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She blushes as he sashays away, whistling some irritatingly jaunty song. When we’re alone, she slides over after stopping along the way to pour herself a glass of orange juice. I suspect it’s mostly to have something to do with her hands.
“You didn’t show up for breakfast this morning,” she says. It’s more of a statement than a question, like she won’t allow herself to actually ask it outright.
“I was working.”
I curse myself for my gruff tone, but fucking hell, I don’t know how else to be around Wren. She’s not a woman I have a blueprint for and it makes me stiff… in more ways than one.
“Dmitri, um… we really need to talk.”
I lean back in my seat. “Then talk.”
“It’s about Cian. I know you hate his guts?—”
Despite having had every intention of staying calm, my anger gets the better of me. “You should hate his guts. The motherfucker took you, hurt Bee, and destroyed a plan that was years in the making.”
She frowns and tilts her head to one side. “What plan?”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
She sighs and places a hand on her belly. “Well, then I’ll stick to what does matter. He treated me well during my captivity. I had a clean, comfortable room, and food, and?—”
“So I’m supposed to let him off the hook because he fed you a fucking charcuterie board and replenished the toilet paper?” I scoff. “Not a fucking chance.”
The more I push her, the more determined the set of her jaw becomes. “I’m not saying anything like that and you know it. I’m just telling you my honest experience.” Her throat bobs as she swallows. “And I’d be lying if I said he treated me badly. In fact, he acted as though he didn’t want me there at all. He told me so.”
“And you believed him?” My tone drips with condescension. I can’t stomach that, after all this, she’s still pleading his case. Going to bat for a man who wanted her dead and was just too cowardly to pull the trigger.
“Considering he was drunk off his ass at the time… yes, I believed him.”
That makes me pause. “What do you mean, ‘He was drunk’?”
“He mostly just avoided me. And when he did come into my room, the visits were always short. I mean, he was polite, but curt. Definitely not chatty.” My fingers curl automatically as I imagine what it would feel like to wrap my hands around his thick throat and squeeze until he stopped moving. “But one day, he walked in reeking of booze and sat down on the floor with me. He seemed… down.” Wren’s eyes cloud as she remembers. “It felt kinda like he was battling with a guilty conscience. He told me point blank that he didn’t want to keep me there, that he felt bad about taking me at all. He also said he was taken off-guard at the wedding. He gave me the impression that the shootout happened without his permission.”
She looks utterly convinced, but I can’t trust anything she’s telling me. Just because he was convincing doesn’t mean he was telling her the truth. For all she knows, he was putting on a performance in the hopes she would buy it.
Well, mission fucking accomplished in that regard. Well played, O’Gadhra.
“He was lying to you, Wren.”
“That’s what you keep saying. But why? What would he gain from that?”
“For one, he’s a manipulative bastard and he probably enjoyed the game. For another, he was probably hedging his bets. Trying to cover himself just in case I managed to get you back.”
Her hair flops over her forehead as she shakes her head. “I don’t think that’s what he was doing. Things aren’t always as black and white as you make them out to be, Dmitri.” She scowls at me through the curtain of her bangs, eyes bright and fierce. “Most people aren’t purely good or purely evil. Most of us are just flawed fuck-ups who are trying to do our best. You. Me. Cian, too.”
“You don’t know Cian?—”
“I know him a heck of a lot more than you do. Have you ever actually talked to him? Ever had a meal with him? Ever?—”
I jolt to my feet and seethe, “If you thought I was interested in breaking bread with the man who helped kill my wife, you thought very fucking wrong indeed.”
She flinches back, her expression clouding. The stubborn set of her jaw doesn’t change, though. “Except he wasn’t responsible for Elena’s death, was he? It was Cathal who was behind it. You told me so yourself.”
“He was complicit, if nothing else. That’s all I care about.”
“Complicit,” she repeats quietly. “So you’re holding him accountable for his brother’s sins.”
I lean in so that we’re nose to nose. “You bet your ass I’m holding him accountable.”
