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Chapter Twenty-Two

EDEN

I’m starting to think I wasn’t listening to my heart when I told Murph I was okay with hosting his friends yesterday. Because today has arrived, and although all the brothers are aboard and everyone’s having a good time…

I’m not sure that I am.

I’m hiding out in the kitchen, taking my sweet time preparing bowls of grapes and orange slices and other little snacks for everyone. But although the sea is perfectly calm, my nerves feel like I’ve spent the night being tossed around on the waves.

“You sure you don’t need any help?” someone calls out from the stern, where most of them are gathered. It’s a little nicer on the bow, but there’s just not enough room for so many people, so we’ve made do with the stern until Murph shows up.

“Positive,” I call back, grabbing the bowls to deliver them to the stern.

I pause in the doorway to hand them out, because the guys also insist that every time I’m on the deck, I wear a lifejacket. Apparently Murph made them all promise. I can’t be mad at him about it. But it does feel like being the little sibling still wearing water wings when everyone else is in the big kids’ pool.

“Oranges?”

“And grapes! Oooh, kiwi—” Gage sticks his hand right in the bowl to grab some, before Ronan slaps his hand. “Ow. What?”

“That looked pretty a second ago.” Carter elbows him. “Look, that one’s still nice.”

“Oooh.” Drew cranes his neck to see the arrangements I’ve made with all the different shapes of fruits. “You really are an artist.”

“Thanks,” I chuckle sheepishly.

“No, thank you, Eden. You’re a great host!” Felix’s enthusiasm could carry for miles. “Ten out of ten!”

“Murph, though? One out of ten,” Alph grumbles. “The man’s frigging married to the sea.”

“Does that make Eden the mistress?” Drew teases me. Then he yelps, but there are several glares directed at him, so I can’t tell who just stepped on his foot. In any case… it’s a little too late. What if they’re right, and Murph is more married to his work than he is to me?

It wouldn’t be the first time. But I’m used to being the backup option.

No. That’s not what’s happening, and I know it. I’m just psyching myself out because it’s such a delicate moment—between the two of us, and between my present and past.

“He’s taking the work he needs to,” I insist, suddenly cutting off whatever conversation is happening as I raise my chin and stare defiantly at the rest of the guys.

Whoops. Maybe I didn’t time that as well as I could have.

Finally, Felix helps to break the awkward silence. “Yeah. He’s a dumbass, but we love him. And we love his nice, flat barge and all the deck chairs that fit onto it.”

“Hear, hear,” calls out Alph, raising his drink, and the other guys follow suit.

“I’m going to make more hors d’ouevres,” I murmur, smiling and slipping back into the interior.

God. I should just keep my mouth shut and count down the minutes until Murph gets here. He’ll make everything easier. He always does.

Hosting isn’t the problem. That part comes easily enough. And the brothers really are sweet, even if they’re all boisterous as hell. It’s fun enough being around them that I could almost forget the part that’s bothering me most. Almost… but not quite.

This feels too familiar.

I can’t help remembering how George would ask me to cook and then start up conversations I couldn’t join. Or, if we were going to other people’s places or a restaurant, he’d abandon me to fend for myself once he’d squeezed out all the praise he could get for “supporting the arts”, via his poor sympathetic artist boyfriend.

Finance bros don’t want to talk about the how or even the why of art, only the how much and who. And I didn’t realize until this moment how much it would bother me to be alone—literally alone—with all of Murph’s friends.

I crouch by the fridge to stare blankly at the hors d’oeuvres. I want to save the ones that Murph will like until later… but I don’t know which ones those are.

Fuck. Get it together, I tell myself, running my hand down my face.

“Hey.”

From the Irish accent I hear in even that syllable, it must be Kieran. I met the pink-haired bartender before, the day I hauled myself up onto the ferry wharf, soaking wet and bedraggled after my fight with the inflatable fake dinghy.

