Chapter 8 #2
At Shea’s suggestion, we played a game of darts, with him heckling us every time it wasn’t his turn.
He couldn’t seem to accept he was just shite at darts and always resorted to dirty tactics to throw me and Fionn off our game.
Unsurprisingly, I won the game again - third year in a row.
I was thoroughly looking forward to my scrambled eggs and tea in bed tomorrow morning, which the other two now had to deliver me.
As I gloated over them, a mass of wild black curls shoved underneath my gesturing arm.
“All right Tierney’s, your taxi is here,” Sorcha grinned at us.
I closed my arm around her in a headlock and planted a wet kiss on her forehead.
“Ah Sorch, you’re always minding us,” I slurred a little. I was the same every year, trying to keep up with two grown men on pints. They pressured me to drink up or skip one of their rounds so they didn’t have to get me a drink... and fuck that.
“Let go of my girlfriend,” Shea drawled as Fionn descended on Sorcha with wet kisses and happy Christmases too. Okay, maybe all of us were elbows deep in the drink.
“They love me babe, I think they’d prefer if I was their sibling instead of you actually,” she winked at Shea and the grin he gave her squeezed my heart.
It was like you could see the adoration shining out of his eyes every time he looked at her.
And a sad broken part of me knew I’d never have a man look at me the way my brother looked at Sorcha.
Shaking off the morose thought, I went back to annoying Shea and manhandling Sorcha as we did every year when she wrangled us home from the pub.
With Fionn's help I managed to hoist her on my back, despite Shea’s shouts and Sorcha threatening to wet herself from laughing, and we made our way home to annoy Mam and Dad with our stupid antics and Christmas giddiness.
********
I was curled up on my bed in Limerick, having just spent the better part of an hour hauling all my stuff from the car after being home in Cork for over a month, enjoying the Christmas break.
The miserable weather had caught up with me just like everyone else, and I felt as sick as a small hospital.
My nose was red raw from blowing it, my throat and chest felt like serrated glass from coughing, and my head was stuffed full of cotton wool.
My royal coffers were well and truly topped up after spending the whole month of January working in Dad’s office, but all I wanted to blow that money on was an extra hot water bottle, and a clone of Mam to rub my head and fuss over me.
The girls hadn’t made it back from home yet, so I was the first one in the house.
I was eager for Sara to arrive so I could find out how Freya was doing.
Ella and I had gone to Galway during the break to give any help we could after Freya’s surgery and just to get Sara out of the house for a few hours.
I was hoping she would be in better form coming back to Limerick.
But I knew she was still a little anxious about how her Christmas exams had gone, given she was so distracted with the news about Freya.
While I hadn’t commented on it, I had noticed the “late training sessions” with the football team had supposedly ramped up as well, which couldn’t be helping her state of mind.
I heard a car pull up outside and waited patiently to see which one of them had landed when there was a knock at the door.
I groaned, thinking it was most likely Sinéad.
She’d want help with the bulk shop Betty inevitably sent her down to Limerick with after the Christmas break.
I shuffled to open the door, blanket trailing behind me and engulfed by my Harry Potter Oodie and Pikachu fluffy socks, just as a second knock came.
“Keep your fucking hair on, I’m coming,” I mumbled as I opened the door wide to find forest green eyes looking down at me and a mouth-watering woodsy smell.
“Bollocks,” I panicked and went to close the door in Ronan’s face.
I looked like I hadn’t slept since the famine, and bar that first awkward professor/student encounter, I had never seen him without a lot of consideration going into my appearance - even when I was aiming for the ‘I’ve made no effort’ look.
He shoved his foot in the door just before it could slam shut in his face and pushed it open with his elbow as he raised one eyebrow at me.
“I come over to mind you and you shut the door in my face?” he demanded sardonically, and my whole face caught fire with a blush.
It was self-preservation with this Feek standing there, looking like he’d walked off a GQ magazine shoot, and I looked like they were about to quarantine me to study communicable diseases.
“I just got a shock, I wasn’t expecting you and I’m not exactly ready for company.” I shifted foot to foot self-consciously, very aware of his eyes traveling from my fluffy socks to the Dumbledore face on the hood over my head.
“I can see that, but this makes it even better I dropped in. Do you have any idea how adorable you look right now?” he asked casually.
I narrowed my eyes at him.
“I don’t do adorable, Ronan,” I arched back, but the cutting edge in my tone was slightly lost to my hoarse voice.
“Oh, that’s right, you’re made of stone and even the flu can’t take down the fierce Róisín.
You’re even cuter when you glare you know, sweetheart.
” He took a step towards me and cupped my face with one hand while holding the delicious smelling brown bag in the other.
I leaned in towards him, but I think it was more my stomach driving that desire.
“Okay, what’s in the bag?” I demanded, my mouth watering.
He stepped back with a grin and lifted the bag.
“Brown bread my awkwardness might finish me off if I had to watch them all make small talk.
Especially when those three knew everything there was to know about the man, down to the growly sounds he made when he got carried away kissing me.
Ronan came in with the soup and a refilled hot water bottle, then settled onto the couch beside me while I considered how to demurely slurp the soup down in front of him.
“Where did you get the hot water bottle?” I suddenly asked with an air of trepidation. It had been on my bed in my room with the door ajar, right opposite the sitting room.
“Off your bed,” he smirked. “Looks like you’re enjoying some light reading while you’re sick.”
He had seen my Fifty Shades of Grey book that I was now rereading for the fourth time… I didn’t have some kind of fetish problem, but sometimes I needed some Christian Grey in my life.
“Looks like you shouldn’t be snooping in other people’s bedrooms,” I quipped back, but it didn’t come out as ferocious as I’d planned when a coughing fit started.
“I wasn’t snooping, I promise. I just spotted the hot water bottle and then happened to notice the book on the bed.
” He continued as I eyeballed him. “And I might have been a bit curious what your room looked like,” he smiled down at me almost shyly.
The butterflies banged around in my stomach as I opened my mouth to respond, but I heard a car door close and then the front door rattling.
Mother of divine Jesus, I really did not want an audience for whatever this was.
“Who the fuck is parked in my spot?” Sara grumbled loudly as she kicked open the front door with a washing basket of freshly ironed clothes balanced on her hip. I felt a rush of relief seeing her and fought the urge to jump on her with a hug, knowing she’d hate that.
“That’s my cue,” Ronan murmured, right against the shell of my ear.
Even though I was annoyed I had been exposed at my very worst, I didn’t want him to leave yet.
But I did want to talk to Sara while I had her on my own and see how she was really doing.
She was much better at sharing if it was one on one instead of when we were in a group.
Ronan stood and I grabbed his arm as the sitting room door opened.
“Feel better, sweetheart,” he leaned down and kissed my forehead before straightening up and gracing me with a smile that made his adorable dimple pop. My skin tingled where he had dropped the kiss.
“Oh Jesus, hi. I’m Sara.” She awkwardly waved beside the door, looking up at his towering frame now he had straightened to full height.
“Hi Sara, I remember,” he smiled. “I’m just heading away, nice to see you again.” He nodded at Sara as he passed and headed out the door, with me watching his arse the whole way. Sara whipped towards me with her mouth hanging open.
“First.. fucking wow that man is hot! Second, what in the name of God was he doing here?”
“Don’t worry about any of that, I’ll fill you in after. How’s Freya?” She hesitated, giving me a watery smile before settling in beside me to let it all out. I held her hand as she eventually let the tears flow and squeezed my eyes tight, praying with everything I had that Freya would be okay.