“Of course not.”
She shot him a scathing look. “I’m beginning to have my doubts.”
“You can get off that high horse. We’re in this together.”
“In what?” she demanded. “What is going on?”
“I’ve told you more than you need to know.”
She wanted to push him, to make him tell her. But that wasn’t how her brother worked. Fianna decided to try a different approach. “Fine. Good luck locating Ruarc,” she said and turned to leave.
“Where the bloody hell do you think you’re going? And what are you wearing?”
Fianna halted, rolling her eyes at her brother’s predictability. She pivoted to face him. “They’re clothes, and I’m going back to my duties.”
“I need your help.” His words were less a petition than a command.
“I’m not doing anything until you tell me everything.”
Dorcha stared silently at her for a time. “Someone took Da. I don’t know why.”
“Do you know what they want?”
“They’ve not told me yet.”
She blew out a breath, feeling better now that he had opened up to her. “We’re going to need to find out. Did they tell you how they found Da?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“No, I wouldn’t have either. Until they get back with you, we can’t do anything, right? We just need to carry on as we have?”
“Yes.”
Fianna nodded slowly as she suddenly had a thought. “What about Patrick and Casey needing a place? Do they have anything to do with any of this?”
“Why would you ask that?” he barked, his tone biting.
“Because you’re focused on finding Ruarc, and you only want him to get Casey and Patrick places.”
“If they were part of it, I would’ve told you,” he snapped.
But Fianna wasn’t so sure. It wouldn’t do any good to argue. She had gotten Dorcha to say all that he had. Never before had she cause to doubt her brother’s word, but she did now. She’d known that something was off since he invited the guests to the manor. Her lips parted as she was about to ask how long ago their father had been taken, but she decided against it at the last minute. She couldn’t put her finger on why. Still, her instincts were always right, and she would follow them on this occasion.
Fianna left Dorcha in the same place she had found him. With her mind still turning over everything, she examined every room in the manor, including those occupied by guests. When she walked to Rordan’s room, she hesitated before knocking on the door. She wasn’t sure why he hadn’t returned with her. She had told him things she hadn’t told another soul, and it had been so easy. Talking to him about anything was easy. He made her want to open up and tell him everything.
Fianna rapped on the door. She waited several moments. When he didn’t answer, she knocked again, this time saying his name. Still, there was no answer. She turned the knob and opened the door, pushing it wide without stepping inside.
“Rordan?” she called. “I’m searching rooms.”
Like all the others she had inspected, Fianna left the door wide and just scanned the space. She didn’t open any drawers or even the closet. She finished quickly, but she found herself staring at the bed, imagining him sleeping there. Images of naked skin, limbs tangled in the sheets, and bodies rubbing against each other flashed in her mind.
She squeezed her eyes closed to stop the picture show. Then, she hastily left the room and moved on to the next. Nothing was out of place. She stayed as far from the guests as she could—they were scattered throughout the estate.
Once finished, Fianna was on her way downstairs when she looked up and spotted Rordan a few steps below her. She smiled at the sight of him. His lips softened, causing her stomach to quiver once more. He started to say something when Ruben and Ayda came in with some others, their conversation shattering the moment.
Rordan nodded to her and moved to the other side of the stairs as he continued on. She thought about following him and sharing what she had found out, though she wasn’t sure why she wanted to share such things with him. Maybe it was because he seemed to care. It might be because of the attraction she felt.
He’s a temptation. You know what happens if you continue on like this.
Fianna descended the stairs and began her sweep of the grounds. Not only did she want the time alone, but she also didn’t want to trust this to anyone else. She needed to see things with her own eyes. The estate was large, and she took advantage of being by herself. On the occasions that she ran into one of her guards, she merely nodded. They knew their duties. She didn’t need to micromanage them. However, she took the opportunity to study them before they knew of her approach.
Vast swaths of land on the estate weren’t guarded. There were only so many for the positions, and she’d opted to keep them closer to the manor. Being alone in the woods was freeing. Fianna hadn’t told Dorcha where she had gone earlier—or with who—and he had no idea where she was now. When she told Rordan that Dorcha had to know where she was at all times, she heard for the first time how asinine that sounded. She was her own person. Had she made mistakes? Absolutely. Everyone did. But she wasn’t that person anymore.
Regardless if they found her father or not, she wouldn’t check in with Dorcha like a child to a parent any longer. Her discussion with Rordan had opened her eyes to a lot of things—things she should’ve seen much, much earlier. It was easy to fall into a pattern. To gradually accept things that became normal. But hearing herself had been mortifying.
She stopped next to a fallen tree and sat upon it. Her gaze took in the clothes she hadn’t changed out of after returning from searching for Ruarc. If it hadn’t been for Dorcha forcing her to attend the dinner, she wouldn’t have remembered how she liked dressing up or wearing heels. She wouldn’t have changed into jeans and the sweater that day. But he had pushed her into doing what he wanted, and in turn, she had been compelled to take a good, long look at her life.
And she didn’t like what she saw.
How did any of her guards obey her or take her seriously when Dorcha ordered her about like a slave? Since their father gave Dorcha the commands, she didn’t know for certain what Da said about her or to her. Everything was filtered through Dorcha. What she couldn’t understand was why she hadn’t questioned that fact earlier.
But she was questioning everything now.
She owed her family. They’d helped her up from rock-bottom. But that didn’t mean they had control of her life. At first, she had needed the structure so she didn’t relapse, but she was stronger now. She could be on her own. She had become complacent and had accepted what her da wanted without argument.
“Not any longer.”
Fianna quite liked the new person emerging within her, and she knew that Rordan had played a huge role in it. He had asked questions of her that no one else had, and that was because she never spoke to anyone about her family—she rarely spoke to anyone at all. When she did, it was about training or security. There were no conversations, no stories of the past or hopes for the future.
She released a long breath. The future. She couldn’t remember the last time she had thought about her future. Everything had been tied to her father’s vision of what the Fae should be. Gratitude had put her in a position to aid him—and thereby Dorcha—in any way she could.