but still . . .
She lifted her head, wiped at her eyes. “Freedom costs,” she told the dog. “I don’t know how much I’m willing to pay.”
But she sat and used what Aisling had taught her to soothe the bruises.
For himself, Keegan walked into his sister’s house and poured a whiskey.
Aisling eyed him as she chopped cabbage for a supper of colcannon. “A bit on the early side for that, I’d say.”
“Not from where I’m standing.”
“How’d she do then? I found I couldn’t watch you knock her down another time without wanting to come out and box your ears until they rang.”
“She’s strong, and she’s quick when she doesn’t think so damn much. The woman’s in her bloody head more than she’s out of it.” He tossed back whiskey. “She learns, I’ll give her that.”
He tugged up his shirt to study the storm cloud of bruises on his ribs.
“Caught you more than once. Here, let me see.”
“No, I’ll see to it.” He dropped his shirt. “She regrets, and it holds back what she has. She could’ve bruised my balls more than once, but holds back, regrets the harm done before she does harm.”
“Don’t we all, at the bottom of it?”
Though he wanted to disagree, he couldn’t. Not when he lived with regrets every bloody day of his life.
And still.
“Regrets need to be set aside to keep worlds safe and whole. But that’s a lock in her I don’t know she’ll open. And inside with them she keeps doubts close—like a woman might a favored jewel.”
“She needs time.”
“So do we all. That doesn’t mean we’ll get it.”
When he stepped over to stare out the window, she stopped her kitchen work to go to him. Slipped an arm around him.
“It’s not all of it on her shoulders, Keegan. It’s for all of us. All the Fey, and all those with us.”
“I know it, but I swore to Eian, I swore to him I’d protect her, I’d help her become. I don’t know how to keep my promise any other way but this.”
He felt the warmth over his ribs, sighed. “I told you I’d see to it.”
“Now it’s done.” Because she loved him, she kissed his cheek for good measure. “Are you having supper here?”
He shook his head. “I thank you for it, but no. Harken and I will make do, and I need to send a falcon to Ma. If I can keep her and the rest up-to-date, I don’t need to go back to the Capital for now. I feel I’m needed here more than there.”
“Send love with the bird,” she told him, and went back to chopping.
Since she’d managed to soothe her body, Breen soothed her mind and heart FaceTiming Marco.
“Look at you! Girl, look at that face. I miss that face.”
“We FaceTimed last week.”
“I still miss that face.”
“I miss yours, too. Busy night at Sally’s?”
“Wall-to-wall. DesDamona’s got a new act, and it slays. I’m gonna crash after we talk. Everybody’s missing you and reading your blog. Now tell me everything you’re not writing in the blog.”
If only she could. “It’s pretty much all there. Writing, walking, hanging out with Bollocks, learning to ride.”
“Can’t believe you got yourself up on a horse.”
“I really like it.”
“Dogs and horses. We’re gonna have to start looking at farms or something if you keep this up. Something going on,” he decided, narrowing his tired eyes. “I know that face. You tell me what’s going on.”
“I’m still figuring it out, Marco. There’s an awful lot of figuring out.”
“You’re not getting out enough. How come I don’t hear about you sitting in pubs, singing a tune, flirting with some hot Irish guy?”
“Flirting’s not on the schedule right now, especially with my wingman thousands of miles away. How about you? Any new man?”
“I’ve taken a couple for a dip. Just no sparkage. I’m in a slump there, girl. Come on now, Breen, who knows you like me? I can see something’s going on. You homesick, honey?”
“I miss you, and Sally and Derrick. Maybe a part of me thought I’d hear from my mother, but I haven’t. And I’m okay with it. I don’t like being okay with it.”
“More than that.”
She needed to give him something because he did know her. Since she couldn’t give him Talamh, she grabbed something else. “I guess I’m feeling anxious, and I don’t want to write about it in the blog, and get people who follow it going on about it.”
“What now?”
“You know that children’s book I wrote?”
“About the dog, sure. I’m