Chapter 13 #2
I looked toward the floor. "That's an irritatingly good response."
"I have moments."
A laugh escaped me, but it broke somewhere in the middle and became too close to a sob to hide.
I hated the sound immediately, hated the weakness it seemed to represent, but Irish didn't react.
He didn't rush across the room, didn't tell me not to cry, and didn't pretend the moment could be fixed by touching me.
He simply stayed where he was, solid and quiet enough that I didn't have to manage his reaction on top of my own.
"I should have seen it earlier."
His expression changed. "Seen what?"
"All of it. Blackridge. Croft. The structural changes. Isla and I reviewed drawings, approved finishes, argued with contractors, and stood inside those buildings without realizing what was behind the walls."
"Because you didn't know what you were looking for."
"I should have."
"Why?"
"Because this is what I do." The words came sharper than I intended, but once they started I couldn't stop them.
"I read buildings. I notice when measurements don't align, when moldings are wrong, when somebody replaces eighteenth-century plaster with cheap modern work and assumes nobody will care.
Isla noticed this before I did, and now she's locked inside one of those buildings because of what she found. "
Irish pushed away from the wall, but instead of coming toward me immediately, he stopped several feet away. "That isn't why she's there."
"How do you know?"
"Because the people who took her made that decision."
I looked at him.
He held my gaze with an intensity that had nothing to do with attraction this time.
"You don't get to claim their choice as your failure."
Something in the sentence hit far deeper than the immediate situation.
I studied him. "That sounds practiced."
A guarded expression returned, but not quickly enough to hide what had passed through his face.
"I know what blame does when you give it too much room."
The answer was quiet, and for one second I wanted desperately to ask what happened in Ireland, who he had lost, and why every mention of home seemed to reach beneath his skin.
Instead, I remembered what I had told him near the window the night before: he could tell me something without telling me everything.
If I expected him to believe that, I had to live by it too.
"She left those marks because she thought I'd find them," I said.
"Aye."
"What if she thinks I took too long?"
Irish crossed the remaining distance then and sat beside me on the edge of the bed, leaving enough space between us that the choice to close it would still belong to me.
"She lasted long enough to leave you a trail."
"That doesn't answer the question."
"No." His gaze dropped briefly toward his hands before returning to me. "But if Isla knows you half as well as you've told us, she knew exactly what kind of woman she'd be sending after her."
I glanced sideways. "What kind?"
"Stubborn enough to argue with armed men."
I almost smiled.
"Reckless enough to walk into buildings alone."
"There it is."
"And observant enough to see things half the room misses." His expression softened. "Loyal enough to make twenty-three days everybody else's problem."
That was the line that finally broke through what remained of my control.
I leaned forward with my elbows braced against my knees and started crying, not delicately and not quietly enough to pretend otherwise.
Weeks of anger, exhaustion, helplessness, and the unbearable relief of knowing Isla was alive came loose together.
I covered my face, furious at myself for needing the release, but Irish still didn't reach for me until I moved first.
I shifted toward him until my shoulder pressed against his arm. Only then did his hand settle against the back of my neck.
His hand was warm and steady against my skin, offering comfort without demanding anything from me in return.I stayed beside him until the worst of it passed and my breathing began to even out again.
When I finally wiped beneath my eyes with the heel of my hand, I could feel the beginnings of embarrassment settling in where grief had been.
"I hate crying."
"Why?"
"It makes me feel useless."
His brows drew together slightly. "You're sitting in a safe flat helping dismantle an international religious network because you noticed a wall was four feet thicker than it should've been."
I looked at him.
"That sounded almost complimentary."
"It was."
"Two in one day."
"Don't get greedy."
A laugh escaped me, and this time it remained a laugh.
Irish's thumb moved once against the back of my neck before he seemed to realize what he was doing. His hand fell away slowly, and the absence of it registered more strongly than I wanted it to.
"Tell me something," I said.
His expression immediately became wary. "Depends."
"Not everything."
That eased some of the tension in his shoulders.
"What?"
"Why do you call yourself Callum?"
Every part of him went still.
The change was so immediate that I almost apologized, but after a long moment he looked toward the partially open door and then back at me.
"Not tonight."
I nodded. "Okay."
Surprise crossed his face.
"You aren't going to ask again?"
"Eventually."
His mouth curved faintly. "Terrifying."
"But not tonight."
Something softened in his eyes.
"Thank you."
The words were so unexpected that I didn't know what to do with them.
A knock sounded against the open door before either of us could say more. Hawkeye stood in the hallway with one hand resting against the frame.
"Sorry."
Irish stood first. "What happened?"
"Cipher found another mark."
That was enough to pull me to my feet.
We returned to the main room together, and nobody commented on my red eyes or the fact that Irish remained closer to me than he had before. I appreciated both kindnesses more than I wanted to admit.
Cipher brought the western-wall photograph back onto the main screen. "This was beneath the first notation. Hawkeye caught it in another angle."
The new image showed a small cluster of marks carved into the lower edge of the greenhouse frame. Three lines appeared first, followed by a gap, then two lines, another gap, and a single line.
My heart kicked harder.
Irish looked toward me. "Another code?"
"Not exactly."
I stepped closer and traced the pattern against the screen with one finger.
"Three, two, one."
Storm looked between the photograph and me. "A count?"
"No. Directions."
Cipher enlarged the old Croft House plan.
"There is no third corridor."
"Not on the official drawing."
I pulled the historic survey closer and forced myself to ignore everyone watching while I rebuilt the building in my mind.
The main hall ran west from reception. The residential corridor branched from there.
The old laundry passage continued behind the sealed section, and if the historic footprint still existed beneath the newer renovations, another short corridor would form where the official plan showed nothing but solid wall.
I leaned over the table and pointed.
"Here. If the old service passage continues behind the concealed wall, this becomes the third corridor."
Trigger came closer. "Then the second mark?"
"Second turn."
I traced the route along the page.
"From the service entrance, you follow the hidden corridor, take the second turn here, and then..." My finger stopped at the first doorway shown on the historic plan.
Hawkeye finished quietly, "First door."
I nodded.
Nobody spoke for a moment.
I stared at the route Isla had left us, feeling the meaning settle piece by piece rather than in the violent rush of hope I had expected.
She hadn't merely marked that people were being held inside the concealed wing.
She had left directions through it. Somehow, while trapped inside Croft House, Isla had found a way to tell me which corridor to take, where to turn, and which door mattered.
Irish moved beside me until his shoulder nearly touched mine.
"This is how we reach her," I said.
His gaze stayed on the plan before lifting to mine. "Aye."
For the first time since I had seen Isla behind the window, the fear inside me stopped feeling shapeless.
It was still there and probably would be until I had my arms around her, but now it had something else threaded through it: purpose.
We had more than a building, more than a suspicion, and more than a photograph of a woman behind glass.
We had a route through the concealed section and a specific door at the end of it, left by someone who knew I would understand what she was trying to say.
I rested both hands against the table and studied the path again, memorizing every turn until I could have drawn it with my eyes closed. Somewhere beyond that first door, Isla had expected me to keep looking, and this time I knew exactly where to look.