Chapter 4 Eredine #2
His expression softened. “I’m not worried about her, wee brother. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Excuse me!” We heard a gasp, and I looked around just in time to watch Arro jolt back from the table and bolt out of the room.
“Is she all right?” Thane asked over my head to Mac.
Mac, concern etched in his brow, left the table with a mute nod to march after her.
“Everything’s cooked properly, right?” Lachlan glanced frantically from plate to plate. “Usually Robyn cooks the chicken,” he said, inspecting his half-eaten tortilla, “but the smell was giving her the boak.”
“The what?” Regan asked.
“Making me feel sick,” Robyn translated.
“Ooh, that’s a new one.” Regan looked at her fiancé, Thane. “You’ve never used that phrase before.”
“It’s not exactly a sexy word,” he muttered dryly, eyeing Robyn with suspicion.
“What is it?” I asked, looking at my sister-in-law.
“Nothing,” he murmured before taking a drink.
It took less than five seconds for my attention to be drawn back to Eredine.
Even as Eilidh and Lewis started fighting over the TV remote in the living room and Thane yelled in my ear for them to quit, I didn’t tear my gaze from her.
She was watching the hallway where Arro and Mac had disappeared, a pinch of worry between her brows.
I could still hear Lachlan clucking over Robyn to make sure her food tasted all right, that he’d cooked everything okay, like he was a fucking mother hen.
And I wondered if I really wanted to do that to myself.
Give myself to another person so completely—it would change me.
Thane, Lachlan, and Mac had changed. Not dramatically, but in small ways.
Well, maybe Mac’s transformation was a wee bit more dramatic than that of my brothers.
But as Eredine turned those gorgeous hazel-green eyes on me, I realized I had no choice.
I wanted to see what could be between us more than I could remember wanting anything.
Eredine’s gaze flew over my head and widened with concern. “Arro, are you okay?” she asked.
Everyone turned to watch my sister walk back into Lachlan’s large, open-plan living area with Mac’s arm around her shoulders.
Her cheeks were pale. They halted before the table, sharing a look with one another before Arro heaved a sigh.
“I guess there’s no better time to tell you since we’re all here together … We’re having a baby.”
“Oh, bloody hell.” Lachlan shocked us all by slumping back in his chair.
Arro scowled. “Not really the response I was hoping for, big brother.”
He blanched. “No, it’s not that.” He looked to Robyn, but her back was to me, so I couldn’t make out her expression. But then she turned to Arro and Mac, and she seemed ready to burst into laughter.
“Um … You will not believe this.” Her eyes flicked to Mac, her father. “But I’m pregnant too.”
The table exploded into a chatter of surprise as we all flew from our chairs to congratulate the couples. When the hugging and exclamations died down, Robyn asked Arro, “How many weeks are you?”
“Fourteen.”
“Holy shit,” Robyn huffed. “I’m fourteen weeks too.”
“Could this family get any weirder?” I asked.
Because Robyn had married Lachlan, and Mac (Robyn’s dad) was engaged to Arro, Lachlan’s sister, that meant that any kids each couple had would not only be cousins, but Arro and Mac’s child would be half uncle or half aunt to Lachlan and Robyn’s child because Robyn would be Mac’s child’s half sister.
It was weird before, when Arro was technically Robyn’s new soon-to-be stepmother via Mac and sister-in-law via Lachlan, but now she’d be auntie to Lachlan and Robyn’s baby.
And the final cherry on top of the weirdness…
Mac would be grandfather to Robyn and Lachlan’s baby.
Fuck, that hurt my brain just trying to work it out.
And now the kids will be the same age.
Robyn snorted. “So we conceived—”
“Don’t,” Mac cut her off belligerently, and Arro pinched her lips tight to keep from laughing. “No. Nope. Fucking no.”
“Mac, there are children present,” Regan admonished primly.
“Sorry. But no. We are not discussing the details of this strange, bloody situation.” Mac glared at Lachlan. “This is all your fault.”
Lachlan’s indignant expression did it for me.
I laughed, and hearing Thane’s laughter join mine just made me laugh harder.
“I am stuffed.”
I turned from my seat on the steps of Lachlan’s back deck to see Eredine slipping through the bifold doors before closing them behind her. She smiled, illuminated by Lachlan’s deck lighting, before sitting beside me.
“I think Lachlan and Robyn made all that dessert to distract us.”
My lips twitched. “There is no distracting anyone from the fact that they most likely conceived a child in the same week. It’s fucking hilarious.”
“Not for Mac.” Ery nudged me. “Give the guy a break.”
“You laughed.”
Eredine snorted. “Who wouldn’t, to be fair?” She glanced at me. “Hey, you’re going to be an uncle again.”
I grinned at the thought. I loved Eilidh and Lewis.
In fact, I felt sad when I thought about all the years I’d missed with them.
But I was trying my damnedest to make up for it.
“I’m looking forward to more miniature Adairs running around.
If they are as funny as the current minis we’ve got, it’ll be grand. ”
“I don’t think there will ever be another Eilidh and Lewis Adair.”
“Truth.” I thought about the hardship those two wee ones had been through.
Not only had they lost their mother to a brain aneurysm months after Eilidh was born, a man who was stalking Regan had traumatized them.
