He holds up his hands. “I’m not trying to start a fight. I’m saying I can see the tension you’re carrying.”
“Then stop looking.”
I should have taken my wife on a honeymoon.
Sure, business has been breathing down my neck, but I plan to make this marriage work till death do us part, which I hope will be a very long time. Business deals will come and go. Priorities. It’s about priorities.
There’s no time right now for a vacation to Paris or a European cruise, but I can schedule a short getaway for a few days. Somewhere local.
We go back into the meeting, and the deal closes by noon with handshakes, preliminary agreements, and lawyers promising documents by the end of next week.
Ronan looks pleased. Even Declan looks satisfied.
“This solves our problem,” Declan says. “Proves we don’t need the Sullivans.”
“Good.” I’m already reaching for my jacket. “I’m heading home.”
“We should celebrate.”
“Celebrate without me. I have some matters to attend to.”
Ronan catches my eye as I pass him and silently mouths, “Fix it.”
I place a call to my mother while I’m in the elevator.
It rings twice before she answers. “Cillian, I’m quite busy?—”
“What the fuck were you trying to do to my wife?”
A pause. “I don’t know what you mean. I invited her to a charity luncheon?—”
“With Aoife Sullivan. You orchestrated that.”
She doesn’t deny it.
“You let her show Nora photographs. You let her talk about the deal we lost.” My voice is level. It’s always level when I’m this angry. “You told me you were trying, yet you pull a stunt like this. Why?” I rage. “What were you trying to accomplish?”
“I was showing her reality. That girl is not suited to be an O’Rourke.”
“That girlis mywife.”
“A wife you married out of some misguided savior complex or something.”
“It doesn’t matter why I married her. She’s my wife and I love her.”
The words land before I fully process saying them aloud. Fuck, I can’t believe I just said that to my mother. I’ve thought it. I’ve felt it. But this is the first time I’ve admitted it to anyone, including myself, and it sits there between us. Undeniable and irreversible.
Ma clucks her tongue as though she’s disgusted. Her laugh is short and dismissive. “You sound like a child.”
“I sound like a man who knows what he wants.”
“I raised you to think strategically. To put family first.”
“I am putting family first. My wife.”
“That girl is not your family. She’s a stray you picked up because you felt responsible?—”
“You will stop calling her that.”
