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Chapter eighteen

The Blood of My Blood

Kira

T he cell door opened, and I stumbled to my feet. Kieran was much more graceful, coming to a stand with his hands clasped in front of him. His face was a stone-cold mask of indifference.

Blood ran down his suit, down his body, to his shoes. Blood covered his face, his hands, his… everything.

He was red from head to toe. Even his eyes were bloodshot.

I opened my mouth to speak, but shut it again.

“O’Malley,” Eoghan said, not sparing me a glance.

“Get the mortician and embalm the body. Keep the blade and head together, because we’ll need them.

Have them dress him in a suit—take one of mine if you must or buy a new one.

I want it tailored to him. Shave him, clean him.

Have them cut his hair the way it had been before… before…”

He shut his mouth, swallowing something down, as he looked away, clenching and unclenching his fist before he regained his composure.

Running a bloody hand through his blond hair, he straightened. Then, he looked at Kieran with the authority of a man who was not a crimson mess of human remains. His face went from one of anguish to… nothing. Like someone had extinguished the light of Eoghan Green, and left nothing behind.

“Give Giovanni Morelli as much dignity as we can.”

“Yes, sir.” Kieran nodded.

“Husband…” I whispered on a sigh, just hoping he would turn his head to me. Just for a second.

When he did look, his eyes were searching me for… something.

Whatever he was looking for, he did not find it because he turned away, trudging up the stairs, leaving bloody footprints in his wake.

“Eoghan!” I called, but he did not answer.

Kieran already had a phone to his ear, relaying information to someone else.

I was about to follow in Eoghan’s bloody wake when Kieran called out, “Mrs. Green!”

I turned to him, and he put his hand over the mic of his phone.

“Please be kind.”

“Of course, I’m going to…”

Kieran’s eyes turned to the blood-soaked room.

I followed his gaze, confused at whatever the hell he was trying to tell me.

The room was horrendous. Blood everywhere, along the desk, where photographs were meticulously laid out in a semicircle.

But what struck me was the sheer number of books.

There were stacks of them everywhere. The bed wasn’t fancy, but even I could tell from this distance that the sheets were not the threadbare prison kind.

They were luxurious, and clean, as was the velvet duvet.

The desk was an ornate oak, topped with a Tiffany lampshade of green-stained glass.

This was more like a dorm than a prison, not at all how I expected Morelli to be kept.

There were no cuffs or chains. He was just… living here. Confined.

When I opened my mouth to ask for more information, Kieran had already turned away, his phone to his ear, rapidly talking to the mortician—or so I assumed.

Eoghan had taken care of him. I had been afraid that Morelli had endured three years of torture and pain, but instead, he’d been kept in a gilded cage.

I rushed up, assuming that maybe he was going to take a bath, and almost ran into him in the dark foyer. He was standing in front of his large painting, staring up at it.

“For fuck’s sake, Eoghan!” I said quietly, as I fumbled for a light.

When the light flicked on, Eoghan was as red as the painting in front of him. His head was tilted back as he looked at his masterpiece—his self-portrait.

I shuddered.

“Morelli managed to forgive me for this,” Eoghan said, quietly.

I didn’t know if he was talking to me or to himself.

“I bled him for weeks.” Genuine remorse ghosted over his features. “When my madness passed, he forgave me.”

He leaned forward, until his nose practically touched the canvas.

“Or was he cleverer than I ever thought?” Eoghan was talking to himself. “Was he just pulling my strings the entire time?”

He stepped back, his head moving with his eyes, as he searched the canvas.

“I did not think this was a prophecy when I made it.” There was something mad about the way Eoghan looked, his head tilting from side to side, his body moving unnaturally as he searched for answers in his own artwork.

He lifted his hand and carelessly placed his bloody palm against the painting.

It took everything in me not to lunge forward and remove his hand! The old habits of working in an art gallery hadn’t completely left me, it seemed.

“But it’s all come to be, hasn’t it?” He let out a sad, almost crazed laugh. “My madness has not lessened any, has it?”

He wiped his hand down, leaving a bloody handprint against the face of the self-portrait devil he’d made.

“I am still mad,” he laughed to himself, and I…

Well, I definitely agreed with him. He was acting crazy.

I was afraid… not of him, but for him.

“Eoghan,” I whispered, reaching out tentatively. “Come back to me, sweetheart.”

I tried to coax him back to me, to bring him from this strange stupor. Was he in shock?

Was he finally broken after killing Morelli?

Eoghan stepped back, moving out of my reach. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulders. As if unaware of everything around him, he lifted his hands and put them in a prayer position in front of him.

“Blood of my blood,” he whispered, then opened his palms in front of him. “How life has imitated art.”

He slowly turned and languidly walked up the steps, towards our bedroom, moving like a man possessed.

I stood still, waiting. For what? I had no fucking idea.

I stared at the painting for long minutes.

I must have stared at the painting for an hour, maybe more.

I was looking for some sign about what he was talking about.

What prophecy? What life imitated art? I wanted to know.

I wanted to open his brain in my hand like a pomegranate and devour the insides until all his secrets were laid bare before me.

He said I knew all of his secrets, but I had barely cracked the surface.

A man like Eoghan is more than his biography. He was images and lore. He was a thousand different symbols, interwoven. Like a painting that was just a little bit different every time you looked at it.

I found no insight in the canvas in front of me. I had to give up. So, I went upstairs, hoping that he could give me the answers I needed.

Eoghan was naked in our bed, his head disheveled from going to sleep with it wet. Tears stained his cheeks.

I tucked him in, then removed my clothes. I slid beneath the sheets beside him, pressing my naked chest against his back, wrapping my arms around him from behind.

“Eoghan,” I whispered, as I ran a hand through his silky golden hair. “What has happened to you, my love?”