Plausible Deniability

Aila follows Niall out of the pool-room, numb and shaking. His arm stays around her shoulders—he must know she will collapse at any second. Liam and Zayn stayed behind to fish the corpse from the water, and she wonders if they will drain the pool. She will never swim in it.

Tania sends Lilyen for a cup of tea then sits down next to Aila. The War Room quickly fills with people, even the ones who patrolled all night. Aila knows the others will come to the manor when their shifts end. Clint catches her eye, nodding a greeting, before focusing on Niall.

He plants his knuckles against the tabletop and tells those gathered exactly what happened. He even knows the man came against Aila, and she flinches as the words ring in the air. As everyone glances at her. Swallowing thickly, she lets her mind float away from the here and now. She can’t bear hearing this—reliving this. So she wonders what her friends are doing right now. Has she even told them she’s getting married?

They know he asked, but Aila can’t remember if she told them she said ‘yes’. Between her bruises and bloodied face from sparring and— She hasn’t spoken to her friends except through text messages. A hand grips her knee, squeezing hard, and she gasps as she pulls away. Tania murmurs an apology and gestures toward Niall with her chin. He frowns and leans toward her.

“Sweetheart?”

“Sorry. Just...”

“I understand. If anyone has a problem with this, speak up now. Otherwise, I’ll take your silence as agreement, and you can’t back out.”

Aila turns toward Tania, hissing, “What’s ‘this’?”

“I’ll explain later.”

“Tania, go with Clint and Mully. Bring Davenport’s body to the lake.”

The words are barely out of Niall’s mouth before Aila bolts to her feet. Clapping a hand over her mouth, she sprints toward the kitchen. Orlen shouts, but she ignores him to throw up in the sink. She’d forgotten Davenport died because of her. The man in the pool died because of her. The brutes who took her, Nathaniel... Five people, at the very least, have died because of her. Will the death count ever stop rising?

“Miss, are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” she croaks, resting her elbows on the edge of the sink. “‘M fine.”

“Aila?” Harry’s voice is too soft, and he approaches on loud footsteps. Still Aila tenses. “Niall wants me to take you upstairs to bed.”

“I’m fine.”

“No, love, you’re not. C’mon. Don’t make me get Tania.”

“Don’t get Tania.”

Harry’s smile drenches his voice with victory. “Then come on.”

She spits into the sink, washes the vomit down, and apologises to Orlen for startling him. Before he can reply, Harry is steering her from the kitchen and toward the staircase. Clint waves at her as she passes, and Aila wants to cry at the concern on his face. He’d been so kind last night.

Sleep comes quickly. When she wakes, Niall sits beside her on the bed with a folded leg and the other hanging off the edge of the mattress. A ledger lies open before him, another on his knee, and he looks back and forth between the two books. His pencil scratches against the paper.

“What are you doing?”

“Books,” he mumbles, scratching something out. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m... I’m still trying to process everything.”

“Do you need anything?”

Aila shakes her head and scoots closer. “No. You’re busy. I’ll be fine. You being here is good enough.”

Niall stares at her with an unreadable expression then nods. She watches as he goes back to work, despite the fact she knows Harry does the books. Harry does the funnelling of moneys between various organisations they control. Niall just keeps a tight grip on the city, punishes wrongdoers and kills those who deserve it.

But here he sits doing a job that isn’t his so he can watch over her. So she can collect herself without being alone.

The longer he works, moving from the books to ledgers for plans, the further Aila falls into a half-doze. He brings a calm she didn’t expect, not after yesterday. She snuggles against his side, exhaling softly, and drowns in the scent that’s uniquely him.

“Did I frighten you this morning?”

His voice breaks the silence, but Aila finds no fear inside of herself. She shakes her head against his thigh. “No. I...”

“What is it, love?” he asks quietly, and she presses her face into the fabric of his slacks.

“I wanted to do it,” she admits.

