Page 40 of Dublin Charmer (Emerald Isle Mafia #5)

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Finn

C onsciousness claims me in ebbing waves, pulling me from the depths of nothing, only to surface and be pulled back down. Voices fade in and out. Some I recognize. Most I don’t. Machines beep. Fingers prod. But the pain is gone, no, not gone… dulled by whatever they’re pumping into my veins.

Someone’s crying.

“...lucky to be alive...”

“...lost a lot of blood...”

“...reckless eejit...”

I’m dragged down again, sinking into darkness.

Sound echoes in my mind, muffled by the filter of drugs. Everything hurts, but in a distant way, like the pain belongs to someone else. I force my eyes open, blinking against the brightness.

I’m in a hospital room. And a flower store exploded. And someone is holding my hand.

My head feels like a fifteen-pound bowling ball when I try to see who’s with me.

Blue hair. Not the vibrant blue of Nyx’s hair but a teal blue. It’s pretty.

“Hey, Charmer. Are you really waking up this time?”

I blink again, trying to focus. No. Can’t be.

“Nyx?” My voice is a rasp, barely audible.

The figure with the teal blue hair shifts, and there she is. Nyx. My Nyx.

“You changed your hair.”

Lying back in a sleeping chair pulled close to my bed, tucked in under a mound of blankets. By the dark circles under her eyes, and her messy hair, she hasn’t gotten much sleep. I must be hallucinating. It’s the drugs.

“Fuck. You’re not real.”

I know I’m right when she doesn’t speak. She just watches me with those piercing blue eyes. Definitely a hallucination. The real Nyx would have something cutting to say about my current state.

“They’ve got me on the good stuff.” I try to lift my hand to touch her, but it’s too heavy.

Still, she says nothing. Just keeps looking at me with an expression I can’t read.

“You look good, babe,” I continue, words slurring slightly. “Spain agrees with you. Or is it Italy now? I lost track after you dumped me.”

The hallucination of Nyx shakes her head. “I never dumped you.”

“Aye, you did. But I still miss you. So fucking much. Every day. Even when I’m mad at you. Especially when I’m mad at you.”

I let my eyes drift closed. “I would’ve done anything for you. Anything to make you happy. Waited forever. Moved to fucking Timbuktu. Whatever you needed.” My voice cracks. “But you didn’t want that—didn’t want me.”

A tear slides down my cheek, and I’m too weak to wipe it away.

“Oh, Finn. I’m so sorry for making you feel like that.” The hallucination of Nyx reaches over to brush my tear away. Her touch is warm. Solid. Real. “I love you.”

I sigh. “That proves you’re not real. Nyx wouldn’t say that.”

“Not when I wasn’t sure I could stay, no. But I’m here, Charmer. I’m here for you. I chose us.”

Wait. What?

I blink over at her and frown. “You’re really here?”

Her grip on my hand tightens. “I’m here.”

The sound of her voice after so long hits me like a physical blow. I struggle to sit up, but pain shoots through my shoulder and I fall back onto my pillows. “Jesus fuck!”

She frowns and sits up, pressing me to lay back down. “Don’t move around. You’ll open your wounds again.”

My mind races, despite the drugs. “Why are you here? How did you even know?”

“I’m here because I love you, and I know because Sean called me.” Her jaw tightens. “He said you pulled this lone-wolf bullshit because of me.”

“So you flew back to lecture me?” Anger flares through the fog of medication. “Thanks, but I’ve already got four brothers for that.”

“I didn’t need to fly back because I was already here. I met up with Harper and Piper that night for dinner and to get the lay of the land. I was going to surprise you when we got the call.”

“You were already here?”

“Yes. And then, instead of a romantic reunion and talking things out, I rushed here not knowing if you were going to live or die.” Her voice shakes. “And I’m furious with you. What were you thinking, going to a meet alone? No backup? Were you trying to get yourself killed?”

I look away. “Maybe after what you did, I just didn’t care enough to be careful.”

“That’s not fair,” she whispers.

“Fair?” I laugh, a harsh sound that pulls at my stitches. “You want to talk about fair? You called me to dump me and then shut me out. It’s been six weeks of silence. You ended things and that most definitely wasn’t fair.”

Her eyes shine with unshed tears. “I know how badly I hurt you, but what you said that night hit me hard. I knew Gio needed me, but he was only half the problem. You were right. I needed to fix myself. You said his attachment to me was unhealthy, but it went both ways. I’d been taking care of him for so long, I didn’t realize how bad the co-dependency had gotten.

I couldn’t be with you the way I wanted until I figured out who I was without my brother. ”

I stare at her, trying to process what she’s saying through the haze of drugs and pain.

“So, what about Gio? He couldn’t have taken that well.”

“He’s angry, but I hope, in time, he’ll get over it. He’s got the trailer and can travel and heal. I hope one day he’ll put the advice we were given to good use and find his own happiness.”

