She didn’twantto say yes, not when she knew how touchy Jude could be with Abbey-related topics, but they needed to have this conversation eventually. She didn’t like feeling as though he hated her. If she were to spend any length of time in his home, she’d rather it be in a state of tentative truce.
Maeve smoothed both hands over her thighs. ‘Fine.’
‘I’m curious about your prayers,’ he said. ‘I’d like to know how you’ve seen them answered. And how you make your requests when you pray.’
‘Shouldn’t you know, considering you’re the one who receives the prayers?’ Maeve asked, surprising herself with her candour. ‘Besides, you made itveryclear I was not to pray in your home.’
‘Because I’m asking nicely,’ Jude offered with a smile.
She huffed a breath. ‘I pray by first choosing an icon—’
‘How?’ he interrupted. ‘How do you choose which icon to pray to?’
What he was asking felt private. Exposing. ‘I just do. Whichever one I feel like that day.’
His brows shot up. ‘Not the same one every day, then?’
‘No… Well, sometimes. It depends.’
‘On what?’
At this, she finally gave in to her frustration and tossed her hands into the air. ‘I don’t see how that’s relevant. I let the saintslead me, okay? I listen to which icon calls to me. Sometimes, it’s because of their expression – if I’m searching for peace or re-assurance, I’ll pray to someone who looks inclined to give it. Is that enough information for you?’
Jude’s eyelashes cast long spikes down his cheeks as he tilted his head back. ‘And how do they answer?’
‘How?’ she clarified.
He nodded. ‘A specific instance, maybe. Anything that comes to mind.’
Discomforted by his questions and determined not to answer, Maeve studied the stretch of his legs occupying the space between them, counted the slats of the floorboard between his thighs. His black trousers were a shade too short on his long legs, the hems splattered with mud. Jude shifted under the weight of her eyes. Olive jumped off his lap, clearly unhappy with his fidgeting.
‘Maeve.’
She didn’t want to answer him.
The silence stretched.
Maeve shifted, uncomfortable. Finally, she sighed. ‘I can’t see why that’s important, or why you need to know. You’re not a part of the Abbey anymore. The saints answer our prayers everyday. There is always food on the table. Droughts never last for long and the waves never breach our walls. Even the influenza steers clear.’ She met his penetrating gaze with one of her own, vowing to be just as sharp, just as unyielding. ‘That’s enough for me. Faith is believing in the unexplainable. That includes both the mundane and the miraculous.’
‘Specifics,’ Jude pressed, ignoring everything she just said. ‘What do you pray for specifically? And how do the saints answer?Specifically.’
‘Why should I answer you?’ Maeve snapped, trying desperately to quell her underlying panic. She soothed herself with the reminder that she could give him an answer if she really wantedto. Shecould, but she just didn’t want to. ‘It’s about faith. About the power of the saints. About the knowledge that my prayers have been answered at all. I had the faith to believe as a child, and I still have the faith to believe now.’
Jude tucked his legs under him and stood, swaying slightly from whatever he’d smoked. As he leaned down, a chain slipped free from the loose neck of his jumper. A shining gold key dangled in the empty space between them.
Her heart jumped.The locked room.
‘I want you to consider every moment of answered prayer you can remember,’ Jude said. She dragged her gaze from the key to his face. ‘Remember the saint you prayed to. Remember how andifthey answered. As specifically as you can.’
‘Why?’ she asked, voice a choked whisper.
He didn’t reply, only continued to study her.
This close, Maeve could see a faint spray of freckles across the bridge of his nose. The shade of his eyes was a swirl of green and brown and grey. Just below, the gold key shimmered and swayed.
Sheneededthat key.
The sole letter she had sent Ezra had barely contained anything useful. She knew it hadn’t been good enough. His lack of reply told her she needed to try harder, and she was certain that locked room held the answers she so desperately wanted. She couldn’t risk Ezra’s disappointment.
