Page 61 of A Trap So Flawless

“Yes,” Rowan says. “The clot was bad enough. But it caused a heart attack on top. He died before the ambulances arrived.”

I stare at Valentina. She catches my gaze and nods.

“He died beside me,” she says quietly. Almost meekly. But then, something goes metal-hard in her gaze and her voice grows louder. Steadier. “I didn’t do any CPR on him. There was no time. I had to make a choice.” She touches my cheek. “Darragh,” she says, and my name in her mouth is like a drug, “I chose you.”

Chapter 24

Valentina

If I thought Darragh could be stubborn and difficult before, it’s nothing compared to him during his recovery. He doesn’t want to wear the neck brace. Doesn’t want to eat the food. He definitely doesn’t want any medication.

But when I’m with him, he seems at least somewhat soothed. I’m at the hospital around the clock. I don’t know who he’s bribed or threatened, but nobody ever kicks me out when visiting hours are through.

Rowan and Tommy, a dark-haired, blue-eyed soldier, are here often as well, along with a few other men in Darragh’s circle who drift in and out to talk business. Between Tommy being back in Toronto for more than a week and the Irish mob’s contacts at the hospital, Rowan got wind of what happened to Darragh within the hour and was on the next flight out of Dublin to assist. When Darragh sleeps, he and I exist around each other in this wary but maybe sort of friendly little bubble.

The last time we spoke, in the kitchen of Callum’s Dublin townhouse, I got the impression Rowan wasn’t too keen on me. But maybe leaving my own father to die in the dirt and doing what I could to save Darragh instead has warmed him up to me a little. Because he makes at least some effort to engage in small talk now and then. And I notice that he’s learned my coffee order from the cafeteria, always bringing one back for me when he goes. In one moment of oddly thrilling honesty, I ask him what he thinks about what my father did, and he answers.

“He knew that news of his death would bring you back to Toronto,” he says. “And I think he knew that Darragh would follow you. He’d get you back under his thumb and revenge on Darragh for the Fabbri mess all at once.”

“And what about Callum’s murder?” I still don’t understand why Papà bothered with that. Callum never had any interest in Toronto. He was too focused on Dublin.

Rowan shrugs his giant shoulders and takes a sip of his usual drink – black Irish breakfast tea.

“What use would it be to convince Callum to alter his will,” he reasons, “if Callum was left alive to potentially change his mind and take it back?”

Well, he’s not alive now. The will is basically written in stone. I gaze at Darragh’s sleeping face and sometimes wish, for his sake, that we had never met.

The doctors want to keep Darragh in the hospital for a week. But after five days, he finally loses his last vestige of patience and leaves against medical advice. I go with him, because I can’t imagine going anywhere else at this point.

I won’t return to that house. Not now.

Not ever.

Rowan drives us to Darragh’s Forest Hill house. We reach it at dusk. When Rowan asks Darragh in low tones if he needs him to stay, Darragh tells him to go. So he does.

In the deepening gloom, Darragh and I are truly alone together for the first time in days. He’s already ditched the neck brace and the arm sling that the medical team tried to make him take. He’s dressed in his own clothes, the only sign of what he’s gone through being the thick white bandaging protecting the sutures at the junction of his shoulder and his neck.

He looks so good. Strong. Like himself.

“You should get inside,” I say. The wind is cold. I want to touch him. But I worry…

I worry that I’m not allowed. That I don’t deserve to. Because the only reason he was hurt was because I went back to that house. I fell for the trap. And when I fell, I dragged him down with me.

He didn’t want to bring me back here. He didn’t want me to go.

He could have died because of me. That knowledge hits me hard, a near-miss of terrible grief. Maybe it shows on my face, because Darragh grabs me with his good arm, his hand seizing my chin.

“What’s wrong?”

Tears spring to my eyes.

“I thought I’d lose you.” I sniff hard and blink. “And before you make some snide remark, no, these aren’t tears of happiness at the thought.”

His touch on my chin gentles. When his mouth brushes mine, it moves with a tender hunger, a searching quality, like he’s looking for something. Asking me something.

“We should get you inside,” I say, pulling back, all too aware of the cold and the dark and his injuries. I want to hover over him. Make him soup and tuck him into bed.

“Yeah,” he says gruffly. He releases my face and runs a rough hand through his hair. “I’m desperate for a shower.”

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