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Chapter nineteen

Try Not To Die

Eoghan

W hen I went into the bedroom, I cleaned the blood off and dumped my clothes into the laundry chute. They were used to cleaning blood from clothes, though this was going to be quite the task.

When I got out from under the shower spray, my phone buzzed on the countertop.

I didn’t look to see who it was. I didn’t need to.

“Dairo.”

“Eoghan.”

“How’s the child?” I asked flatly.

“I’ve grown quite attached to my nephew. He seems to think I’m you.”

I chuckled, not surprised that the little one would mistake us. We’d always been close to twins, distinguishable only by the stark color of our eyes. Mine black, his a bright arctic blue.

“He keeps asking for his mother, though,” Dairo sighed. “The twins distract him. He’s a very good older cousin to Jos and Jer.”

Dairo’s twins were a bloody handful.

I wasn’t surprised to know my son was good with younger children, though. If he gained anything from me, it was probably the rampant desire to have a larger family than the one fate would bestow. Genetics are a fucking curse.

“I’m glad to hear it.” I wasn’t, though.

Intellectually, I was happy to understand my son was not suffering too much in his mother’s absence, but I did not have it in me to feel anything but the weight of impending loss.

Dairo and I both sighed, each of us lost in the heavy silence that passed between us.

“I think she’s going to leave me,” Dairo finally said.

I was sorry to hear that.

He and Rose had struggled since the twins were born.

The pregnancy had been grand. Dairo doted on his young bride, and she seemed to bask in his attention.

But after they were born, something had switched.

I didn’t know which of them was at fault, or if neither of them was to blame.

It was just obvious that the more he held her close, the further she pulled from him.

I couldn’t understand why. I didn’t know how to help him.

His love for her grew after she became the mother of his children. Hers waned, as though she did not have love to spare after she was done with the twins.

“You always have a home here,” was all I said. “I’ll always have a place for you.”

It was all I could say because I knew that I would be in the same boat as him soon.

Common sense would reign when the war was over, and Kira would also likely depart from my side.

“Just like old times,” Dairo said with a sad little laugh that matched my sadness. “You and me.”

“And Shiny,” I added.

“And Ajax,” Dairo said bitterly. “Her husband won’t be leaving her anytime soon.”

“True. But she deserves to be happy.”

“Aye, she does,” Dairo said with a slight yawn. “She’s still a brat, though.”

The unsaid part was that we did not deserve the same.

I waited to see if he’d say more, looking at my reflection in the bathroom mirror. Christ, I looked a fright.

“Try not to die, will you?” Dairo said.

“I can’t make promises,” I answered.

“I know you can’t guarantee to live,” Dairo said quietly. “But try not to die.”

I chuckled. My cousin knew me well.

At least that was a little comfort to my loneliness.