Chapter Thirty-Two
Austin’s forehead ground against Liam’s chest, a growl rumbling deep in his throat.
“I hate him.”
The couch had been pulled out into a bed, and they were lying on it together.
Morning daylight was streaming in through the kitchen shades.
Despite being desperately tired, Austin had only snatched a few minutes of sleep here and there.
Liam, after giving up on telling Austin to go to bed, had annoyingly slept like a rock.
“She’s a girl,” Liam said, voice husky with sleep.
She was perched on Liam’s hip, staring at Liam’s neck with huge, black pupils.
Austin’s growl grew louder, and he tucked his head under Liam’s jaw, protecting his delicate throat.
In the time it had taken Austin to return to the cottage, she’d already managed to gouge dozens of marks into Liam’s skin.
Austin had been protecting him all night from further injury.
“She just wants to curl up. She likes sleeping against my neck.”
She seemed more interested in ending Liam’s life than lying down for a snooze. During the night, Austin hadn’t been able to see her, and her sneak attacks had been resoundingly successful.
“Get rid of her.”
Liam sighed. He reached past Austin to stroke the jet-black cat. She curled herself around his fingers, then her fangs flashed white.
“Don’t!” Austin’s hand shot out. The cat bit Liam, swiped the back of Austin’s hand, and leapt to the ground, bounding off in springing little hops. “She’s clearly feral, and you need to bring her back to wherever you got her.”
Liam sighed again.
“I said—”
“I heard. The answer’s no.”
Austin’s attention snapped sideways as the cat jumped up and sat on Liam’s hip.
“She’s back again.”
“As long as you keep playing with her, she’s going to keep coming back.”
“Playing?”
Her pupils expanded. Austin curled protectively over Liam’s head, yelping as paws landed squarely between his shoulder blades.
A dozen precise strikes landed on the back of his head, then jaws tried to clamp around his skull.
The cat gagged on a mouthful of his hair.
Liam diverted the cat’s attention to his hand, which she viciously attacked.
She then bolted away.
“How are you ever meant to sleep?”
“She sleeps 90 per cent of the time… Hang on, have you been doing this all night?”
Austin caught the blanket and yanked it up over his head, tucking it right up against Liam’s chin.
The cat jumped onto Austin’s head. She batted around, but the shield of the blanket protected Austin from her claws.
Realising her attacks weren’t getting through, she walked in little circles, plopped down, and purred loudly for a few minutes before beginning to snore.
Austin flushed. “She thinks she won.”
For a second, it seemed like Liam was going to be stupid enough to agree. “I’ll make breakfast,” he said instead. He carefully extracted himself from Austin and the cat. “Get some sleep.”
The cat yawned, squirmed her way under Austin’s blanket, and curled up under his chin.
Austin growled. She purred and pressed her wet little nose against his pulse.
He was terrified she’d bite his gills, and with a prickle, they smoothly merged back into his neck.
It was the first time they’d disappeared since their painful emergence.
Liam looked down at them with an unreadable expression.
Without saying a word, he fetched his phone, took a picture, and set about making breakfast.
Austin was too angry to speak for a long time.
He watched Liam through slitted eyes as he moved comfortably about the kitchen, putting together a fry-up.
Austin didn’t remember falling asleep, but he felt way better when he woke hours later. The kitten was still curled under his chin and stubbornly clung to his shoulder when he sat up.
Liam was sipping coffee in the kitchen. “Breakfast?”
Austin nodded. “And can you bring me my phone?”
While Liam warmed up breakfast, Austin got hold of Tammy, earning an odd look from Liam when he shared the cottage address with her.
“I’m sure she knows about this place already,” Austin said. “She’s not stupid.”
Liam set a pillow on Austin’s lap and a plate of breakfast foods on top of that.
Austin ate one-handed as he scrolled through the masses of texts from Bradley that Liam had warned him about.
In the last photo he’d sent, his girlfriend was kissing the healing cut on his jaw, and Bradley looked quite pleased with himself.
Austin almost sent, Glad it’s healing well.
But the cat bit his ear, and he sent, You have a stupid name instead.
Sam’s texts took longer to go through, but the unreal story Sam had told in Hal’s court made more sense when he could read it and think it over slowly.
Austin believed what Sam had said about their encounter in the bar being a misunderstanding, but he couldn’t think of what to say.
