Chapter New Wings
NEW WINGS
DECLAN
One Month Later - London
Iwoke to gray London light filtering through curtains I still wasn't used to.
The room was too big. The ceiling too high.
The bed too soft compared to the one I'd slept in for the past decade in Chicago.
Everything about Ravenswood Manor felt like someone else's life, except for the fact that Troy was pressed against my side with his face buried in my neck and one leg hooked over mine in a tangle of limbs that had become familiar faster than anything else here.
I lay still for a moment. Let myself adjust to the reality that had taken a month to feel even remotely real.
We were in London.
Adrian had made the visa process move with an efficiency that suggested strings pulled and favors called in from people I probably didn't want to know about.
When I'd tried to ask Troy about it, he'd just smiled and said Adrian had connections that made Luka's network look provincial.
I'd wisely decided not to push for details.
Mara had taken over the Chicago branch of the rehab.
Centre without hesitation. Had plans already forming about expansion and new programs and connections with local organizations that could feed clients our way.
The center would be fine, and would probably be better than that with her running it.
That knowledge had been the only thing that let me leave.
Troy shifted against me. Made a sleepy noise that might have been my name. I ran my hand down his spine, feeling the warmth of his skin beneath the old t-shirt he'd stolen from my dresser before we'd packed up Chicago for good.
“You awake?” I asked quietly.
“No.” He pressed closer. “Still sleeping. Don't ruin it.”
“It's past nine. We're supposed to meet with the contractor at ten to go over the east wing renovations.”
“Fuck the contractor. Tell him we died.”
“Pretty sure he'll notice we're alive when we don't show up.”
Troy groaned. Lifted his head enough to glare at me with sleep-swollen eyes and hair sticking up in every direction. “I hate that you're a morning person now. It's deeply offensive.”
“I've always been a morning person.”
“Yeah, but in Chicago I could ignore it. This place is too big. You disappear into the house and I have to actually get up to find you.” He flopped back down. “It's a design flaw.”
I smiled despite myself. “We could fix that by staying in the same room.”
“We are in the same room.”
“I meant when we're both awake.”
“Revolutionary concept.” Troy rolled onto his back.
Stared up at the ceiling with an expression that suggested he was still adjusting to the scale of everything too.
“You know what's fucked up? I've been living here for three years and I still get lost. Yesterday I opened what I thought was a bathroom and found a library I didn't know existed.”
“How many libraries does this place have?”
“At least four. Maybe five if you count the study off Adrian's wing, which I don't because that's his territory and I value not being murdered.”
The casual mention of Adrian still felt surreal.
I'd met the man exactly three times now.
Once when we'd first arrived and he'd given us a tour of the sections of Ravenswood that would house the new rehab center.
Once at a formal dinner that had felt like stepping into a period drama.
And once when he'd cornered me in the hallway to ask, with terrifying politeness, whether I intended to hurt Troy.
I'd said no. He'd looked at me for a long moment with eyes that suggested he'd killed men for less than disappointing the people under his protection. Then he'd smiled and told me the west wing had excellent acoustics if we needed privacy.
I'd decided then that Troy's assessment of him was probably accurate: brilliant, dangerous, and operating under rules I didn't fully understand.
“Come on.” Troy sat up. Stretched until his spine cracked. “Let's get this meeting over with so we can go back to pretending we know what we're doing.”
I pulled on jeans and a sweater that felt too nice for a construction meeting but apparently passed for casual in Ravenswood. Troy wore black jeans and a gray henley that clung to his frame in ways that made me want to cancel the meeting and drag him back to bed.
He caught me looking. Smirked. “Later. After we convince the contractor we're not completely incompetent.”
“Are we incompetent?”
“Deeply. But we're learning.”
The meeting went better than I'd expected.
The contractor walked us through the plans for converting the east wing into residential space for the rehab center.
Individual rooms. Group therapy areas. A kitchen designed for teaching life skills.
Outdoor access to the gardens that Adrian had agreed to share on the condition we kept them maintained.
The plans were ambitious and expensive, but they were exactly what we needed to make this work.