“Aila—”

“No, don’t. I know what you’re going to say.” She sits up, staring through the terrace doors, and continues in a horrible mimicry of his accent, “‘You aren’t ready to take a life, so I have to do it for you’. And—and I get that. I do. But I—”

“I’m gonna stop you right there, Aila. Don’t claim you know what I’m thinking, especially when you’re wrong.”

Her head snaps to the left, and she gapes. It’s all she can do. What the Hell is he talking about? “Wait, what?”

He chuckles and sets the books aside. Aila can read the hesitance, see the minute shaking of his outstretched hand. She wants to stay far away from someone else’s touch, but... It’s Niall. He’s not that man. So she moves to curl up in his lap, and he lets out a shuddering breath when she tucks her face into his neck.

“I’m thinking that... I wish I’d known you wanted to take his life.”

“How could you have known?” she whispers. “I didn’t even know until after I watched him die.”

“You’re thinking, aren’t you?”

Aila sighs and pulls back. Niall’s eyes are soft, so sweet and warm. She hesitates then leans forward to kiss him. There’s no terror, nothing to be afraid of. Niall has saved her and kept her from harm as much as he could. He’s never taken what she wasn’t willing to give. God, she would give him everything. He smiles against her lips, but Aila isn’t amused as she pulls away. Not with the question in her mind:

“Is it hard?”

“What? Taking someone’s life?” At her nod, he blows out a breath. “It can be, depending on the reason. And age.”

He tells her his hardest kill wasn’t even his first one—barely fourteen and watching the man’s life fade into nothing. He’d hurt a little boy, caused irreparable damage. Bobby wanted to be certain Niall was ready for the responsibility. Niall tortured the man for hours without vomiting before finishing the job. He shot him directly in the head, straight through.

No, his hardest was a child.

“A mercy killing,” he says. “She was so small and ill, the wee thing. The daughter of our cook. Wasn’t gonna make it, even if we fattened her up. She stole from Ma’s jewellery box, but even Da didn’t have the heart to punish her. I was sixteen and had to listen to her parents screaming for mercy as we carried her away. They didn’t understand this was mercy.”

Niall’s voice crackles, and Aila watches him blink quickly. His eyes still shine with tears. She loops her arms around his shoulders, pulling him in against her, and holds him close. He isn’t crying, not quite. But she can’t let him think he’s alone.

After a few minutes, he sits up and wipes at his eyes. She pretends she hasn’t just held him through such a horrible memory.

“What was your easiest kill?”

He grins. Blue eyes rimmed in red, nose pink from emotion, but his grin is brighter—sharper—than anything she’s ever seen. “Every time it was for you.”

Aila knows he should be taking care of the city instead of her, but she’s selfish enough to let him stay in bed with her all day and far into the night. He peppers her with kisses, gentle hand running over her arm as they cuddle, and she tells him about Tarris. About her family. About YaYa and how she misses her grandmother more fiercely than anyone else.

Priscilla has refused contact with Aila, and it’s come with the consequence of Aila not speaking with her YaYa.

They’re gone before sun-up. Aila curls up in the seat on the train with Niall keeping watch. There is no need for the overprotection: No one gives a damn about each other this early in the morning. The car is silent as it treks away from Primden and toward bordering towns.

She remembers taking this trip, in the opposite direction, only eight years ago. She’d been full of foolish hopes—a relationship meant for forever, a happy future with a husband and kids and maybe even a cat or two. A huge garden and a home filled with love. Instead, she’d gotten heartbreak and betrayal.

But now she has Niall and his eclectic ‘family’. They love her despite her weakness, and she loves them for all they are.

The home she grew up in looks the same. Her father must have repainted when spring fell. White shingles under a thick straw roof, bright yellow door keeping the brisk autumn wind out. The windows are covered by the curtains YaYa embroidered for Priscilla and Wendell’s marriage gift.

