Page 147 of Dirty Eoin

“Taking the hits.”

She snorts. “I need you alive, Roisin. Without you, I’m as good as dead.”

I nod. She’s right, of course.

There’s a pause.

“Thank you.”

“What for?” It’s my turn to ask.

“For not telling them who I am. You could easily have traded your life for mine. I’m the reason Molly was jilted in the first place having issued Eoin with the ultimatum.”

I smile politely at her. “You’re the mother of my grandson. What sort of a grandma would I be if I willingly allowed him to grow up without his ma in his life? He needs you. Both of your boys do.”

I pause before I say the next part.

“You’re also my daughter-in-law. What sort of a mother would I be if I took from my own boy the person he loves most?”

Silence.

I can tell she’s digesting what I’ve just said. She’s probably wondering which of my sons I’m referring to, and she’s probably hoping that it’s Padraig.

She stares at the rope that she’s been made to hold on to. We both know that, for now, it’s a simple enough task. Simple until it feels like she’s holding up a slab of concrete. Simple until her fingers get pins and needles, or worse still, they go numb and she can no longer feel it slip between her fingers.

“Eoin.”

I put her out of her misery as I know she won’t lower herself to ask.

She lifts her gaze to look at me, disappointed. I can feel the emotion radiate from her. She wants the love of my youngest, not my eldest. Even though he’s lost to her, she craves it more than anything.

But I need to move her mind away from him. It won’t help anyone.

“Eoin doesn’t love me. Love doesn’t allow you to move on as quickly as he did.”

I snort. “You played him for five months, Jaine. You told him that you didn’t love him, that you never would, that you hated him. What did you expect him to do? He needs to step up and we all know that every Da Duster needs his Ma Duster by his side in order to be able to do so.”

She knows what I’m saying is true. Did she just expect to walk off time after time and for him to be sitting around waiting for her to change her mind?

Her forehead creases.

“I never said I hated him. At least, not recently. I don’t hate him.”

“Then perhaps he misinterpreted your words. but that’s what he believes to be the case.”

“He told you that?” Her frown deepens.

I know what’s going through her head. The fact that if neither of us get out of here alive that Eoin will continue to think that she hated him.

What does it matter what he thinks if she’s so insistent she doesn’t care about him?

“Eoin would never tell me anything of such a personal nature. He’s an extremely private person as you know. He told Dylan. Dylan told me.”

She nods. Like me, she’ll be only too aware that since the Jessie fiasco, Eoin and Dylan have become close, the same as she and Jessie have.

“Why did he tell Molly the truth about Fin?”

It’s my turn to frown because even I’m confused by those actions. “I’m not sure. From what Malky said it seems Molly had suggested that she and Eoin adopt him. Perhaps he chose to tell her the real reason why they couldn’t. That he trusted her enough because if she loved him, she would never betray him.”

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