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“Are you serious with this right now?” I demand, whirling on him as Savvy moves to the bar to make us all drinks. Big drinks. “You’re apologizing to me for the fact that your brother finally let himself open up?”
“If that was him opening up, I can see why he’s stayed closed,” Kian mutters. “We’ve worked so hard for weeks now—months—to convince the King that Garrett is able to resume his old duties. And the second we’re close, the second we really have a chance, he goes and pulls this…” He takes the drink Savvy hands him. “Thanks, darling.”
“Pulls this?” I’m outraged, and it shows in the voice I can’t keep steady and the lethal body language I don’t even try to control. “What exactly do you think Garrett just pulled?” I space the words out as I speak them through clenched teeth.
My own indignation and anger finally seem to get through to Kian. “Wait. You’re seriously mad at me too? Garrett just handed me my ass—”
“Considering you’re shocked that Garrett finally snapped, I’m sure you can’t imagine why that happened.”
“Can we all sit down for a second?” Savvy asks as she hands me a glass of wine. “Let’s just take a breather for a moment and then the two of you can get back into the trenches.”
Kian does as she asks, leaning into her and pressing a kiss to the top of her head as he allows her to lead him to the nearest chair. I follow because I don’t have much of a choice, and because I’d be lying if I tried to say my legs weren’t a little shaky right now. I’m worried about Garrett.
Savvy’s right to make us sit—somehow, civilized discussion seems so much easier when I’m facing Kian across the table. “Look,” I start to say, but Kian starts talking at the same time.
“I’m sorry I’m being an asshole,” he tells me. “I’m out of it right now. I just…I can’t believe I missed it.”
“You didn’t miss it,” Savvy tells him. “Garrett hides his shit well. He always has.”
“I missed it,” Kian says again. “He’s my fucking twin and this wasn’t even on my fucking radar. I knew he had nightmares sometimes, but I had no clue he was this torn up.”
“He has nightmares every night.” Normally, I don’t think Garrett would want me to share that with Kian and Savvy, but after what just happened, I figure normal rules are off the table.
“Every night?” Kian asks.
I nod. “Pretty much, yeah. I’ve tried to get him to talk about them a number of times, but he never has. I think he thought he could just bottle it up forever and eventually it would go away.”
“Yeah. This whole destroying shit isn’t really Garrett’s thing.”
“Because he’s got incredible self-control, not because he doesn’t feel things deeply.” I think back to our first night in Paris, to the emotion that poured out of him when we made love. Tenderness and love, yes, but also a bone-deep weariness and pain that broke my heart.
“I know that. From the time we were kids, he’s been able to compartmentalize in a way I can’t. The fact that he can’t now makes me concerned about just how much he’s been faking these last few months.”
“A lot, probably. But I think this is a sign that he’s finally getting better.”
Kian looks at me as if I’m nuts. “He just did a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of damage to a hotel room. How is that better?”
“Think about how much damage has been done to him,” Savvy pipes up for the first time. “A hundred thousand dollars is nothing compared to what they did to him. Compared to what they took from him.”
“Exactly,” I agree. “I’m not a therapist, obviously, but I am the woman who’s spent the last two weeks with him. And I can see the difference in him. He’s less likely to hide behind a glib comment, less likely to tell me he’s okay when he wakes up from a nightmare in the middle of the night. I think he’s finally stopped hiding his feelings about what happened to him—from himself and from us.”
Kian stares into space for long seconds as he thinks about what I’ve said. I watch him carefully, so I see the emotions flit across his face as he tries to come to grips in his own mind with what just hap
pened.
“I was asking him to kiss up to Dad when he lost it. Telling him to just shoulder the blame so Dad would be able to save face when he gives him the throne back. But I never meant that he was to blame for the abduction. I never meant that I thought any of this was his fault.”
I think about the way Garrett cried last night in his sleep, the way he thrashed around the night before like he was trying to defend himself from some horror I can’t even imagine. “I can’t imagine the kind of strength it takes for him to wake up every morning, to do what he does as well as he does it with the specter of what happened to him hanging over his head. And then to hear that he has to grovel for a throne that he’s suffered for more than any person should ever have to suffer? A throne I broke up with him for less than fifteen hours ago. Is it any wonder he lost it? If I’d gone through one-tenth what he has, I’m pretty sure I would have burned down the world.”
“I’m such an asshole.” Kian bangs his head against the kitchen table.
“I think we’re all assholes equally on this one,” Savvy tells him.
I nod my agreement, not wanting to alienate the brother of the man I’m desperately in love with, but not wanting to lie, either. Thank God, there’s a knock on the suite door to save me from putting my foot in my mouth.
Kian’s across the room before I can so much as shove back from the table.
“I wanted to check in with you before I left,” Dr. Deveraux says as he makes his way into the living room. “His hand did need stitches, so I took care of that. I cleaned his other cuts—there were a number of them on his arms and feet. And I gave him a shot of a mild tranquilizer. He fought against it, but eventually he gave in, which I’m glad about. He’s pretty out of it right now—in fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if he falls asleep before you make it in there to check on him. Combined with the alcohol in his system, he’ll be out for a good eight to ten hours, I would imagine. I also left a prescription for some oral tranquilizers. He’s not going to want to get them filled, but I suggest you do. They’ll make it easier until he can get to his therapist—”
