The headline that shattersmylife is that Darcy is adopted.
She’s not...
We’re not…
She’snotmy niece.
Well, legally, she’s my niece. It’s still wrong for us to be together in the eyes of our family. It’s just not a shameful sin that we had sex.
I fall into my seat. I didn’t sleep with my actual blood-related niece. Relief washes over me and makes me feel twenty pounds lighter.
Darcy hangs her head. She knew and didn’t tell me. Even when she saw how I suffered from the shame of what we were doing.
“Darcy?” I call out to her, hiding my anger.
“I’m sorry, Ewan. I thought if I told you right away, you’d leave Waterford before I had the chance to tell you about Sadie. You know…” She doesn’t finish.
Before she told me she thought Sadie was mine. Then I told her I couldn’t have wee ones. It’s clear she didn’t tell me because she wanted out of Waterford, to get away from Callum. Now I’m stuck wondering if the truth about her being adopted would have affected my decision to bring her back here. As a wife for Kieran.
“What now?” Connor asks, breaking the silence in the room.
“Nothing,” Da sputters. “There’s no deal to be made. No offense, dear. You stay here as long as you want, but we can’t offer you to Kieran as a bride to make a deal between our families. You don’t have Quinlan blood.”
The slight I’m sure Rian’s felt his whole life washes over Darcy’s face. It breaks my heart, and I pull her into my arms. “You just said two minutes ago her not being part of our blood doesn’t matter.”
“To me, no. But consider this, Ewan. First, little Norah dies on Kieran. Then Siobhan runs off.” Da goes red in the face, and I worry he’s going to have a heart attack. “Now you want to forge a marriage with a woman who’s not a blood-born Quinlan? Are you aching for an O’Rourke bullet in the back of the head, son?”
Da suddenly clutches his chest. I catch him before he collapses onto the ceramic tile and chips a tooth. Connor helps me get him back into a chair.
Darcy drops in front of him and grips his wrist to check his pulse. “I’m a nurse, Grandad. Just take deep breaths. Stay with me.”
We make Da take one of his nitroglycerin tablets and suggest he lie down. When he’s sleeping, and Ma says she’s going back to the kitchen and takes Darcy with her, both refusing to look at me, I grab Connor and stalk down to our wing.
“What are you going to do?” my brother asks, handing me a whiskey from the bottle I keep in my office outside my bedroom.
I throw down the entire shot in one gulp and stick the glass back in his face. “Another.”
“Besides get hammered.” He pours, and I drink.
With barely anything to eat, two shots on an empty stomach has glittery spots forming in front of my eyes, but the alcohol hasn’t calmed me down.
Making sure the door is closed, I say, “She knew all along she was adopted. Why didn’t her father say anything?”
Now it makes sense why it didn’t faze her, the way we were fucking like rabbits.
“You showed up, offering a golden ticket.” Connor sips his drink. “They want what’s best for her.”
“Forewarned is forearmed, and I’m cut down to the knees here. By everyone.” Despite my instincts to protect Darcy firing on all cylinders, I’m also furious with her.
Mostly because if I were selfish enough to make her mine, her not being related to me clears the way.
“Want my opinion?” Connor asks me.
“Fuck, yes. Do you think it’s easy making all these decisions?”
“You certainly make it look easy.” He raises his glass to me. “I’ve never seen you sweat. In fact, the only time I’ve seen you remotely look vulnerable is…”
“Yeah?”