Page 37 of Fire Island
I chug through a string of erratic breaths and choke.
Iris sits me up, rubbing my back. “Breathe, mo nighean.”
Mo nighean.
I look up at her, face broken to pieces with one phrase.
“Oh shit, Evie.”
As if realizing what she’s said to me and who called me that for the last six months.
She swaddles me into her arms, and I bury my face in her shoulder. I grip her arms like the lifelines they are right now.
“Dammit, Cal,” Iris mutters.
Every breath burns. My head is pounding. And I finally put space between us.
“What if he never gets the last year back?” I rasp.
Iris holds me at arm’s length. “You know, it’s been playing on my mind all stinking day. He loved you once. I don’t see any reason why he wouldn’t again.”
I huff a strained sound.
Asecondsecond chance.
The memories he’s lost... Could I spend days recreating them?
Would it be deceptive? I couldn’t do that to him. It would be like telling him his truth without him getting a say in it.
“You can’t make Callum McCreary do anything he doesn’t want to.” I pick at the hem of my shirt, sniffing back the snot and tears that have swollen and reddened my face.
Iris chuckles. “No, you cannot. But what if I can give you the chance to find what you two had? He needs to go home. He also can’t be alone. And I can’t think of anyone I trust more with my brother’s heart, his head, and his health than his caileag luachmhor.”
I tamp down the emotion swelling with the phrase. I wish she would stop saying things like that. Hell, it’s like she’s testing me. Seeing how deep this thing between Cal and me goes.
Went.
I snap my gaze up to hers. “How?”
She smiles, palming my cheek. “Oh Evie, you two may have been holed up on that little island for months, but we’re talking about my big brother. The only other person I know better than myself. He loved you and still he let you go. He broke his own heart to make sure yours was happy and free. Stupid dunderheid should have gone with you, if you ask me. But he’s too stubborn for his own good.” She sucks in a long breath. “You can travel out in a few days, after Em’s cleaned up a little. Look after him for me, will you?”
I don’t know what to say.
Em’s going out to clean... He’ll find the devastation I caused. The trashed house. The garden that’s probably half dead. The remains of the lamp. The queen who took the fall.
The everlasting evidence of the fact that this maiden saved herself.
At a cost to the man she loves.
Ten
CALLUM
“Em’s here, Irry,” I call up from the diner.
“Yep, I know. He’s here for you,” she yells down the staircase. “We’ll be down in a minute.”
We.
