Page 97 of Unrequited

I open my mouth to sass him, maybe say something snarky about him walking around half naked, too, but I shut it just as fast. Probably not the time.

“Good girl,” he murmurs, and damn, I like the way he rolls the Rs. “Come meet my best mate.”

I follow him into the living room. Seated at the table is a large man with light-brown hair that curls at the ends, his brown eyes dancing with something unreadable. He’s built like Seamus, broad and imposing. He wears a faded tank top and worn jeans. Muscular arms, tattooed sleeves.Tough, but there’s something warm in the way he looks at me.

“My cousin, Colm,” Seamus says. “Colm.” He lifts his chin a bit when he says it, pride in the word.

“My wife, Zoya.”

“Very pleased to meet you, Zoya,” Colm says, giving me a respectful nod.

“Pleased to meet you too,” I reply softly. “I was just about to make Seamus some breakfast. Are you hungry?” I ask, still standing.

“Zoya. Sit.” Seamus barks the order, and I sit without thinking, hands folded in my lap. Colm’s eyes sparkle, like he knows exactly who Seamus is and what I’m learning about him too.

Apparently, he knows Seamus’s ways well.

Seamus rests his larger hand atop mine. “I know, beautiful. And I promise, I’ll give you another chance. But for now, I want you to sit.” His voice is low, protective, not patronizing. He’s not treating me like a child. He’s shielding me. There’s a difference.

“Now, angel,” Seamus says, “Colm’s come to tell me what’s going on.”

“I think if it weren’t for you, ma’am, your father would’ve stormed the damn castle already,” Colm adds, half-joking, half-serious.

Seamus lets out a breath, then turns to me. “Me mom has a way of gentling me dad like no one else could. At least a little.”

“I think your dad suspects something’s up,” Colm says. “But you’ve got a lot of explaining to do, don’t you?”

“No,” Seamus says, quiet but final. “I’ve got very little explaining to do to anybody. What I have a lot of is work.”

He turns to me, his steady gaze locking on mine. “I won’t apologize for taking Zoya. She’s mine. She belongs to me. There is none other.”

Colm smiles and nods once. “Okay.”

That’s so very him. So very Seamus.

“My plan is to stay here with my wife as long as I can,” Seamus says, with calm determination. “And when it’s time… when it’s time for me to go, I will. I reckon we’ve got at least one more night.”

Colm winces. “I think your mom probably talked your dad into that, eh? Branson’s gone for now.”

“Fuck Branson,” Seamus growls.

God. I remember the story he told me about the king and his trusted advisor, the one who tried to usurp the throne.

I know exactly who Branson is.

Colm holds Seamus’s gaze without flinching. “It’s time,” he says.

Seamus doesn’t blink, but something inside him gives, something quiet and worn thin. That weight, the fatigue of it, slides into his features.

“I figured,” he answers. There’s no fight in it, but there’s no surrender either. Just inevitability. Colm’s eyes flick to me again, sharp and cold, but not unkind. He’s measuringme, calculating, adding up the cost of who I am and what I’ve already changed.

“They know,” Colm says. “Or they will. You made it clear when you took her.”

“Aye,” Seamus replies. No apology in it. Just fact.

“Then get ahead of it, Seamus. Show your face before they start knocking down doors. You know how this works.”

His voice shifts, deeper now, more serious, like the gravity just increased in the room. “You know your father. And you’ll lose whatever grace you’ve got left if you don’t move now.”