45. Liath #2
His eyes lingered on me. “Incest, for example, is considered a fundamental prohibition. Yet studies show how prohibition reshapes desire and how taboo can intensify attraction. So what happens when the forbidden lives under the same roof?”
Lorcan stiffened beside me, his body a wall of heat, his silence vibrating with fury.
I held my face still. Don’t flinch. Don’t look at Lorcan.
“Consider the Westermarck effect and how might it fail, resulting in siblings who inappropriately crave each other. Is that then a flaw in their neural circuitry, say, a maladaptive response of the insula and amygdala… or is it a disease? A mental illness?”
His gaze pinned me. The room shifted, students looking at each other, looking at me, looking at Lorcan.
Aoife was smiling at the edge of my vision. Not the cruel kind. The interested kind. I have something now. The rumor was being born. I could feel the shape of it taking form on her tongue.
“Miss Lasair.” Deargán’s voice cut across the hall. “Your brother looks determined to keep you all to himself. Perhaps you’ll speak for him, since he won’t let you breathe.”
Laughter rippled through the class.
Lorcan’s hand clenched around his pen so tight the plastic creaked.
Don’t flinch. Don’t give them the reaction.
When class ended, the room emptied with the scrape of chairs. Deargán lingered at the lectern, stacking papers, his eyes fixed on me.
Lorcan moved first, his body heat searing through my sleeve. His hand hovered at the small of my back, claiming me. “Let me take you home, Gray.” Loud enough for Deargán to hear.
“She can meet you at home, Mr. Lasair.” Deargán’s voice was smooth as glass. “I would like a word with her about her paper.”
He didn’t look at Lorcan. Only me.
As the last student left, Lorcan planted himself in the doorway, broad shoulders blocking the exit. “I’ll wait right here, then. Wouldn’t want to leave her alone with a convicted felon.”
Deargán crossed the room with calm precision, pressed his hand against my back, and guided me toward the lectern as though Lorcan weren’t there.
He tilted my chin, eyes glinting, not bothering to lower his voice. “Why waste yourself on that boy? You’re mistaking Rua’s crush on him for your own.”
A growl rolled from Lorcan at the doorway, feral and raw.
I held still under Deargán’s fingers. He wants you to react. Don’t.
“Do you have anything useful to say to me, Professor,” I said, my voice level, “or are you just trying to provoke him?”
Deargán’s gaze sharpened, his voice dropping low as he leaned in even farther. “There’s a way through this where you don’t have to end it with him. We get closer. Trust me.”
I frowned up at him. “What are you—?”
“Step away from her.” Lorcan’s voice cracked the air like a whip.
Suddenly Lorcan was at my side, shoving Deargán away from me with one hand and pulling me into his side with the other.
“Father’s looking for us, Gray. Wants us both.” His words were clipped.
Deargán’s lips curled faintly. “Strange. I thought Lasair Senior was away until tomorrow.”
“He’s back early.” Lorcan’s voice snapped. “But so thoughtful of you to keep track of his comings and goings.”
Their glares locked over my head.
“Tell your father,” Deargán said, his eyes still on Lorcan, “I look forward to facing him again.”
Lorcan’s eyes glittered. “I think he’ll look forward to putting you away again. So will I.”
The noose tightened between the three of us, every word, every touch, every look pulling it harder.
Lorcan at my side, burning and claiming.
Deargán in front of me, watching, waiting, calculating.
Neither of them was stepping away.
Neither of them was letting me go.
And it would soon tear me apart.
Half hiding my face in my scarf, I sat on the third row of the Ravenwood bleachers, the cold of the metal bench biting up through my jeans. I wanted nothing more than to hide away in the warmth, away from the constant stares, but I’d promised Lorcan I’d come.
Beside me, Nuala unwrapped a Cadbury Snack. She passed me half with a pointed side glance. “You sure you’re alright?”
“Mm.”
“Because you didn’t answer me when I asked what position Lorcan was playing.”
Shite.
“Sorry. Distracted,” I said with a forced laugh. “Fullback.”
She studied me, the question building behind her teeth.
“Look,” I said, pointing to the field. “He’s about to score.”
It worked. Her head turned.
The pitch stretched out below us, churned-up grass and chalk lines and a thin morning fog still clinging at the corners.
The air smelled of wet earth and damp wool and the burned coffee drifting up from the cart at the far end.
Somewhere a whistle went and a body hit a body and the home crowd around us groaned.
God, Lorcan was beautiful when he was moving.
Every long stride landing where it needed to, his feet nimble as he danced around his opponents, the sliotar obedient against his stick.
He cut around a defender without slowing.
He shouldered another off the line with a casual brutality the ref didn’t bother to call.
You’d never know he was playing with horrific injuries still healing across his back.
A whistle blew. Lorcan slammed his shoulder into someone and the man went down. My breath caught against the toxic rush of need.
My chest was tight with pride and want, snarled together for the boy on the field and the boy who had pinned me to a wall and said fuck, I missed you into my mouth like the hour apart had been a wound.
The skin at the back of my neck started to prickle.
Shite. I was being watched.
Deargán was on the touchline in his dark coat, hands in his pockets, staring at me.
My stupid stomach flipped.
He started up the bleacher steps, a few of the mothers on the lower rows nudging each other and turning to track him as he passed.
Beside me, Nuala straightened. “Is that the new psych prof? Why’s he—”