"Let me see," she says.
I turn my face toward her. The bruise on my left cheek must be darkening by now. My lip is split. I can feel the swelling pulling my skin tight.
Saoirse's eyes go hard for a fraction of a second. Something cold and absolute moves behind them, something that reminds me viscerally that this woman didn't just marry into the Bratva. She survived it. She raised her children inside it. She knows exactly what her sons are doing right now, and she approves.
Then the softness returns. She brushes my hair back from my face and kisses my forehead.
"I’ve got some cream that’ll clear this right up," she says, nodding at Iris who promptly zips from the kitchen. "Then tea. Then we'll talk, or we won't. Whatever you need."
The tea appears in front of me. Hot, sweet, and milky. I wrap my hands around the mug and the warmth seeps into my frozen fingers. Iris plops back down beside me as she slides a label-less jar across to Saoirse.
The back door opens and Tanya slips in. Aidan's wife. She's in workout clothes with a coat thrown over her shoulders, her hair pulled into a messy knot. She takes one look at me and her face tightens.
"Jesus," she breathes. Then she pulls out the chair next to Grace and sits down. "Are you okay?"
"I'm okay." My voice is hoarse. "He didn't... it wasn't as bad as it could have been."
"That's not a high bar,” Tanya says drily, shaking her head.
A minute later, Katya appears. She's enormous, heavily pregnant, one hand braced against the small of her back and the other resting on the swell of her belly. She moves slowly, carefully, but the look on her face is anything but gentle.
"Anya’s on her way down.” She looks across to me. “If Killian doesn't break every bone in that man's body, I'm going to waddle over there and do it myself," she says, lowering herself into a chair with a grimace.
"Katya, sit down before you pop," Iris says.
"I'm fine. The baby's fine. We're both furious." She reaches across the table and takes my hand. Her fingers are swollen from the pregnancy and her grip is fierce. "You're one of us now, Nadia. Do you understand that? Whatever happened before tonight, whatever you've been carrying, it's ours now too. You don't do this alone anymore."
I stare at her. At all of them. Saoirse scooping cream onto her fingers, steady and sure, then gently smoothing it over my skin. Grace with her calm, measured presence. Iris with her arm still touching mine. Tanya in her pajamas. Katya, eight months pregnant and ready to wage war.
These women don't know the full story. They don't know about the photos, the blackmail, the years of payments. They know only that someone hurt me and their men went to handle it, and their response was to gather in this kitchen at seven o'clock at night and wrap me in tea and blankets and fierce, unquestioning loyalty.
A sob breaks out of me. Ugly, loud, graceless. I press my hand over my mouth but it's too late, the sound is already filling the kitchen, and then I'm crying properly. The kind of crying I haven't done in front of anyone since I was a child. The kind that shakes your whole body and makes your ribs ache and doesn't care who's watching.
Iris pulls me into her side. Saoirse's hand rests on my shoulder. Someone, Tanya maybe, squeezes my knee under the table.
I cry until there's nothing left. Until the sobs turn to shuddering breaths and the shuddering breaths turn to stillness. The kitchen is quiet around me. Patient. No one rushes me. No one tells me to stop.
"Sorry," I whisper into Iris's shoulder.
"Don't you dare apologize," Saoirse says. Her voice has an edge to it that could cut glass. "You cry as much as you need to. This kitchen has seen plenty of tears and it'll see plenty more. That's what it's for."
I sit up. Wipe my face with a tissue that one of the women presents to me, then take a sip of tea that's gone lukewarm. An ice pack is pressed gently to my cheek by Grace, who holds it there without comment. It feels soothing on top of Saoirse’s cream.
Katya rubs her belly and winces occasionally. Tanya makes a second pot of tea. Iris talks softly about nothing, filling the silence with easy words that require no response. Saoirse stands at the counter like a sentinel, her eyes drifting to the window every few minutes, watching for headlights.
It's almost ten when the cars pull into the drive.
The kitchen tenses. Every woman in the room straightens. Saoirse moves to the back door and opens it before anyone has knocked.
Liam comes in first. His shirt sleeves are rolled up and there's blood on his forearms. He goes straight to Grace, kisses her hair, murmurs something I can't hear. She nods.
Aidan is next. He catches Tanya's eye across the room and something passes between them. She stands and goes to him and he wraps his arm around her, pulling her close, before she turns and nods at me, and they leave.
Killian comes through the door and Katya struggles to her feet. He crosses the kitchen in three strides and cups her face, studying her like she's the one who was hurt.
"Sit down," he says. "Both of you." His hand moves to her belly.
Connor arrives shortly after, his scarred face softening when his eyes land on Anya, who came into the kitchen at some point during my bout of crying.
