Chapter 9
Nora
The estate materializes like something from a dream—iron gates, a long gravel drive lined with mature oaks, and a house at the end of it that isn’t a house at all.
It’s a manor. Three stories of stone and glass, lit from below, with expensive cars already arranged in front of it like a high-end showroom.
I count the trees as we pass. Twenty-seven on the left; twenty-seven on the right. Then I count the cars. Six.
Cillian parks and kills the engine. He doesn’t move immediately, and neither do I. The silence between us is different from the easy quiet we’ve built over the last few days. This one has teeth.
“Stay with me. I’ve got you.” His hand finds mine on my lap. “You’ll be fine.”
I’m uncertain who he’s trying to reassure—me, or himself—but I nod, because speaking feels dangerous right now. My throat is wound tight with something I refuse to call panic.
He squeezes once, then gets out and comes around to open my door.
I smooth the front of my dress—the green one, the one he chose—and take his arm.
With every step toward the front door, I think about how this morning I was in his lap with his hands on me. That woman and this woman feel like strangers to each other.
A housekeeper opens the door before we reach it, and we are ushered into a formal dining room that makes my thrift-store bones ache.
A table long enough to seat twelve is set with china and crystal.
The crystal glasses catch the overhead light and throw it in a dozen directions.
There are sprays of flowers in the center. Real ones.
Three men are already seated. They all turn when we walk in.
Cillian first introduces me to Declan, the second oldest after Cillian.
He has Cillian’s darkness, only more so.
He’s built like a wall, and he looks at me the way a person looks at something that doesn’t add up.
Not hostile. Just a confused curiosity. His scarred hands rest flat on the table. He doesn’t blink.
The third brother—Ronan—tips his chin and offers a polite smile. He’s also curious. Cautious. He’s taking me apart and putting me back together in his head, and he’s smooth enough that it’s hardly noticeable.
Lorcan, the youngest, grins at me from across the table. A real grin, crooked and unguarded. He gives me a little wave, like we’re already friends.
And then there’s the woman at the head of the table.
I grip Cillian’s arm harder.
Kathleen O’Rourke is not what I expected.
I expected someone loud, someone, wielding power like a blunt instrument.
Instead, she’s precise. Her iron-gray hair is swept back from a face that was beautiful once and is still striking.
She wears expensive clothes and muted tones and rings on every finger.
She holds a wine glass and scrutinizes me with eyes the same shade of green as her son’s.
The coldness in them reminds me of an Arctic frost.
She sets the glass down.
“So.” Her voice is as warm as a marble floor in January. “This is the little waif who trapped my son.”
The air in the room compresses.
Cillian’s arm goes to granite under my hand. “Mother.” One word. A warning carved out of ice. “Behave.”
Kathleen’s smile doesn’t waver. “I’m merely anxious to get to know my daughter-in-law.” She draws daughter-in-law out mockingly, like her smile.
I smile back at her. I’ve been smiling at people who wanted to hurt or bully me my entire life. I’m very good at it.
As dinner is served, I’m silent.
I pick up the right fork because I watched which one Ronan reached for. I keep my elbows off the table. I eat slowly. I do everything right and none of it matters, because Kathleen is already loading her ammo for the next round.
It happens as Cillian is drawn into a conversation with Declan and Ronan about something involving a shipment and a contact named Brennan. I hear their voices but not the words. My attention is locked on the woman across from me, even though my eyes remain down on my plate.
“What did your family do, dear?” Kathleen asks, her tone all maternal curiosity.
I set my fork down. “My father worked odd jobs.”
“Odd jobs.” She repeats it thoughtfully, as if she’s filing it somewhere. “And your mother?”
“She passed away when I was young.”
“Oh, how difficult.” Not a trace of sympathy in it. “So you were raised largely by the odd-jobs man.”
“Yes.”
“And schooling? Where did you attend?”
“Public school. I graduated.”
“Locally, I assume.” She takes a sip of wine. “No university plans?”
“I…uh… it wasn’t feasible. I was working.” Keeping the lights on and trying to keep my father from drinking himself to death, but I don’t say that.
“Of course.” Another thoughtful pause. “Any particular skills? Accomplishments?”
I know what she’s doing. She’s not asking questions. She’s drawing a map of everything I’m not, and she wants me to see it clearly.
“I’m a hard worker,” I say.
“I’m sure you are.” Her smile is immaculate and merciless. “It must have been exhausting, all that hard work, with no real prospects. And then suddenly—” she gestures vaguely toward Cillian, “—you’re swept up into all of this.”
My nails press into my palm under the table.
Lorcan’s jaw tightens across from me. Ronan’s eyes cut to Kathleen briefly, then away.
“I imagine it must feel like a dream come true.” She tilts her head. “The kind you’re afraid to wake up from.”
Cillian’s fork hits the plate.
The sound isn’t loud, but it silences the entire table.
He turns to his mother, and the temperature in the room drops. “Enough.”
“I’m just making conversation, darling—”
“Your thinly veiled innuendos don’t go unnoticed. You’re being rude to my wife.” He holds her gaze without blinking. “It stops now.”
No one moves. No one breathes.
Declan leans back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest. “Come on.” His voice is low, almost reasonable. “We all know this marriage isn’t real. It’s a sham. There’s no way you actually have feelings—”
“She is my wife.” Cillian doesn’t raise his voice. He doesn’t have to. “And I will put a bullet through anyone who disrespects her. Anyone.” His eyes move to each of his brothers in turn, unhurried. “Including family members.”
