Page 14 of Queen Crow
She’s got clearer eyes than I do right now.
I read the chart over and over again, and time comes to a standstill. Lips doesn’t say a word or attempt to rush me along, she just sits there and waits me out.
There’s a reason I would kill and die for this girl.
Eventually, the silence twists and distorts into something smothering and I break it, just to keep myself from screaming. “The last time I saw him, before he came for me and got shot, he told me he wouldn’t share me.”
Lips nods, her eyes still on the rise and fall of his chest. My eyes just keep scanning over his chart as though the words ‘he’ll live’ will suddenly appear if I stare at it for long enough.
“I was so angry at him, so frustrated that even now I wouldn’t get to have him because… I love Aodhan. I love him and I love Atticus but—is it really fair of me to ask them to share?”
Lips takes a deep breath, blowing it out slowly, her eyes still on Atticus as we watch him breathe together, as though if we look away, he’ll stop. “I still have doubts. Not about the guys or how much I love them but—they don’t deserve to have to share. They should each have someone who will only love them the way they only love me. They deserve marriage and kids and the whole picket-fence life that they don’t have to navigate and negotiate. They can’t have that when they’re sharing me.”
Tears fill my eyes again, stupidly. “They would never give you up. All three of them will happily share and negotiate and fall into a big pile in your bed as long as they get you. They love you that much.”
Lips nods slowly. “Yeah, I’m really starting to believe that. Aodhan has already said he’s down, no matter what. I guess you just tell Atticus again that you’re not giving him up and he has to decide… it’s not a great choice, but that’s just the way it is. Who knows, you might just date them both and then move on, find someone else.”
I nod, but we both know that’s highly unlikely. Neither of us are the casual type, and I know that both of the men I’ve fallen for are the forever type as well.
We wouldn’t have been drawn to each other if they weren’t.
I look back at Atticus’ face and I try not to freak out about how wrecked he looks. He’s still as handsome as ever as long as you don’t linger on all of the signs of mortality on him: the dark hollows under his eyes, the bloodless color of his lips, and the sallow tone of his skin.
The nurse walks in and startles just a little when she sees us both sitting there with him, then she pulls herself up straighter and rolls her shoulders back as though she’s preparing for the biggest assessment of her life.
She’s right.
“I’m here to give Mr. Crawford his antibiotics and painkillers. I can talk you through it, if you like?”
She doesn’t sweat or shake under my sharp glare or Lips’ cold, apathetic stare. I give her a point in her favor as I nod, and then we listen as she explains the changes in medications.
His condition hasn’t changed at all, which isn’t necessarily a good thing. They were hoping for improvement by now, something to show he’s fighting and doing better.
Instead, we’re at a stalemate.
I want to scream, the impotent rage inside of me brewing with absolutely nothing that I can aim it at. There’s nothing, absolutely nothing that I can do about this, except wait. Wait and continue to pay the best doctors and nursing staff that money can buy to take care of him while I pray that it’ll be enough.
It has to be enough.
* * *
Two hours later and the wind has picked up even more as we stand together in the Mounts Bay cemetery.
The black skirt suit I’m wearing is trimmed with a delicate white lace that is handcrafted, painstakingly sewn on by an artisan in Paris, and staring down at it is the only way I make it through the graveside ceremony and burial of Jack O’Cronin without bursting into tears.
I don’t have any feelings of shame about doing so, but Aodhan and Harley are struggling to keep themselves together and I can’t break down and send either of them over the edge.
Lips’ hand is cold in mine.
She’s dressed all in black as well, dark sunglasses over her eyes, and a stern sort of look on her face as she keeps an eye on everything happening around us. Ash and Blaise are both standing with Harley, though my brother is keeping an eye on us both like he’s ready to storm over here and murder anyone who dares to attempt to talk to us.
And then there’s Noah.
Lips’ baby brother is smoking a cigarette two steps away from us both like he couldn’t give less of a fuck about Catholic funeral decorum. He’s also wearing torn up fishnet tights and a Grateful Dead tee that is more holes than fabric. He looks like an adorably fierce Mounty street brat and there’s a part of me that admires that in him.
Right up until I notice that the sunglasses he’s wearing are a pair of mine.
I wait until the priest has finished his Bible passages and starts to throw some dirt onto the coffin before I threaten the little asshole.