Page 35 of Iron Crown

“Thewholetruth, Irish.” Her voice was low, drawling, lazy, and more than a little amused. “You’re skipping details and selling yourself short.”

Eoghan looked at her, his face crestfallen, as if the very last thing he ever wanted to do was relay this story.

“I tended her wounds, put vitamins in her water, and gave her something to eat that she wouldn’t puke up at the next day’s torture.” He dropped his head. He took his hand off the back of Cillian’s chair, his eyes landing on me again, but then looking away quickly. “What my father, and his men—” He sighed, quietly, before he amended, “Whatourmen did to you was unconscionable. I did nothing to stop it. I felt like Icouldn’tdo anything to stop it. But I was probably wrong on that account. For that, I am truly sorry.”

“Blah, blah, blah.” Yuliya waved her hand in a circular motion, telling him to go on. “I do not need your apologies, dear first-cousin-once-removed-in-law. I simply want people to know. If you feel you owe me, then tell them what happened, and all will be square between us.”

Again, so fucking casual. I had harbored hate in my heart for Giorgio Morelli, while she seemed to feel nothing at all.

“They beat her, mostly.” Eoghan’s Adam’s Apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed. He looked nervous. “Grown men taking their fists to a wee child.” He shook his head. “They waterboarded her, too.”

Jericho sucked in an angry breath through his clenched teeth, his nose twitching like a wolf about to snarl.

Eoghan looked at Yuliya and gave a half-hearted smile. “She pretended to be unconscious, and when the man torturing her was pissing himself, thinking he’d killed her, she waited until he got close, and slammed her forehead into his face. She broke his nose.”

Yuliya lifted her chin and wore a proud smile.

“I admired the hell out of that.” Eoghan smiled back, but then frowned again as he continued, “If I remember right, he broke her arm, and considered breaking a leg as well.”

Eoghan’s voice was barely a whisper, as if he were the one who had been put through pain.

“You probably don’t remember, but I asked how to get word to your father about your whereabouts. How to get a message to him.”

“I remember,” she said, with a nod. “I told you he would not care if I died.”

Again, another nonchalant shrug. How was she so fucking cool?

“I was speaking the truth,” she said, not at all bothered about her father’s lack of affection.

“Believe it or not, I know a little something about having a father like that,” Eoghan said, his eyes growing distant. “It made me more determined to have you live.”

I reached over and put my hand on his, our son oblivious to his parents connected behind him continued to line blueberries on his plate

Eoghan clung on to my hand like he was hanging on for dear life. I held on just as tight, just so he knew that I was here with him.

“I couldn’t get you out. Not without getting caught, and we’d both be shot dead.” Eoghan leaned back, probably trying to emulate the same nonchalance as Yuliya. “You told me to contact Jericho. I couldn’t deliver the message myself, of course, as we were sworn enemies. He’d shoot me on sight.”

“I still would,” Jericho confirmed.

Like he was embarrassed, Eoghan began to fidget with a loose piece of string on the tablecloth. “Another little girl had to do the work of a grown man.”

I squeezed his hand between us.

“She got the message to you.” Eoghan lifted his eyes to stare at Jericho Vasiliev. “And you found her in time.”

It was the most anti-climactic way to end a story. When no one reacted immediately, Eoghan added a dismissive, “And that was that.”

Eoghan leaned forward, grabbed his untouched wine glass in front of him and downed it, upending the stem as he tossed his head back.

“Now we’re all one big happy family.” He put the wine glass down, breathing heavily through his nose.

I stared at Eoghan’s face, his left cheek, and the way he kept his eyes on nothing. It was as if he was living the memories again, and I didn’t know how to help him. I had no clue what to do.

“I wish you had told me,” I said quietly.

I did not think that I could love him more. I did not think that I, and Paradigm, could have read him so wrong.

Was his late-night counsel the same type of secret? Was he going out at night, and saving kittens and nuns?

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