back. From the torture chamber we’d discovered to the realisation that we’d let a monster slip through our fingers.
It felt like a purge.
It felt likebetrayal. But it had to happen. Cam was our president for reasons far beyond his family name, and I fucking needed him.
Cam took it all in, the only sign of emotion the redness in his eyes. When I was done, he sat back in his seat, scratching absent, distressed fingers through the thick, dark scruff on his jaw. “Does Alexei know all this?”
“No.”
“Saint?”
“He does now. He got between me and Ranger when we got into it.”
“And Orla knows about the abuse, but not the threat?”