The fields stand barren to the right; harvest is over, and the crops have been split between the families on the sixty-acre farm. Crop-sharing is an enormous part of Tarrisian culture. If someone doesn’t participate, they are shunned, ostracised until they leave the settlement.

To the left is the road leading back to the station. The road Aila and Niall trekked along, despite his slacks and dress shoes. She squeezes his hand, kisses his cheek, then knocks on the door. He steps closer into her side, whispering encouragement as footsteps near.

“Mama, it’s for you!”

Matreo walks away without a word to his sister. Niall scowls, mouth opening, but Aila shakes her head. Her brother isn’t worth the disdain. Matreo and Aila are as different as two siblings can be, and that will never change.

Priscilla stands in the doorway a moment later. She’s pinned her blonde hair back in her typical style: swooping curls draped from temple to the back of her skull, the rest piled high on her head. Aila always said it looked like her mama wore earrings for her hair. That hasn’t changed.

“You’ve come home.”

“I’ve come to see YaYa.”

“And who is this?” asks Priscilla with an appraising glance at Niall. “I’m—”

“Stopping me from seeing my grandmother.”

“You’re being very rude, Aila.”

Niall clears his throat and rests his hand on Aila’s lower back. “I believe your daughter has a reason for being here. Introductions aren’t it. So if you could please allow Aila to visit with Miss Celine, that would be wonderful.”

He’s perfectly charming—pleasant, even sweet—but the edge to his tone gives no room for argument. Priscilla’s mouth opens, closes, and opens again. She stumbles back a few steps before disappearing further into the house.

“Have I mentioned I love you?” mutters Aila as they wait in the cold of the morning. “No one has ever made her shut up like that.”

He doesn’t get the chance to respond before Aila is swept into strong arms, and she immediately melts into her YaYa’s embrace. The woman smells so much the same as before—spices from the foods she provides at the evening meals, linen from the washing, rich earth that only nature can provide.

“Oh, I’ve missed you so much.”

“I—I’ve missed you, YaYa.” Aila sniffles and buries her face in thick grey hair, struggling not to fall apart. “I’m so sorry.”

“No, my butterfly, don’t apologise. You did what you should have done.”

Celine pulls back and cups Aila’s cheeks with wide, calloused hands. Hardy hands, hands that have rocked babies and knit blankets and dried tears. Hands that have chopped wood and reaped the harvests. The old woman’s face is more lined than ever, but her sparkling blue eyes—the eyes Aila inherited—are warm. She smiles and turns to Niall, holding a hand out.

“This must be the fiancé your mother screamed about. Hello, dear. I’m Celine.”

“My name is Niall, and it is an absolute pleasure to meet you, Miss Celine.” Niall presses his lips to the back of Celine’s knuckles. “You’re even more beautiful than Aila said you were.”

“Oh, butterfly, he’s quite the devil with his silver tongue, isn’t he?”

“He’s an angel, YaYa.”

“Let me grab my shawl, and we can go on a walk.”

So they do. Niall listens quietly as Celine and Aila speak of the changes years have brought. Her grandmother stumbles over frozen clods of mud, but she refuses to slow. Refuses to give into her age. Aila hates seeing her YaYa struggling so much. She glances back at Niall who nods and grins.

“YaYa... Do you want to come to Primden with us? It doesn’t have to be permanent, but...”

“You know I can’t impose like that, butterfly.”

“I just—I’ve missed out on so much time with you already. I only want a bit more.”

“How do you think your parents would fare without me?”

Aila snorts, ignoring her grandmother’s sideways glance. “About as well as they’ve got on without me.”

Silence descends upon the trio as the sun climbs higher in the sky. The last of the season’s birds sing their songs of preparation, and Aila realises she’s missed this. The peaceful aura and open sky. No city buildings within sight. She even missed the boredom, the hard work in the fields, cooking settlement meals every night.

Celine agrees to come back—“For a visit, only. I will not force my presence onto my butterfly and her love.”

Aila hopes her grandmother never leaves.