30. Liath
LIATH
Orange embers glowed weakly beneath the ash while cold slowly crept back into the tower room around me. I sat curled beneath the blanket on the chair in front of the fire, listening to the silence pressing in from every side.
The tower had gone quiet after Lorcan left.
Too quiet.
Every groan of old pipes inside the walls and every hiss of wind against the stone made my chest tighten all over again.
I should have asked him to stay.
I could still feel the heat of him under me from earlier, the weight of his hands on my skin, the expectant look in his eyes. Right before I’d stepped back from him and cleared my throat. “It’s getting late.”
The tower felt far too cold without him in it.
A sharp knock sounded against the door.
My entire body jolted. Relief hit so fast it almost hurt.
Lorcan.
Heat surged low through my chest. I was already moving toward the door, the blanket sliding from my shoulders. I fumbled with the lock in sudden desperation, my pulse racing harder with every second.
Then I pulled the door open, his name on my mouth.
But it was not Lorcan.
I froze.
The man standing outside was a few years older, dark hair, shadowed blue eyes, tattoo ink disappearing beneath the collar of his black leather jacket, his jaw sharp enough to cut glass. Rain mist clung to the shoulders of his jacket.
Something about his face tugged strangely at me. Like a photograph glimpsed years ago and forgotten.
I could not place it.
My hand tightened instinctively around the edge of the door. Who the fuck was he? And why was he here?
“You don’t know me,” he said evenly. “But I know you, Liath.”
Every muscle in my body locked.
Liath.
My real name.
Fear jolted up my spine. One of the Sons?
“And I know Deargán,” he continued. “He’s gone to do something stupid. You need to come with me. Now.”
Minutes later, we were in his car, the quiet roads around Blackwood blurring past the car windows in streaks of darkness. The engine roared too loudly beneath us while the tires hissed over wet pavement.
Bas drove far too fast.
The heater blasted hot air through the vents, but I still shivered inside the coat I’d snatched up on my way out.
My hands stayed clenched tightly in my lap while I stared sideways at the stranger beside me, wondering whether getting in this car had been a good idea. I knew nothing about him.
“I don’t know your name,” I said.
“Call me Bas.”
I frowned. “Death?”
A faint smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth, but he did not explain.
The strange answer only deepened the uneasy feeling sitting inside my chest.
“Are you one of Deargán’s friends?” I asked.
Bas snorted. “Deargán doesn’t have friends.”
Despite everything, a small smile pulled briefly at my mouth. Very true.
He glanced back toward the road. “I’m one of Ava’s… friends.”
Something unspoken moved underneath his words. A larger story.
Questions pressed immediately against the back of my throat.
Ava.
A sudden rush of homesickness swept painfully through my chest. For Dublin. For laughter and dancing and drinks out at The Vault. For the life I had before Magdalene swallowed it whole.
“How is she?” I asked softly.
“She’s…” Bas glanced at me sideways. “We’ve been looking for you. But that’s a story for another time.” He looked back at the road.
I pressed my lips together hard.
Outside the window, the estate grounds rolled past beneath the darkness.
Ava had been looking for me.
All this time.
Emotion tightened painfully behind my ribs. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t—”
Bas placed his hand against my arm, the gesture startling me. “We’re just glad you’re alive.”
But how did he know? How did he find me? And where was Ava?
The crackle of static suddenly cut through the car from the police scanner mounted on the dashboard. A distorted voice broke through the interference.
“Break-in at Lasair Manor… at Ravenwood Hospital… critically injured.”
Ice flooded straight through my body.
His grip tightened on the steering wheel. “Hang on.”
The car jerked as he spun the wheel hard, the tires screeching across the road.
My stomach dropped as I seized the grab handle above the door as the car cut across several lanes and turned left onto the road to Ravenwood.
Trees blurred past outside in black smears.
My pulse slammed wildly against my ribs as horror spread cold and fast through my chest.
Deargán. What have you done?
The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead as I slipped through the side entrance of Ravenwood Hospital, the dim empty corridors lit in an amber glow of wall sconces.
