Being told to leave here is the best possible solution.
We pack them up, but take hardly anything. I’m glad to leave this fucking house, and I imagine they feel the same.
Sheena won’t look at me, but I don’t give it a second thought. Not at first, anyway. She’s got to be under enormous stress and after what just happened. I imagine she’s just doing what she has to, like I am.
Tiernan takes baby Sam and fills a flimsy plastic grocery sack with a few things.
“Anything else you need?” I ask him.
He shakes his head. It saddens me that the boy has nothing of importance at all to him, nothing that matters. I don’t own many things myself, but I’ve a few items that do matter to me.
Lachlan helps Fiona. She’s taken a liking to him from the beginning, I’ve noted, and guess she must trust him. Could be because he’s the youngest of all, the one with the most boyish temperament. She has a few more things than Tiernan does, but still, her items are few, a little notebook, and a box tied with string she tucks under her arm. Lachlan takes the rest of her things and helps her carry them.
Sheena takes nothing. She scowls at the house as we go to leave and mutters under her breath, “Good fucking riddance.”
I can’t talk to her now. We’re moving them out of here and back to our home temporarily until we find another place for them to live. I have to fill Keenan and the rest of the men in, and we need to ensure that everything we’ve recorded tonight with the O’Gregors will be fulfilled.
We drive back to Ballyhock in silence. Sheena and me, that is. Sam coos and fusses a bit until Tiernan finally snaps, “Will you be quiet already?”
No one bothers to contradict or correct him. Tension’s high, and we’ve hardly gotten out of danger.
Fiona and Sam quiet.
We get back to Ballyhock well past midnight. Seems every fucking light’s on in the mansion. With a sigh, I turn to Sheena.
“You stay with them tonight,” I tell her. “It’s important to have you with them. I’ll be up with Keenan for a good long while, and we’ll make plans to move you in the morning.”
She doesn’t meet my eyes but looks somewhere past me. For the first time tonight, I wonder what she sees. What she feels.
“Aye,” she says. “Thanks very much.”
Thanks very much.
It’s like we’ve come to the end of something and are making polite talk, planning to send cards at the holidays, shake hands, and that’s about it. I feel as if something’s off between us, but I don’t really know what. I chalk it up to my preoccupation and her trauma from the night.
“Do they need to see Sebastian?” Lachlan says when we get out of the car.
I shake my head. “I don’t think so. Everyone needs a good night’s sleep.”
“And a strong drink,” Sheena mutters. That makes me smile.
“Aye, doll. I’ll have something sent up to you.”
She smiles sadly. “Thanks—”
I put up my hand to stop her from speaking. She gives me a strange look.
If she says thanks very much again I might take her across my knee and give her a good spanking.
I’m pleased to see both mam and Megan waiting for us when we arrive.
“Take care of them,” I tell them. “I’ve got to meet with Keenan straight away, and it’s been a difficult night for them.”
“Aye,” mam says. She reaches for Sam, who goes to her eagerly and tucks his little head against her neck. She closes her eyes when she embraces him, swallows hard, then nods.
Megan takes both of Fiona’s hands and gives her a squeeze. “Oh, it’s good to have you back.”
“They won’t stay long, Megan,” I tell her. “Just for the night, most like.”
I don’t miss the way Sheena’s body tightens. I reach for her, but she steps away from me and marches up the stairs. Did she see me reaching? Or did she step away on purpose? I frown after her, confused about exactly what just happened, but I have no time to think anything over. We’ll deal in the morning.
Keenan’s waiting for me in his office. Lachlan and Carson join me as we go in to tell him everything that happened.
He scrubs a hand across his brow when we enter. “Didn’t expect you boys to deal that quickly,” he says. “Efficient, aren’t you?”
“Didn’t have much of a chance,” Lachlan says. “They were waiting for us.”
“Aye,” I tell him. I fill him in on all that happened, what was said, and how we negotiated restitution.
“Told us we had a spy among us,” Lachlan says with a frown. “Think he was pulling the mickey, Keenan?”
Keenan looks sharply at Lachlan, then me.
“What do you think, Nolan?”
“No idea,” I tell him.