Steal the Sun (Thieves #4)(119)

“Fine, I promise no hair pulling.” I stopped and took a deep breath. I looked back at Neil with a frown. “I have no real intention of fighting with the woman, but don’t you think we need to talk about this?”

“About the fact that Dev has a kid?” Neil posited. “Maybe not, Z. She obviously didn’t want to push the marriage. All she had to do was show up at the Seelie palace with Little Dev and Miria would have approved their union. She didn’t. How does the timing work because Dev’s been on the Earth plane for seven years?”

I did the math in my head. “It’s only been eighteen months here. Dev was seventeen when he spent the year here. Declan just turned twenty-two and the boy is roughly four. It works out. Dev got Chima pregnant while he and Declan were here for Declan’s training.”

“But Dev didn’t leave the sithein for a couple of years after that,” Neil pointed out. “Yet she didn’t contact him. Leave it be, Z.”

I willed myself not to cry. “I can’t. Dev wants a kid so bad. He should know he already has one. It isn’t fair to him and it isn’t fair to the child to not know a loving father.”

I could only hope it wouldn’t change his feelings for me. I had to hope that he wouldn’t feel like he needed to stay here, but I worried his sense of honor would lead him to that decision. If I thought about what this meant for all of us, me and Danny and Dev, then I would probably follow Neil’s advice and keep my mouth shut. But I’d just lost a child. Summer was lost to Danny and me as well. I couldn’t allow Dev to not know Sean. I couldn’t allow our family to lose another child.

Neil shook his head and pointed down a hallway. “Chima is that way, and I think Nim is with her. I’ll stay out in the hall unless you need me. Remember your promise about the hair pulling.”

I nodded and forced myself to walk down that hallway and confront the woman who had borne my husband’s child. I cursed myself the whole way. Who was I to upset this balance Chima had found? No one was trying to force Dev to acknowledge his responsibilities and yet I was ready to push the issue. I couldn’t get the look in that little boy’s eyes out of my head and I pressed on.

Nim and Chima were talking as I approached the balcony they were sharing tea on.

“I like her,” Nim said. “I don’t understand your problem with her. She’s sweet and funny.”

Chima snorted and tucked a stray piece of chestnut brown hair behind one ear. “You don’t understand? How can you not? Think about it for a second, Nim. How would you feel in my position? He said his people would never accept me, but they’ll accept some human? And why is she running around with a vampire?”

“Whoa, Chi,” Nim returned in an affectionate tone as I walked onto the balcony. “She isn’t…”

“I’m running around with the vampire because he’s my husband, too,” I said forthrightly. I met Chima’s blue eyes head on. “Now that I answered your question, perhaps you can answer one of mine. Why haven’t you told my husband he has a son?”

“Zoey,” Nim began.

“Hush, Nim,” Chima said, her lips a flat line. “This is between me and Her Highness.”

I flushed with anger. “Don’t call me that. You can’t mean it as anything but an insult since by all Fae laws you’re his wife and I’m a second, with only the rights you’re willing to give me until I produce a child.”

“I give them all to you, Your Highness,” she said with a bitter laugh. “Please feel free to consider that bastard all yours. I wouldn’t take him back if he dropped out of the sky and begged me on bended knee.”

“He has the right to know his son.” I stated my position as plainly as I knew how.

“Why does he have the right?” Chima attempted to stare me down. “Did he stay with me to see if I was pregnant? Do you want to know what your loving husband did to me? He told me he loved me one night and walked out and left me the next morning. He never asked about me when he returned to this sithein. He never visited me or glanced my way at a state dinner. When he was done with me, he left a lovely parting gift and a note telling me he was sorry it couldn’t work out. Why should I share my son with him?”

“Because he should know his father,” I insisted. “Whatever he did to you, I’m sorry you were treated that way, but it doesn’t mean he wouldn’t be a good father. He deserves a chance. He wants a child so badly. When I lost ours he went a little crazy. Knowing he has a son on this side of the sithein could stop this war. Have you thought of that?”

“Look, as I told you before, I’ve been in the country with my son for a couple of months now,” Chima said, calming down a bit. “I’m truly sorry to hear you lost a child. I don’t know what I would do without my son. Perhaps before we tear at each other over a piece of shit man, you should bring me up to speed. All I was told when you arrived last night was that there was trouble with the new Seelie royal. I’ve learned a little from Nim this morning, but I try to stay out of politics.”

It was a reasonable request and I honored it. I told the future Queen of the Unseelie exactly what had happened during my stay in Faery.

“Declan believes that Herne was an Unseelie spy,” I explained.

“Of course he does,” Chima said, rolling her eyes. “Did you try to sway him?”