“The advice you were given? You sought help?”

“I did. I started seeing a therapist and then got Gio to come with me a few times. You were right about his needing me being unhealthy, but I needed him, too. He thought we could pull ourselves out of this life but that won’t ever be possible.

I love you and we’ll be tied by that love whether I’m with you or not. ”

She’s on a roll now and I’m having a hard time following.

“And even more than Gio needing me, I needed to talk to a therapist about what would happen when someone more important needed me. What it would mean for me to return to your world. To be part of the Quinn family. Was it selfish or safe? After what happened with Laine, I had to be sure.”

My mind is spinning out. “What happened with Laine?”

“And then you go and nearly get yourself killed. Do you have any idea what you risked? What you almost threw away? No. Of course you don’t because I haven’t told you yet.”

I close my eyes and give myself a mental shake. Is she talking in circles?

“Babe, maybe it’s the drugs, but I only understand half of what you’re saying.”

“I know. I’m sorry. You see, I didn’t call you that night to dump you. I called to tell you something. Something I didn’t want you to hear over the phone, but I also didn’t want you to freak out and come find me when Gio was so agitated.”

I draw a deep breath. “Tell me what, luv? I don’t understand.”

She shifts her legs around on the sleeping bed and tosses the mound of blankets to the side. Only, the mound isn’t part of the blankets… it’s her belly. “Remember the night I straddled you on the floor in front of the fireplace?”

She points at her rounded tummy. “Finn, meet your very own Baby Q.”

My mind blanks out completely on that and I feel like my body is floating. Am I dead? Maybe none of this is real.

It takes a bit of maneuvering for Nyx to extricate herself from the sleeping chair, but then she stands at my bedside.

She takes my hand and presses it against the round of her body.

“He’s going to be joining us in less than five weeks, and he needs his papa alive and well.

So, no more recklessness. No more lone-wolf bullshit. Got it?”

I pride myself for quick thinking, but none of my synapsis are firing.

The night she straddled me by the fire? Of course I remember. That moment has been on the highlight reel of my time with Nyx since it happened. We were both so swept up…

And we…

“Wait. Did you say, he ? It’s a boy?”

Nyx is wearing the biggest smile I’ve ever seen on her. “Surprise!”

I can’t even wrap my head around that. Five weeks. My son will be born in five weeks. “I’m going to be someone’s da?”

“Or papa.”

My head is spinning. I want to grab her up and pull her onto the bed with me, but I can barely fucking move. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

She takes a deep breath. “I was almost five months along before I even realized. My cycle has always been glitchy and with my focus on Gio I missed it. I figured the weight was all the stress eating, and feeling tired and a bit nauseous was a result of everything I was going through. But then he started to wriggle.”

I chuckle. “That’s how you figured it out?”

She nods. “Talk about being freaked out, I didn’t know I was pregnant and then something was moving inside me.”

As if he knows we’re talking about him, Nyx’s belly bulges with a slow-motion wave of shifting density. I stare at where my hand is riding the rolling of her tummy. “That’s fucking weird.”

“Imagine how I feel.” She laughs, pressing her hand over mine. “And by the way he kicks, I think he’s going to be a professional footballer.”

I grin. “Aye, that’s my boy.”

Her grip tightens. “So, you’re happy, then? I didn’t totally cock it up?”

I meet her gaze. “Och, you cocked it up, but if you’re here with me and we’re going to make a go of it with our boy, I’m happy. I’ve never been happier.”

The relief in her eyes pierces me to my very soul. I pat the mattress beside me. “Come here to me, luv. I need to hold you.”

It takes a bit of careful shuffling to get the rail of the bed down and for her to climb on next to me, but we manage.

I wrap my good arm around her and pull her to my chest, pressing my face against her hair to breathe her in.

“I haven’t felt alive since you left. And when you stopped talking to me.

.. I needed something. The danger. The adrenaline. Just to feel anything at all.”

“I’m so sorry.” A tear slips down her cheek. “But that’s over now. We’re here and we need you. So, if you ever pull a stunt like this again, you won’t have to worry about whether your recklessness kills you, because I will.”

I laugh, then wince at the pain. “I would expect nothing less.”

“I’m serious, Finn. You could have died. Nothing is worth that, not even me.”

“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that, but it’s a moot point.

” I press a gentle finger under her chin and lift her gaze to meet mine.

“The point to focus on is that you’re mine, Emilia Farina and I’ll never let you walk out on my life again.

You’re a Quinn now and Quinns are in it for the long haul. ”

“The long haul,” she confirms. “Forever and always.”

“Forever and always,” I murmur, the drugs pulling me back toward sleep.

The last thing I feel before drifting off is her lips pressing softly against mine, and a nudge against my side from my son practicing for his Premier Division tryouts. A son. Nyx is back and she’s given me a son.

For the first time in months, I can breathe again.