Page 7 of Sam
My interest piques as I wonder who they’re talking about. “She’s okay, infection has cleared up and she’s back home. He wanted to ask me about the Queens Wraiths. I recommended the security company to them, and they’ve been in touch.”
“What’s going on?” I want to know.
“Oh, that’s right, you were in the States when it all happened. Ally picked up a stalker at university, and he broke into her house and nearly killed her. She’s been in and out of hospital over the last year. She caught a couple of infections in the stab wound. It was touch and go for a bit, but Adam says she’s on the mend now.”
“What the hell?” I say, surprised. “Bren and Ellie never said anything.”
We all knew Ally and Jeanie; I didn’t know them as well as my sisters did, as they were a few years younger than me.
“Bren has had other things on her mind and Ellie probably never thought to say anything,” Dad continues. “She’s good, though, on the mend and Adam is happy as a pig in shit having his girls back home.”
Draco and I chuckle. We knew how overprotective all the O’Sheas were when it came to their wives and daughters. Although if I remember correctly, Ally and Jeanie had needed that when they’d landed with them.
“What happened to the fucker that attacked her?” I want to know.
“She killed him,” Draco replies with a proud, cheerful look. “Stabbed him in the neck; he was dead when the cops and Adam broke in. She remembered her training even while scared out of her mind.”
“Good, I’m glad she’s okay,” I state, finishing up my lunch and wiping my mouth before standing. “I’ve got to get going. I’ll see you later.”
They tilt their chins at me and wave as I walk away.
The rest of the day is spent where I’m happiest—in my workshop, creating furniture and surrounded by the smell of sawdust and wood oil.
CHAPTER 4
ALLY
I hate this. The feeling of fear that creeps up on me as soon as the house goes quiet and everyone’s in their beds. That motherfucker may not have succeeded in killing me, but he’s still living rent-free in my head, and I’m sick of it. I’d not only spent months in hospital because I may have survived the stabbing… just. But the infections that I got after it had almost finished me. I’d had to be resuscitated twice. After the second time, I almost gave up; however, seeing love, worry, and concern on my family’s faces when I woke up made me realise I couldn’t quit.
I set a goal for myself once the antibiotics started to work that I’d do what I had to and get out of the hospital. I’d done that a month ago. It was time to set the next goal.
I’d spoken to my therapist about my goals, and she’d encouraged me to keep doing them. My next goal was to find a job, something that gave me independence. Not that I necessarily needed to find a job elsewhere. I could work for any of my family. They’d welcome me, but for my own peace of mind, I needed to do this for myself. I needed to know he didn’t win. He’d taken enough of my independence because I was terrified to go anywhere on my own, which was a complete ball ache not only for me but for whoever was babysitting me at the time. It meant that schedules had to be rearranged to fit around me. Not that anybody moaned about it. This was all me and hating that Iwas too scared to get into my car and drive somewhere because I didn’t want to be alone.
Frustrated, I slap my hands down on my bed, kicking my feet like a child having a tantrum. I know I’ll never get to sleep while I’m feeling like this.
Throwing my duvet back, I swing my feet out of bed and stand, wincing as my scar pulls at the abrupt way I moved. I’d been assured the tenderness would eventually ease. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just another thing for me to be pissed off at Abel Donaghue for. Yep, that was my stalker’s name. The things they’d found in the private garage he had made my blood run cold. I wasn’t the first person he’d stalked in his thirty years, but I would be the last. The other women hadn’t been as lucky. Some they still hadn’t found. The ones that the police had found at least meant their families now had closure. I took comfort from that.
Opening my bedroom door, I walk into the dimly lit hallway. My mum, knowing my fresh fear of the dark, had bought night lights and plugged them in wherever she could so that if I got up at night, our home wouldn’t be in full darkness and I’d be able to see.
My nose burns as I try to hold back my emotions at how much my family has rallied around me. All the uncles, aunts, and my cousins, even the Crows, had visited me while I was in hospital. I’m loved, and that goes a long way to helping me heal.
Walking into the kitchen, I go straight to the kettle and flick it on before looking through all the boxes of tea that Mum had in her tea dispenser. Choosing the chamomile, I put the bag in a mug, and once the kettle boiled, I fill the mug, adding a teaspoon of honey to it. Wrapping my hands around the mug, I walk into thelounge and curl up in Dad’s recliner, pulling a blanket over my legs.
From the direction of the bedrooms, I hear a soft click of a door closing, and I know my mum is coming to check on me. Somehow, she always knows when one of us is awake. She calls it her mum's beacon. Not a second later, she walks into the room and comes right to me, bending to kiss my forehead.
“Can’t sleep?”
Shaking my head, I reply, “No, my brain won’t switch off.”
Mum runs a hand over my head, and I close my eyes, taking the comfort that is offered. “Let me make a tea, and I’ll come sit with you.”
“Kettle’s not long boiled,” I tell her. Watching my mother walk away, I’m in awe of how strong she is. She’d lived through hell, and with the help of my dad, she’d come out the other side. Oh, not my biological dad. He was part of the hell. No, the man who’d taken my mum, Jeanie, and me into his heart and made us whole again. Adam O’Shea was that man. He’d loved and protected us from the start, and I know he’d lost it when he found me bleeding out on the floor. My new need for independence was going to be hard for him to understand.
As far as Dad was concerned, Jeanie and I never needed to leave home. He’d wrap us in bubble wrap if he could, so we’d never be hurt.
“Squidge up, baby,” Mum spoke, breaking my contemplation of our family history and how it had brought us here.
I do as Mum asks and squish up into the corner of the chair so that she can sit with me. Although I’m in my twenties, I snuggle into her the moment she settles under the blanket with me. I’dfound over the last months I wasn’t too old to take comfort from my mum when I needed it.
