Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)(74)

“You got the freak part right,” he agreed. “You should hear my brothers talk. They think I’m an idiot savant. I can do tricks like a dancing bear, but I can’t seem to stay out of trouble with the cops. What does that suggest about my intelligence level?”

She covered her face. He heard smothered giggles. It gave him a happy glow to get a laugh out of her, even if it was at his own expense.

“So you’ve been doing, ah, contract work ever since then?” she asked, when she got her voice back under control.

“Nah. I burnt out a while back. For a while, after Kev died—after Kev was murdered,” he corrected himself. “I didn’t care whether I lived or died. But after a while, I started caring again. And if you keep putting yourself in harm’s way, it doesn’t matter how lucky you are. Statistics will catch up with you. Besides, it was so freaking depressing. I would have ended up eating a bullet in the end. Just so I didn’t have to keep seeing all that awful shit every time I closed my eyes.”

“Oh dear,” she whispered. “That’s awful. I’m sorry.”

“You know that diamond mine f*ck-up I told you about? The electrical wire episode? That was the clincher, for me. I got this other scar in that incident, too.” He put his hand over the side of his abdomen, against the throb of remembered pain. “I had lots of time afterwards to lie around watching a bag drip into my arm and ponder how f*cked up my life was. I decided it was time to lighten up.”

She was quiet for a while while she thought about what he’d said, but he knew he wasn’t off the hook yet. Long car trips were the pits, when it came to curious women. It was like being chained to a chair.

“That summer that we met, you were saving up money to finish your degree,” she ventured, her voice cautious.

And I blew every last penny on a rock for you, baby.

He stopped himself, just in time. No need to burden her with that. He touched the small gem in his ear, twirled it. His one nervous habit.

He’d worn it ever since he’d gotten the money together to set it into an earring, and never examined why. Masochism, maybe. A stern reminder not to get wound up about women. A perverse mix of both.

Maybe just because he was a vain peacock. The diamond looked sharp, which he liked, and it bugged his humorless brothers, which he also liked. Jerking Davy and Con around was one of the great joys of his existence. They considered his diamond an effete affectation. Fuck ’em. That was just dour old crazy Eamon talking. He’d be damned if he’d let the ghost of his dead father dictate his fashion accessories, too.

The shadow Dad had cast over his life was long enough as it was.

“So. I know you were interested in studying chemical engineering. Did you ever…” Her voice trailed off.

“No, Liv,” he said gently. “I never went back to finish my degree.”

She paused. “I didn’t mean to seem as if I was criticizing you.”

“Nah. A lot of things changed that summer. To tell you the truth, I forgot all about chemical engineering. It barely crossed my mind.”

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

“Don’t be,” he told her. “I’m not. In retrospect, academia or theoretical research or a think tank would have been all wrong for a spaz like me. I would have gone batshit. Adrenaline junkie that I am.”

She twisted her hands together. “I’m so sorry,” she said again.

He shot her a puzzled look. “What are you sorry for this time?”

She shrugged. “All of it. What happened fifteen years ago. The dent that it put in your life. What happened today, too.”

“Ah. That,” he said. “Don’t be sorry about that on my account. I’m better off than I was before. It’s easier to deal with Kev being murdered than accept that he’d gone nuts. Now I’ve got someone external that I can hunt down and kill. That’s so much better, babe. So much.”

“Well,” she murmured doubtfully. “I suppose. If you say so.”

He decided to deflect questions from his own twitchy self. “So what have you done with yourself in the past fifteen years?” he asked.

She let out a small laugh. “Compared to you, absolutely nothing.”

“Oh, come on,” he said. “Spill it.”

She tossed her hands up. “Normal, dull, predictable stuff. Went to college. Went abroad. Studied art and architecture and literature. Tried to learn some French and Italian. Didn’t get very far. Got a masters in library science. Worked various places as a research librarian. Decided to try my hand at running a bookstore. And the rest you know.”

“I thought your folks wanted you to go into the family business.”

“Oh, yes. My mother was frantic. I wasted lots of energy opposing her. I guess that’s the big war story of my life, but it’s too sad and boring to tell. So that’s it for me. No crossing the desert on a camel, or swashbuckling swordfights, or guarding diamond mines, or mortal combat with cruel warlords or suchlike. Just dull, normal living.”

He rubbed the scar from his bullet wound. “Be glad,” he said.

“I know, but it seems so tame. At least until yesterday. My normal life is mostly work. In my spare time, I read books, shop for groceries, do laundry, pay utility bills. I see lots of movies. I love to garden. I collect patchwork quilts. I enjoy making bread and jam. Being domestic.”