“Hi,” I mumble back, standing up again. My shoulders rise as I prepare to tell him that it’s fine, that I’m okay?—

Oh. He’s not checking on me. Kieran’s here to make another drink. He heads over to the countertop with all the spirits and mixers, plucking a chipped glass from the lineup and starting work. For a moment, there’s comfortable silence.

Then Kieran murmurs, “You all right?” Somehow, he manages to do it almost without me noticing. He has this way with words—like a bartender would, I guess, if they’re good with people.

I sigh. “Yeah. Fine. I’m just avoiding getting into that stupid lifejacket again. It’s easier when Murph’s here to do it for me.”

Kieran grins and winks. “I bet it is.”

And although I blush and laugh, it actually feels nice to remind myself that the past is in the past—and I’m here, now. Murph might not be yet, but he’s coming. I know he is.

“Drink?”

“No thanks,” I shake my head automatically.

“Suit yourself.” He leans on the counter, watching me with this knowing look. “You know, it’s great that you stand up for him. But you can be mad with us, not at us.”

“I’m not…” I trail off at the look Kieran’s giving me, his eyebrows raised. “Okay, fine,” I relent with a sigh. “Maybe a little mad.”

“Yeah. We love him enough to tease the shit out of him, but he can be a clueless lump.”

That gets a laugh out of me. “I can see that,” I admit, despite how protective I feel about him. “A lovable lump, though.”

“That’s our Murph,” Kieran cheerfully agrees. “Hey, look. You’re a real one for hosting us all when you hadn’t even met half of us. I’d have been scared shiteless. And you’re allowed to be pissed off that he isn’t here.”

My chest suddenly tightens as I look up quickly at him.

Am I? Then, a second later, the next thought hits. Fuck. I am. I’m just so used to taking it all and never saying a word of complaint. And that’s not how you build a team, much less… well, whatever this is going to be.

Kieran smiles crookedly at me. “Yeah,” he says, answering whatever the hell he sees on my face.

“Yeah,” I murmur back, nodding slowly. I want him here. And I’m going to learn how to tell him that, too. “Uh… anyway. Thank you.”

Kieran just winks and raises his drink. “Welcome to the brotherhood. Let yourself be mad when you need to be mad. Sure I can’t get you one?”

I laugh. “Oh, what the hell, may as well. Sure. Thanks.”

Kieran claps my shoulder. “That’s the spirit!” he cheers me on. Just as he grabs the cocktail shaker, he almost drops it. “Hey, look! That way!”

I lean forward to peer through the kitchen window, and then my jaw drops. It’s—holy shit, they weren’t lying. It’s a bathtub sitting on top of a sheet of metal, just casually puttering on by.

“He’ll be headed to the race start point,” Kieran says, laughing at the look on my face. He slams the shaker together and starts to vigorously rattle it between both hands, turning around to toss it behind his back with a flourish. “We’d better hurry up and get back on deck. Trust me: the real fun part is seeing who sinks before the starting line.”

He pours my drink as one of the guys hollers for us to come see something. I’m the first one to scramble down the hall, but when we’re halfway there, the microwave dings. I spin on my heel and Kieran collides with me, but somehow manages to grab both drinks and keep them safe.

The energy is high, and this time, I can’t help but get swept up in it.

“Come join us?—”

“I will!” I promise, rushing for the microwave. “Just gonna get these?—”

“I’ve got your drink!” Kieran hollers, like I’ve forgotten in the last three seconds.

“I know! I’ll be right there, let me know if anyone’s sinking!” Then I knock on wood, because if Murph were here, he’d have something to say about that.

And it won’t be long before he is here, and he does, and I’ll be able to laugh with him. Because at the end of the day, Murph will make sure everything turns out okay.

His heart is in the right place, but he can’t read my mind. I have to step up to the plate, too. And I’ve spent a long time practicing not doing that, to keep things working with a man who never deserved half the effort I put in.

I don’t think it’ll even be that hard, once I overcome my own initial resistance. I just need to tell Murph the truth about what I need from him, that’s all. And if there’s one thing Murph can be trusted with… it’s the truth.