Chasing River

I hate it when he uses my own words against me.

“You’ve always thrived on thinking through your options, and that’s not going to change. It’s in your core, it’s who you are, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, hon. I think you’ll feel better with whatever decision you make after you’ve given yourself some time and space to weigh things out. I know I’ll feel better about it.”

He’s right, of course. It’s who Amber Welles is, at heart, no matter what’s happened since coming here.

It’s my current.

It’s the only way I’ll know what I want in the long run. It’s the only way I won’t wonder if I’m doing the right thing.

“You’ll be happy with whatever decision I make?”

He snorts. “I did not say that. Just to be clear, I think that even having this conversation is insane. I’m not even sure who I’m talking to right now. But I’m hoping the level-headed daughter I raised will come back to me soon enough.”

I plant a kiss on his cheek. “You know, that’s not the worst idea you’ve ever had.”

“I only have brilliant ideas. Like, right now, for example?” He stifles another yawn. “I have this brilliant idea to take a nap.”

“A nap?”

He ruffles my hair. “A nap. We can talk some more in a few hours, if you want.”

I smile, remembering how hard it was to adjust to the time zone difference. I watch him sling his duffel bag over his weary shoulders and head for the stairs. “See you tomorrow.”

“Just a few hours! Which room is mine?”

“Take the one on the top floor.” I’d rather not have my dad sleeping in the room directly beside us.

“I take it Stream will be staying here tonight?”

“Dad . . .”

Whatever he mutters under his breath, I can’t understand it. Probably for the best.

THIRTY-FIVE

River

The air is thicker in this little hospital room than elsewhere.

Or maybe it’s that seeing my brother—his body basically mummified in gauze, with an IV drip full of morphine needed to numb his pain, and his usual perma-grin lost—is making it hard for me to breathe.

The chair legs scrape against the linoleum floor as I drag it closer.

Rowen’s eyes open and shift to catch mine. “Have they arrested Ma yet?” he croaks.

I chuckle, despite everything. Breaking the news about Aengus and his looming incarceration to her wasn’t easy but it was unavoidable, seeing as the second she saw the garda outside his door, she went off on him, accusing them of being “a little too late with the protection.” “She’s in the cafeteria, getting something to eat. She’ll be back in a bit.”

“I could hear her yelling.”

“I don’t doubt it.” I pause to study the bandaged stump lying across the hospital bed. “What does it feel like?”

“Like I still have a leg.” His listless eyes stare up at the ceiling. “Though I can’t feel much with all these drugs, thank Christ. You should see the nurse that just popped her head in while you were gone.” A lazy smirk lifts the right side of his mouth. “Do you think she’ll give me a sponge bath if I ask?”

I shake my head. At least Rowen’s spirit wasn’t blown apart with his body. He’s always been one to make the best of any situation. I can’t say I’d be making jokes right now, if I were in his place. And I deserve to be, more so than Rowen does. This shouldn’t have happened to him. If I’d just listened to Amber in the first place and talked to Duffy, he’d still have his leg and Delaney’s wouldn’t be a pile of firewood.

That hard marble that lodged in my throat three hours ago, when Ma and I first walked in here, suddenly expands. I hang my head, unable to stop the tear that slips out from the corner of my eye. “I’m so sorry, Rowen.”

Silence falls over the room.

Finally he sighs, and says in a rare somber voice, rank with emotion, “This is all on Aengus. Not you, not anyone else.” When I look up, I find a matching drop rolling down his cheek. It only spurs on more of my own.

I wipe them away with my knuckles. He doesn’t need me here, crying. Ma’s done enough of that. “You’re going to get better. We’ll get you fitted with a leg. You’ll be walking around and pouring pints again in no time.” I hope the doctors are wrong about the nerve damage. I don’t know if I can handle seeing Rowen in the kind of pain that our da has suffered all these years. “I’ll talk to your school tomorrow.”

“Was Ma being realistic about the pub being open again in a month or two?”

I sigh. And shake my head. “You know how slow insurance companies move.”

“What are they going to do for money? How are they going to—”

“They’ll be fine. Besides, that’s not for you to worry about. You just worry about getting better and getting out of here. Ma will have your old room ready for ya.”

He groans. “Bloody hell. She’ll be trying to wipe me own arse, won’t she?”

I start to laugh. Because he’s right. “For a while. Then you’ll be strong enough to come back to Dublin. At least we don’t have to sell the house anymore.” With Aengus heading to prison, the need to move away from him isn’t there. By the time he gets out—if he makes it out of there alive—we’ll likely be living elsewhere anyway.

“I heard you and Ma talking outside the door. Did he really confess to that bombing?” Aengus has never been one to own up to his mistakes, so I can understand the doubt in his Rowen’s voice.

“Yeah. I didn’t give him much choice.”

“What’s going to happen to him?”

“Nothing that wouldn’t have happened to him eventually.” As much as I dread the day we get the phone call from Portlaoise informing us that we need to be planning for a funeral, at least we’re not going to get caught in the line of fire again.

“I guess. I just . . .” Rowen’s eyelids begin sticking together. He hasn’t been conscious for more than half an hour at a time.

I ease out of my chair, gritting against the throb in my thigh. I have no right to moan about anything next to Rowen. “I’m heading back to Amber’s now. I’ll be here in the morning.”

“Going to spend some quality time with your future father-in-law?”

Now it’s my turn to groan. The second those sharp, near-black eyes of his settled on me earlier today, I knew he’d already made a decision, and it wouldn’t be a favorable one for me. That was before Amber told him why he had to jump on a plane and fly across an ocean.

I’m actually dreading this. Part of me thinks I should just head home for the night. If I weren’t so desperate to see Amber, I would.

“I’ll save you a bed next to me. I’m sure you’ll . . .” His words drift off.

“Get some rest, brother.” I shut the door quietly behind me and head down the hall, around the corner. The garda standing outside Aengus’s room recognizes me and nods once, his gaze darting behind me. Probably wondering if he’ll need to restrain Marion Delaney again. I slow just long enough to peer through the window in the door, to see Aengus lying in his bed, his eyes closed. His wrist handcuffed to the bedrail.