He’d spiralled after Sam. And he’d been in such a negative headspace for such a long time that it was hard to suddenly absolve Sam of blame.
He wondered if this complicated feeling was at all similar to what Connor had felt towards Austin about the cheating misunderstanding.
Liam made a pleased sort of grunt as he took Austin’s empty plate. “Will you manage a second helping?”
“I’m full now.” Austin put his phone aside and peered around the room.
It had been too dark to see anything when he’d stumbled in dead tired last night, but now he could see that Liam had cleaned the place up.
A proper sliding screen door separated the washer and dryer from the rest of the room, a new window had replaced the cracked one, and every speck of mould had been scrubbed from the walls.
Best of all, the draughty open fireplace had been replaced with a stove. His cottage wasn’t ice cold.
“You’ve done a lot.”
“You were gone a while,” Liam said over his shoulder as he washed the dishes.
He didn’t say it any particular way, but Austin knew from Tristan that Liam had been sitting on the shore, waiting. Austin pushed the cat off his shoulder and went into the kitchen. He leaned against the counter next to Liam. “I’m sorry I just left like that.”
“Wilbur and Bradley spooked you.”
“I exhausted myself getting over there, and at first I didn’t trust Tristan enough to get a message to you,” Austin said. “I’ll get word to you sooner if something like that happens again.”
“I’d appreciate that.” Liam set his hands on the edge of the sink and seemed to debate something. “I’m going to get the name of a good architect from Tammy to plan out an extension.”
“Okay.”
Liam stared at him.
“What? You have my details for paying for it all. If you don’t, just get them through Tammy.”
“You’re sure you’re all right with me living here again?”
Austin couldn’t look away from Liam’s eyes. His arms folded over his chest, fingers gripping hard at his own flesh. Conflict broiled inside Austin, but not indecision. He would try. Try to have this connection. Trust himself not to ruin it. “Did you open your own message thread on my phone?”
“I didn’t go through your phone. I only made sure Bradley wasn’t sending weird things to you.”
Austin offered it to Liam, who dried his hands and took it.
Liam tapped through to his own name in the message threads, and Austin averted his eyes.
He wasn’t sure how many messages there were.
At least a hundred. Since the day he’d fired Liam and demanded he leave, Austin had drafted dozens upon dozens of messages.
None had ever been sent, but there they all were, sitting there on Austin’s phone as exposed as peeled-back ribs and an open heart.
Some said, You can come back, I guess.
Others, Tammy is going to be offering you a job in Ireland.
And, Please.
“I thought I’d ruin you,” Austin said. “Sometimes, I thought I already had.” His eyes burned.
“I hate how much my voice can hurt you. I hate that I’m capable of giving you headaches just by opening my mouth.
That I make you cringe.” He breathed out a shaky, unstable breath.
“But I think you’re right about what you said.
I won’t always feel like that. I won’t always be like that.
I feel better now than I have in years”—perhaps better than he ever had—“and that’s even after getting bad news. ”
If finding out about Gary wasn’t enough to turn his voice deadly to everyone, then Austin believed there was hope.
Sam’s rejection had turned his voice so harsh that nobody could get near him without covering their ears, and he’d been forced to send Liam away again.
Learning about Gary’s fate hit far harder, but his voice held steady. Austin stayed in control.
Liam pulled Austin into a tight hug. Something must have clicked because he finally embraced Austin without awkwardness. “I’d be ruined without you, Austin,” he admitted, gruff. “Not because of you.”
Austin clung to Liam until most of the bubbles in the sink had popped. When he pulled back, he couldn’t look at Liam’s face. “I’m going to shower. Can we burn the files afterwards? In that new stove?”
Liam made an indistinct noise. Austin had a horrible suspicion that the man’s cheeks were wet and quickly fled.
When he emerged from an extra-long shower, Liam had stacks of cardboard boxes in the living room and a fire lit in the stove.
“It’ll take all day like this,” Liam pointed out.
Austin settled on the couch with the siren book he’d tossed into the waterproof bag alongside Liam’s book. “I have all day,” he said.
A sheaf of paper was in the middle of the book, a folded missive from Hal.
Tristan must have been using the letter as a bookmark.
Curious, Austin read the page Tristan had been on.
Despite capricious and fickle natures, all the sirens mentioned in this treatise formed close-knit, loyal courts.
For example, in my studies of… The passage went on to break down in detail the courts of the five known sirens in the last three hundred centuries.