Antiseptic scorched the back of my throat, causing a thin reedy note in my head like a warning.
I pulled my coat tighter and kept my head down as I moved through the corridor, my boots whispering against the polished floor.
The police scanner crackled through my head again and again with the same terrible words.
Critically injured.
Dear God, please let him be okay.
Bas had driven off to look for Deargán.
My stomach clenched every time a part of me kept throwing up but Deargán wouldn’t— and I kept cutting it off. Because he did. Lorcan was in the hospital because of him.
I thought I knew where his line was. I was wrong.
I wrapped my arms even tighter around me, as if I could shield myself.
An all too familiar voice snapped around the corner ahead. “I demand to see him. Right now.”
I stopped short and pressed myself against the wall.
At the nurses’ station, Rua stood rigid beneath the fluorescent lights, her dark hair now trimmed short above her shoulders.
“Miss, he can’t have any visitors,” the nurse said. “He’s resting.”
“You can’t keep me from him.” Rua smacked the countertop with her palm. “I’m family.”
“I’m sorry,” the nurse said, her face unmoved. “Not even family.”
One of the guards blocked her path when Rua tried to lunge past the counter. The other grabbed her arm.
“Let go of me,” she snapped as the two guards held her between them, guiding her backward down the hall toward the main exit. “I won’t leave until I see him. You hear me? I won’t leave.”
I remained where I was until her voice faded to nothing. Until the nurse at the reception disappeared into the filing room behind the counter.
I slipped out from the corner and hurried past the reception desk, deeper into the hospital. I moved through the rabbit warren of wards, looking for his room.
Bas had found his room number with a few taps on his phone like it was nothing. I hadn’t asked how. Some gifts you don’t question.
I followed the numbers down the corridor until I found the door marked 417.
My hand hovered on the handle for half a second, glancing up and down the corridor, before I slipped inside.
The room sat in shadow except for the glow of the wall sconces and the monitors beside the bed.
Lorcan lay on the white sheets, eyes closed, too pale and far too still.
Air lodged painfully in my lungs as I crossed the room toward him.
Bandaging were wrapped around his throat beneath bruises blooming dark along his jaw. Clear tubing disappeared into his arm while the heart monitor beside him beeped in the silence, the only sign that he was alive.
The room smelled like bleach and plastic. There was no woodsmoke or whiskey smell. Nothing left of him in the sterile room.
For one awful second, my mind supplied another version of the room where the bed was empty and the monitors were dark because I had arrived too late.
My knees nearly buckled. I caught myself against the bed rail and stared at him while my breathing frayed.
Deargán had done this.
I’d defended him. I’d kept his secret, protected him. Every excuse I’d made for Deargán echoed in my head like a judgment.
Something inside my chest folded in on itself and my vision blurred. I half collapsed onto the edge of his bed. I swallowed, but it didn’t stop the burn climbing into my throat. I’m sorry. I should have made you stay with me.
My hand trembled when I reached for his.
God, his fingers felt so cold. So fucking cold. Like all the warmth he usually radiated had been bled from him.
His lashes twitched and a rough sound escaped him.
I gasped, leaning forward, my hand already reaching for his face before I snatched it back. Would he even want me here? Did he blame me for defending the man who almost killed him?
His head shifted against the pillow before his lashes fluttered.
“Liath.”
My name came out hoarse and frayed.
A breath tore out of me. Tears spilled down my cheeks before I could wipe them away.
Faint beneath the antiseptic air, I could still smell a hint of whiskey and woodsmoke and hear the soft trill of violins.
He turned his head toward me and our eyes locked. The corner of his lips pulled up and his shoulders relaxed. “Gray,” he said like a sigh.
“I’m here,” I said, my voice catching on a sob.
For a moment we just stared at each other.
He was okay.
He was alive.
Footsteps echoed outside the room and voices followed, growing closer.
My head snapped toward the door just as they stopped outside the room.
Shit. There was no other way out. Just the large window, but I was four floors up.
I stood just as the door handle began to turn.
Panic iced my limbs. No one was supposed to know I was alive.
And now I was about to be caught.