Lorcan is the first one to move. He reaches for the bread basket, drops a roll on my plate, and says, “So, Nora. Got any hobbies?”
I pause for a long moment before answering. “I like to read. Cillian bought me a whole shelf full of books. He’s been very generous.”
“Yeah,” Lorcan grins widely. “He’s a prince that way.”
Declan snorts. Ronan cough-laughs then pinches the bridge of his nose.
“What’s your favorite genre?” he continues. “I’ve been trying to get into reading—Ronan tells me it’ll make me less of an idiot, which, honestly, I can’t argue with.”
I look at Lorcan—the charming, warm, trying-hard youngest brother—and feel my tense muscles loosen ever so slightly. “Mostly fiction. Some classics, some romance.”
“Romance.” He points at me. “Okay. Give me a starter one. Something I won’t fall asleep reading.”
“Lorcan,” Declan says flatly.
“What? I’m making polite dinner conversation. Isn’t that what we’re doing?” He looks around the table. “Don’t blame me just because you losers have no manners.”
I answer him and the two of us talk about books for the rest of dinner—him asking questions he probably doesn’t care about but asks anyway, me answering with more words than I’ve strung together all night.
It’s the only genuine kindness that happens at this table, and I’m so grateful for it that I could cry.
After the plates are cleared, Kathleen rises and suggests we leave the men to their business and retire to the sitting room.
I don’t want to go. Every instinct I have—the ones honed by years of reading rooms, people, and the specific quality of danger—tells me not to go.
But Cillian is pulled into a deep conversation with Ronan and Declan before I can catch his eye, and Kathleen is already moving toward the hallway with the expectation that I’ll follow.
So, reluctantly, I do.
The sitting room is all pale upholstery and antique furniture. Kathleen settles into a chair like a queen taking her throne, and I sit on the edge of the settee across from her.
She doesn’t waste time.
“You must understand,” she says, “this family has expectations.”
“Yes, ma’am. I’m trying to meet them.”
“Are you?” She studies me with those green eyes. “Or are you simply trying to hold onto a lifestyle you never could have achieved otherwise?”
The cruelty of it is so clean, so surgical, that for a second I just sit with it. Let it settle.
“I care for him,” I say.
Her smile is almost gentle. “How quaint.”
She smooths a crease from her skirt. “My son has always had a savior complex. It’s an admirable quality in certain contexts. But you should understand—what he feels for you now is the novelty of rescuing something broken. It’s pity dressed up as affection. Once that wears off—”
“I’d rather not discuss—”
She ignores me and talks right over me. “Once the novelty wears off, there are women far better suited to stand beside him. Women with education, with connections, with the social fluency this life requires. The Sullivan family alone has—”
“Mother.”
Cillian fills the doorway. He takes in the room in one sweep—Kathleen’s composed posture, my hands locked together in my lap, whatever is written across my face—and his jaw hardens to stone.
“A word. Now.”
Kathleen rises without hurry, smoothing her skirt again. She passes me on her way to the door and doesn’t look at me.
I sit very still and listen to them move down the hall. Their voices carry.
“You will never speak to her like that again.”
“I’m protecting you, Cillian—”
“From what? Being happy?”
A pause. “From making a mistake. The Sullivan alliance—”
“Will either develop without a marriage contract, or it will fall through.” His voice is quiet, absolute, and terrifying. “Nora is my wife. She will be treated with respect in this family, or you won’t see me again.”
Silence.
I press my fingers against my mouth and stare at the pale carpet.
He collects me five minutes later, making curt goodbyes to his brothers—Lorcan squeezes my shoulder and says “Next time, bring more book recommendations”—and then we’re outside, gravel under my heels again, cold air cutting through the thin fabric of my dress.
In the car, I stare at the gate as it closes behind us.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“You’re sorry? For what?”
“For...” I press my hands flat on my thighs. “For being me. For not being good enough.”
The car pulls over. Not gradually—he just stops abruptly on the side of the road, engine running, and turns to face me.
“I don’t wanna hear you apologize for yourself ever again.” His voice doesn’t leave room for argument. “I chose you. You are my wife. That’s all that matters.”
“Your mother—”
“Is wrong. About you, about us, about everything.”
I study him. The set of his jaw, the expensive suit, the strong hands on the steering wheel. He was born into this world—the money, the power, the weight of a name that makes grown men step aside. He moves through it like he was built for it, and it was built for him. Because it was.
And then there’s me. A girl who grew up counting ceiling tiles when she was nervous, and eating stale, moldy bread ends when her father drank away the grocery money.
Kathleen’s voice threads through my head, quiet and precise as a needle. Novelty. Pity. Savior complex.
Cillian reaches over and takes my face in both hands, tilting it toward him. His thumbs trace my cheekbones, careful and warm.
“Stop,” he says.
“I’m not doing anything.”
“I can see those wheels in your head turning, and they’re churning out nothing good.” His eyes hold mine, and there’s no coldness in them right now. No distance. “Whatever she said to you, I need you to ignore it. It’s not true.”
I want to believe him. I do believe him, in this moment, with his hands on my face and the earnestness in his expression.
But Kathleen’s words don’t evaporate just because he tells them to. They’ve already found the cracks in my armor and settled in.
He kisses my forehead. Holds his mouth there for a long breath.
I close my eyes and let myself have this—this warmth, this man, this impossible, borrowed life.
And underneath it, quiet as a held breath, doubt lingers.