“Right.” One word, and Keenan’s got the attention of everyone. “Lachlan’s plenty old enough to be going to the Club. In fact, he’d be an asset if these two ever get their arses in a sling again.” He tips his chin to Nolan and Boner.
Boner grins. “True, that.”
Keenan turns to Lachlan. “What’d you see, Lachlan? You notice anything?”
“Noticed lots, sir,” he says to me. “Noticed the redhead speaking into her phone and using an earpiece. Her mate kept looking at Nolan, and Blaine seemed happy as a pig in shite.”
Nothing new there, then.
“Thought you taught Sheena a lesson?” Keenan says to Nolan, who gives him a grim smile.
“Seems the lass is a slow learner.”
Boner snorts. “Feckin’ crime, you’ll have to teach her.”
But Keenan doesn’t smile. “She’s interfered enough,” he says. “If she were a man you know what we’d have already done.”
Nolan narrows his eyes. “Aye. Not sure why you’re warning me. The lass means nothing to me.”
Keenan holds his gaze. “See to it that’s true, Nolan,” he warns. “Wouldn’t want any of your feelings to get in the way of what must be done.”
His words hang in the room while we all sit in silence for long moments. We may be brothers, and we may have a code we abide by. But spies aren’t allowed to interfere, be they woman or man.
“Aye,” Nolan grunts. “I’ll reach out to our friendly reporter today, make sure she’s behaving herself.”
Mam and Caitlin enter the room. Mam walks to Keenan, and reaches for the baby.
“Sorry to interrupt, boys,” mam says. “Cormac, where’s Aileen?”
I blink in surprise and shake my head. “She’s in the room. She was in the jacks when I came downstairs.”
Mam rocks the baby on her hip while the men talk about what they need to do. Nolan and Keenan are in a bit of an argument, but I hardly hear them.
“She wasn’t there when I went up, son,” she says. “Guard says she went for a walk.”
I’m on my feet. Tully and Lachlan look my way.
“Relax,” mam says. “Likely just needed a bit of fresh air is all. Did you see her in the bathroom before you came down?”
I shake my head. God, I’m a fuckin’ idiot. I assumed she was in there because the door was closed, like a goddamn novice.
I call my guard. Pat answers on the first ring.
“Where’s my wife?”
“Said she was going to the library early this morning, sir.”
“And you let her?” I’m exiting the dining room. Mam’s beside me and Caitlin follows.
“Yes, sir. Didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to, sir.” He’s right, but I still want to throttle him. She’s allow to roam the premises. She lives here, for Christ’s sake.
“Relax, Cormac,” mam says, but I wave her off, heading to the stairway that leads to the bottom floor, the workout rooms, the library. The interrogation rooms.
I dial Aileen, but it just goes to voicemail. She never has her phone with her anyway. We need to have a talk about that.
I trot down the steps, and head first to the workout room. Empty. Next, the library. I hear someone rustling through papers on the right side of the vast room, but when I turn the corner, I only see one of our staff with a dust cloth in her hand, her eyes wide.
“Have you seen my wife?”
She nods. “Aye, sir. An hour or so ago?”
“Where?”
“She was down here for a bit. Did some reading, then went off that way.” She points her cloth to the door that leads to the exit. And to the interrogation rooms.
I’ve never brought her in here before. She’s allowed to roam our grounds freely, but she’s never been to where we interrogate. Windowless and soundproof, the door’s closed except on days the ground floor is cleaned. Like today.
Damn it.
“Cormac.” Mam’s in the doorway to the library, still holding baby Seamus. “Take it easy, son. Probably went for a bit of a walk is all.”
“Stop telling me to relax,” I tell her. “She hasn’t been herself. Something’s on her mind.”
“Of course there is,” mam says, shaking her head. “The woman’s carrying your baby.”
“Exactly.” My body tightens.
“Cormac,” Caitlin says next. She clears her throat, and her cheeks turn pink when I look her way. “We talked last night, Aileen and I.”
My tone sharpens. “Did you?”
“Aye,” she says with a smile. “She’s just trying to find her place here is all. It’s hard enough carrying another human in your body. Complicates things a bit when that baby belongs to a man you’ve only just met, doesn’t it?”
“She can worry about the baby in her belly all feckin’ day, so long as she does it where I can see her.”
I stalk past them, ignoring the look that passes between them. They don’t understand. They don’t know how she’s been. How she’s walled off apart from me. How things have changed since her memory’s returned.