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“She’s gone. Whatever we find... whoever we find. Darcy is gone.”

“My son deserves to know his mother.”

He wouldn’t look at me. King wasn’t the reason Sal wanted to find Darcy. It was his ego, and his guilt. He wanted answers. Hell, we all wanted answers. But they weren’t out there.

“Your son had a mother. One who was there for him,” Cian said carefully.

“It’s my fault he didn’t have her. I need to find her.”

“It was her fault.” Standing from the couch against the wall, I walked to the bar cart. Lifting the whiskey bottle, I poured four glasses. Handing one to Mac and one to Cian, I took the third and held it in front of Sal.

“I loved my sister. I looked up to her. But she had options. Even in the eighties, there were options other than walking away.”

Taking the glass from me, he held it in his hand. He turned around and leaned back against the window and stared at the whiskey.

“My father made it impossible for her to stay. Hell, Tyran had a hand in her running. That’s on me.”

“She was safe in Arkansas. Safe with Kathleen and Curran. Eamon didn’t even look for Kathleen. She could have stayed with them and raised her son herself. She chose not to.” I couldn’t hide the anger in my words.

“Maddie made the same choice. Are you angry with her too?” he asked me. Cian and Mac hadn’t said a word. Letting us hash this out. It had been a long time in the making.

“Maddie is different, and you fuckin’ know it.”

“Why? Darcy was sixteen when she ran. She was a kid. She was alone.”

“She wasn’t alone!” I ran my hand through my hair, turning my back on my friend. “She wasn’t fuckin’ alone. She could have said something.”

“To who? You? You were fourteen fuckin’ years old. What the hell would you have done?”

It was my turn to look out over the city. “I would have killed Eamon.”

Chapter Eighteen

Duncan

“Got a hit on one of those numbers,” Cian said as he walked into my office. He held his tablet out for me to look at.

Holding his tablet in my hand, I leaned back in my chair. I didn’t know what the hell I was looking at. I eyed Cian. “Why do you do this shit? You know you don’t want me learning what you do, so why can’t you ever just give me the fuckin’ information?”

“I see your mood hasn’t improved.”

No, it had gotten worse. The longer I went without Freyja, the more miserable I got. It had been three weeks since I’d seen her in person, the day we left the Soulless Sinners’ clubhouse. Time was supposed to heal fucking wounds, not make them worse.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Shut the fuck up!

“Why don’t you just call her?”

I glared at my friend, tossing the tablet back on my desk. Moving to the counter on the side of the room, I poured a glass of whiskey and drank it in one gulp. Letting the familiar burn wash down my throat. The warmth settled in my chest and I embraced it.

Looking at my busted knuckles, I flexed my hand. I’d become a cold dead shell, and it made zero fucking sense. It was one goddamn night with her. But her rejection had broken something inside me.

Oscar complained about me stepping on his shoes. His duties as interrogator were on hold because I had shit to work out inmy head. And the best way to do that was beating the hell out of someone.

“She wanted someone else. I’m not chasing her down.” Pouring another glass, I sat back down and waited for Cian to explain about the number. Instead, he chose to give me shit.

“She’s not married,” he reminded me.