Troy asked smart questions about timelines and materials. I focused on practical concerns like privacy and safety and how to make the space feel welcoming instead of institutional. By the time the contractor left, we had a revised plan and a start date two weeks out.
“This is really happening,” Troy said once we were alone again.
“Yeah. It is.”
“You having second thoughts?”
“About London? About the center? About you?” I looked at him. “No. Are you?”
“No.” He moved closer. Slid his arms around my waist. “Just making sure you're not regretting leaving Chicago for this insane house with too many libraries and a rehab center that doesn't exist yet.”
“I don't regret it.” I pulled him tighter. “I miss Mara. I miss the gym sometimes. But I don't regret choosing this. Choosing you.”
“Good.” He kissed me. Slow and deep and thorough enough that I forgot about contractors and timelines and everything except the taste of him. “Because you're stuck here now. Adrian already had your name put on the wing.”
“He what?”
“The Kane-Donnelly Recovery Center. Has a nice ring to it.” Troy grinned at my expression. “He asked me yesterday if you'd be offended. I said probably, but you'd get over it.”
“I'm not offended. I'm—” I stopped. Tried to process the fact that my name was going on a building in London attached to a manor I still didn't fully understand. “I'm overwhelmed.”
“Yeah, well. Get used to it. This is your life now.” He stepped back. Took my hand. “Come on. I want to show you the garden before dinner.”
The garden was massive and sprawling, beautiful in a wild, overgrown way that suggested it had been left mostly to its own devices for years.
Troy led me down paths lined with rosebushes and through archways covered in ivy until we reached a clearing with a stone bench facing a fountain that had probably been elegant once.
“This was the first place I came when I moved here,” Troy said. “I was fucked up. Coming off a bad job. Bleeding from places I shouldn't have been bleeding from. And I sat on this bench for three hours trying to figure out if I'd made a mistake leaving Chicago.”
“Had you?”
“No. But I didn't know that yet.” He sat down.
Pulled me down beside him. “I thought I was running again.
Thought I was just finding a new city to hide in.
But Luka and Adrian and everyone else here made it clear pretty fast that Ravenswood wasn't a hiding place. It was a home if I was willing to treat it like one.”
“And now?”
“Now I'm bringing you here and hoping you feel the same way eventually.” He looked at me.
“I know this is a lot. The house. The people.
The fact that we're building a rehab center in a Victorian manor because apparently that's a normal Tuesday for Adrian Calloway.
But this is the best chance we have to build a life that's actually ours.”
I leaned back against the bench. Let the London air settle around us. It was colder than Chicago and damper, but not unpleasant.
“I talked to Mara yesterday,” I said.
“Yeah? How's she doing?”
“Good. Busy. She's already got three new clients lined up and she's coordinating with local shelters about partnership programs.” I smiled. “She told me to stop worrying about Chicago and focus on not fucking this up.”
“Sound advice.”
“She also said if you hurt me, she's flying here to break your legs.”
Troy laughed. “I like her more every time you mention her.”
“She likes you too. Thinks you're good for me.”
“Am I?”
“You got me to leave Chicago. Got me to stop fighting professionally. Got me to move across an ocean to live in a house that has more rooms than my entire neighborhood growing up.” I turned to look at him. “Yeah. You're good for me.”
The decision to retire had been easier than I'd expected. I had the title. Had the belt sitting in storage because I didn't know what else to do with it. Had proven whatever I'd needed to prove to myself about still being able to fight at my age.
But more than that, I had Troy. Had a future that didn't require getting hit for a living. Had work that mattered in ways the ring never quite had.
Mara had understood immediately. Told me she was proud of me for knowing when to walk away. Told me the gym would always be there if I changed my mind, but that she suspected London had better things waiting for me than another concussion.
She'd been right.
“Dinner's at seven,” Troy said. “Adrian's hosting. Fair warning, it's going to be elaborate and there will be at least twelve people there who intimidate the hell out of me.”
“Should I be worried?”
“Only if you're allergic to excessive wealth and people who've killed for less than bad table manners.” He stood. Pulled me up with him. “Come on. We should get cleaned up. Adrian's very particular about punctuality.”
Dinner was exactly as elaborate as Troy had warned.