Page 23 of Velvet Chains

I sank further into the hospital bed, letting out a shaky breath. “I knew he was stupid.”

Alek’s mouth twitched, somewhere between sympathy and exasperation. “Stupid enough to confess in front of federal agents while wearing a shirt with someone else's blood on it?”

“That was his own blood. Russell stabbed him while Kieran was trying to get him off me.”

“You didn’t tell me that,” Alek said, sinking into the plastic chair next to the bed.

“It didn’t come up.”

Alek ran a hand over his face. “Well, fuck.”

This was fraught. Complicated, even.

I was used to having a plan.

It was how I had survived this long. But now the feds were circling, and Kieran was leaving a trail of chaos like gasoline waiting for a spark.

I hadn’t let anyone else in after Kieran came in and confessed, and all I wanted to do now was–what? Cry? That wasn’t me. It wasn’t who I’d become, it wasn’t who I needed to be. But everything felt hopeless, and I could feel all the control slip away like running water through my fingers.

For Rosie…I had to hang on.

I couldn’t go back to what life was like with Julian: picture-perfect on the surface but hollow as a rusted ship underneath…a man who cared more about his work than me. We had only gotten married because it looked good when we were young and ambitious. We had been friends, practical to a fault, but we had tried to make it work. Partially because it looked good, partially because we both really wanted it to work for Rosie, if nothing else.

Julian might not have been her biological father, but he was her father in every way that mattered. Kieran might’ve been hurt, but he should’ve understood.

Kieran was the opposite of Julian in every way. Dangerous. Unpredictable. And there was a part of me that was starting to realize that terrified me just as much as it tempted me.

Alek got up again and started pacing. He looked a little disheveled, his black button-up more wrinkled than usual, shadows under his eyes. I knew what the pacing meant. He was officially in lawyer mode again, which I appreciated. I didn’t want to think about the emotional fallout anymore. I wanted to occupy myself with practical matters.

“You’re going to need a public narrative. Something that explains why you’re here. Why you’re injured.”

I cocked my head. “I gave the nurse the basics.”

“Yeah, for triage,” he replied. “We need optics. What happens when someone leaks the visit? When someone realizes the fedswere here? You don’t want reporters speculating about what happened or about who was in your house.”

I flinched at that. “We didn’t name Russell anywhere,” I said. “You didn’t name him in the report to the FBI, did you?”

He laughed, throwing his head back. “Yeah, no, I totally did that.”

“Sorry, sorry,” I said. “I had to ask.”

“Anyway, there’s no report,” he said. “Not yet. Let’s keep it that way. The doctor is going to push you to speak to the police. Don’t. If you don’t confirm anything, there will be nothing to contradict when this blows up.”

I bit the inside of my mouth. “I’m aware how this sounds, but I don’t want to lie.”

“You’re not lying. You’re just not saying anything.”

I nodded. He was right. “What about the FBI?”

“What about them?”

“They know.”

Alek shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “The feds don’t know anything concrete. They know what they think they heard. No body. No warrant. No Miranda. If they want to make something out of it, they’ll have to do it the hard way.”

“They have the SIM card.”

“They haveaSIM card, not necessarily Russell’s, which they found in a river, allegedly near a femur, and they have a man who said something dramatic happened in a hallway without counsel. That’s not a case, Ruby. That’s gossip.”