“You’ve actually considered this, haven’t you?” Katie said, smiling for the first time today. “You realise that would make them rebel. Then you’d have no idea what they were up to. Think of the trouble they cause you now when they gang up on you and run in opposite directions and add that to being fifteen and thinking you know everything and your parents are only there to make your life a misery.”
“Then it’s boarding school,” Nick said. “One in the middle of nowhere. With no mobile phone reception.”
A man behind us stifled a laugh.
“Where there’s a will there’s someone who can be bribed!” Katie said, her smile now just for Nick.
“You were that nightmare teenage girl, weren’t you?” Nick said, his voice half a murmur. “I need to keep you away from my daughters. You’re probably telling them how it’s done already.”
I laughed, now more aware of Killian’s body behind me than Nick’s conversation. Half a step back took my back against his chest and one of his arms moved around my waist, his hand on my stomach. My eyes closed, the bouncing of the train and the safety of his arms almost a lullaby.
“I thought you slept well?” he said quietly, his tone low.
“I did,” I uttered back. “But that was tough in there and I feel drained.”
“Katie gave us a brief outline. He’s made threats.”
“Not in so many words. They were insinuated, if you knew what he was insinuating.”
“Back to the office, do what you’ve got to do and then to mine. We’re all going to Katie’s awards dinner tonight so don’t be too long at work,” he said. “Take a nap before we head out.”
“How come we’re all going? If anyone recognises me as a family law practitioner they’ll assume Katie’s getting divorced.”
“Exactly.” Killian nuzzled the top of my head. “Your hair smells like my shower did this morning.”
“Is that a problem?”
“No. I’d like my pillow to smell like that too.”
The giggle that came out of me was not one that I recognised. “How much comfier is your bed?”
“Plenty,” Killian’s other arm wrapped round me and I felt Nick’s eyes on us. “You can find out whenever you want.”
“I will. But only after flowers and dinner and everything else you have to do to romance me,” I said, angling to watch his expression.
“You were never the romanceable type,” he said. “Or maybe we were too busy at college doing other things.”
“Like hiding.”
The tube came to a jerky halt and we climbed off, joining the crowds heading through the wind tunnels toward the exit. I never failed to be awed at the engineering and graft that had gone into building the London Underground. The tiles and features told of the era in which it was built, without the technology of today and yet it was still London’s veins through which the workers and tourists and residents ran through.
The Callaghan Green offices were in their usual state of busyness, with Max on a tirade because someone had misplaced one of his files. I caught a brief glimpse of Seph’s face as he slunk into his office and figured that our littlest brother was trying to be a comedian again. It wasn’t an unusual game, to hide something of Max’s and then let it turn up on his desk or under the jacket he always dumped on a chair.
“We’ll use a conference room,” I said, almost walking into Jackson.
“I’ll join you,” Jackson said. “Saves you telling everything twice.”
We sat round a table, Killian to my right with Katie on the other side and I covered everything that had happened at the mediation, including Lacey’s comments.
“What do you think will happen next with his lawyers?” Jackson said.
I shrugged. “If I was them, I would hang on for a good ten days before responding to anything. Slow things down.”
Jackson nodded. He managed the practice more than anything now, his first love – or second now he had Vanessa – was business, but he was also an excellent lawyer, extremely tactical. “What’s your plan?”
“Stay quiet. Let the dust settle and not appear to panic. Then we put in for the divorce petition and see about expediting it. We can expect Lacey to contest it,” I said. “Katie, you need to be aware that without further evidence against him, he could drag it out for years.”
She looked to Nick and then to me. “If it gets to that stage I will.”
