Epilogue Cillian
Six months later…
Nora’s at the kitchen counter in one of my t-shirts, reading a textbook with a highlighter between her teeth, one hand absently scratching her temple.
I stand in the doorway and don’t say anything.
She hasn’t noticed me yet. Her brow is furrowed at whatever she’s reading, and every few seconds she uncaps the highlighter, drags it across a line, recaps it, and chews the end again. Her hair is loose and messy. There’s a coffee mug near her elbow that she occasionally sips from.
“You’re staring again,” she says, without looking up.
“I know.”
“It’s early for that level of intensity.”
I cross to the coffee pot and pour myself a mug. “What are you reading?”
“Child development theory.” She makes a face at the page. “Fascinating and impenetrable at the same time.”
“You’ve been up for an hour.”
“I wanted to get ahead.” She looks up. “Don’t you have a business meeting this morning?”
“I rescheduled it for this afternoon.”
Her eyes narrow. “You pushed back a meeting.”
“I wanted breakfast with my wife. Is that a crime?”
She closes the textbook and pulls the highlighter from between her teeth. “Are you telling me that you are rearranging your life around me?”
“I’m rearranging my morning. There’s a difference.” I reach across and steal the highlighter. “And I’ll rearrange whatever I want. That’s one of the benefits of being in charge.”
She reaches for it, but I hold it out of range. She gives me the look she’s developed over these last six months—a mix of exasperation and fondness, a combination I’ve become addicted to—and I hand it back.
“Eat something,” I tell her.
She opens her mouth, closes it, because she knows I’m right. She pulls a banana from the fruit bowl I started keeping stocked specifically because I’ve learned she’ll eat fruit without thinking about it.
“How was your session yesterday?” I ask, referring to the intensive counseling she’s been undergoing in an attempt to deal with the events of her childhood.
“Good. Dr. Reyes wants me to keep working on the boundary-setting exercises. I told her I said no to something this week.”
“What did you say no to?”
“Kathleen called and asked if I wanted to come for tea on Thursday. I told her I couldn’t because I had a study group.” She pauses. “And then I didn’t apologize or feel guilty for having to decline.”
“That’s significant.”
“It felt enormous.” She looks up. “Your ma said she understood and hoped we could get together another time, and that was it.”
“She’s trying.”
“She is.” Nora turns this over.
My phone buzzes on the counter. It’s Finn. I silence it. He’ll call back if it’s urgent.
“Take it if you need to,” Nora says.
“I’m busy.”
“Cillian—”
“Nora. I’m having breakfast with my wife.”
She holds my gaze for a moment, then nods. Something in her settles—the way it does when she believes me instead of waiting for the catch. Three months ago, that settling took longer. Now it happens faster.
It’s after we share a leisurely breakfast and I’m in my office preparing for a business call when I hear it—a sharp cry from my wife.
Not an ordinary cry. I hear no sorrow or pain in it.
In a split second, I’m rounding the desk and running down the hall.
“Nora.”
No answer.
“Nora,” I try again.
Nothing.
I push the door open.
She’s sitting on the edge of the tub. In her hand is a rectangular plastic device that looks like a thermometer or a...
Oh, fuck. It’s one of those drugstore pregnancy tests. She’s staring at it with her color drained and her eyes wide.
My brain stops completely.
“I took it because I thought—I wasn’t sure—I—” Her voice is stripped of its usual layers. “I’m pregnant,” she says.
“Hey.” I crouch in front of her, take the test from her hand, and set it on the counter. Then I take both of her hands in mine. “Look at me.”
She does.
“Are you happy?” I ask.
She blinks. “Are you?”
“I asked first.”
“Cillian—”
“Nora.”
She looks at our joined hands. At the test on the counter. At me.
“Yes.” The word comes out on a shaky exhale. “Terrified, but yes.”
“Me too.” I hold her gaze. “Terrified and happy.”
“We weren’t—I mean, we didn’t plan—”
“We didn’t prevent it either. We talked about this.” I squeeze her hands. “There’s a baby on the way.”
“Our baby.”
“Our baby.” I sit down on the bathroom floor and pull her with me. We end up both sitting on the tile, which is absurd, and I don’t care at all. “We’re having a baby.”
She laughs—the watery, overwhelmed kind that’s half laugh, half cry—and I pull her against me and hold on.
“I’m going to be a terrible mother,” she says into my shoulder.
“You’re going to be extraordinary.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do. I know you. That’s enough.” I press my lips to her temple. “You have every quality a good mother needs.”
“I never had one to learn from.”
“You’ll give our kid everything you never had.” I pull back to look at her face. “And I’ll be there. Every step.”
She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. “Oh god, you’re already obsessive about my health. You’re going to be unbearable for the next nine months.”
“Without question.”
“You’re going to terrify every pediatrician our child ever has.”
“Absolutely.”
She laughs again—loose and warm—and I feel it pierce my calloused heart and touch my very soul.
It’s at that moment, right there on the bathroom floor, that I glance up at the ceiling and say a quick prayer of gratitude to the Lord above.
Who would’ve thought that a ruthless mobster like me, who came to collect a debt from a lowlife, alcoholic gambler, would end up walking away with a priceless treasure?
I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve any of this, but I intend to cherish every second of the blessings I’ve been granted.