He’d taken the kids and tied them up in the guest house where I was currently staying.
Just the thought of anyone touching those precious kids filled me with rage.
“They amaze me, you know. So resilient.”
“They are.”
The night it happened, Eredine was babysitting.
The intruder, Austin, hit Ery over the head, twice, with a baseball bat.
She was so damn lucky there was no permanent damage.
A miracle, in fact. If that bastard hadn’t toppled over the edge of a cliff while fighting with Regan, I’d hunt him down and kill him myself.
“So are you.” I pressed my leg against hers. “You amaze me too.”
Eredine looked down at where our legs touched.
“Ery.”
“Mmm?” Her gaze moved toward the sea. The moon rippled over the water, and we could hear the waves hitting the cliff bottom.
Lachlan and Thane had built mirror-image houses on the land here in Caelmore, a tiny plot not far outside Ardnoch.
Land stretching along this part of the coastline belonged to the Adairs, and Thane, an architect, had designed two more houses a little farther down the coast. One for Mac and Arro, and one for me.
Planning permission had been slow, just as it had been for the Gloaming, but we broke ground on the houses a few weeks ago.
Thane had a contractor project-managing the whole thing, and I was trusting my brother to get the house done so I didn’t have to think about it on top of the Gloaming renovations.
I was looking forward to no longer living in Thane’s guest annex.
Studying Eredine’s profile, I thought of how I’d asked for her input with the house design and how she’d shyly but slowly offered her opinion. I’d thought I’d made serious progress with her, that I was the one person she could truly trust.
But something happened, and she hadn’t told me about it, and it was pissing me off beyond reason.
For so long, I was not the guy people trusted.
I needed to be that guy for her.
But I didn’t want to force it.
“Nothing,” I murmured, staring out at the water.
Silence fell between us as I stewed and tried not to grow visibly frustrated, thinking that maybe I’d never get past Ery’s walls. That nothing would ever happen between us.
Then I felt the press of her knee against my thigh, and I turned to look at her.
She looked unbearably sad.
I hated seeing her like that. “Ery?”
“You can’t tell anyone because it’s club business,” she said, “but I had an altercation with a member this week.”
Anger, instant and blazing, lashed through me. “Altercation?” I gritted out.
Eredine squeezed my arm. “Nothing physical,” she assured me. “It was with Iris Benning.”
I frowned. “The actor who stopped us outside the Gloaming?”
“Yeah.” Eredine proceeded to tell me what happened between them.
“That scummy wee cow.” I glowered in outrage. How fucking dare she! “What happened? And if you say Lachlan didn’t boot her off the estate, then I’m afraid I’ll have to rip my brother a new one.”
She leaned into me. “You know Lachlan better than that.”
I relaxed infinitesimally.
“But he couldn’t just throw her out like he did with Sebastian Stone.
Mac had to stop him from doing just that and reminded him he had a board to consult.
Thankfully, between Mac’s accusations of harassment and what occurred between me and her, they didn’t take long to come back with their unanimous decision to cancel her membership and have security escort her out of Ardnoch. ”
“I can’t imagine she took that well.”
“Probably not.”
Sliding my arm around her shoulders, I hugged her to my side. Eredine tensed for a second before she relaxed into me. “Is this why you’ve been quiet all week?”
“Aren’t I always quiet?” she teased.
I chuckled. “More so than usual.”
Ery nodded. “I just … I know there are more good people than bad, and most of our guests are really nice and respectful. But knowing there are people like Iris Benning out there in the world makes me sad. I don’t understand them.
I don’t understand that need to cause others pain.
To be so focused on obtaining what you want, you don’t care who you hurt or destroy to get it. ”
“Hey.” I gently grasped her by the chin to turn her face to look at me.
Staring into those haunted eyes, I wished like fuck I could take away every bad thing that had happened to this woman.
But first I needed to know what those things were.
“I’m sorry if you’ve met more than your fair share of shitty people …
but do you know how much more of a miracle it is, then, that you are who you are, Ery? ”
“And who do you think I am?” she whispered.
My chest suddenly felt too tight and my words came out hoarse. “You are good. From the tips of your toes to the ends of your curls … you’re nothing but good, through and through.”
Her eyes widened as the air charged and crackled between us. “Arran …”
Rational thought left me as my eyes dropped to her perfect mouth, and my head descended—
“There you are, Uncle Arran!” Eilidh’s voice was like a lasso, jolting me from Eredine.
She stared up at me wide-eyed before Eilidh’s arms came around Ery’s neck. Eilidh pressed her cheek to Ery’s, and her entire expression melted into warmth and affection.
“Hey, sweetie.” She rubbed Eilidh’s arm. “All okay?”
“Yup.” Eilidh pressed a quick kiss to Ery’s cheek.
“Mum told me to come get you because her and Aunt Arro are talking about the weddings.” Arro and Thane would be sharing a wedding day this summer.
Eilidh’s dark blue gaze cut to me. “Uncle Arran, will you come help me win against Lewis on the Nintendo? He’s being really annoying and smug. ”
My lips twitched at her use of the word smug, and I nodded. “Come on, then.”
We stood, and I tried to catch Eredine’s eyes to see how she was feeling about our near kiss, but she wouldn’t look at me.
And I was worried that pretty much said it all.