For once, could he just do something without being a pain in my arse? I flopped onto the bed next to him, propping my hands behind my head. With a groan, he dropped the pillow.
“How many women have you killed?”I asked, knowing he wouldn’t respond but feeling the need to poke him anyway. “I have an idea! Let’s count.” I shifted the green leather ledger that he kept on the bedside table. “Let’s see, your first victim was—”
Tadhg shot upright, snatching the book with a curse and propping himself against the headboard. He scrubbed a hand down his stubbled cheek, his red-rimmed eyes narrowed. “Tell me what you want so that I can go back to sleep.”
“I need you to kill someone.”
Uncertainty flashed in his bloodshot eyes. His face was so easy to read when he had drink on board. The curse was slowly driving him mad. I knew it. He knew it. Ruairi knew it. Eava knew it. None of us talked about it. “That’s your area of expertise,” he said.
“The people I kill don’t come back.” Most of them, anyway.
He scratched his head, uncovering the tips of his pointed ears—another thing he’d inherited from our father, along with his love of the fairer sex. “And in return?”
“In return, you get a warm fuzzy feeling in your useless heart for helping your favorite brother with something important.”
“Not good enough.” He scoured me from my head to my breeches. “I want your black cufflinks.”
“Why? You don’t even wear cufflinks.” Most of the time, his cuffs ended up shoved over his elbows.
“Maybe I want to melt them down and make you watch.”
“Those are worth a small—” I bit my tongue to keep from making this worse. “You know what? Fine. If you help me, you can have the feckin’ things.”
He bounced on the bed like the child he was, all giddy and full of grins.Insufferable.
I braced my hands against my knees, inhaling a deep breath. Once the words left my lips, I couldn’t take them back. What if Aveen fell madly in love with my brother the way every other woman seemed to?I’d been getting screwed over by fate for two hundred and thirty years. Fate owed me something good.
Out of darkness shines a light. . .
Aveen was the only light I could see.
Thiswouldwork . . .ifI convinced my brother not to pursue her.
If I said she was my friend, he would most assuredly try something. If I told him she was my soulmate, he may still try, if only to get under my skin. If I made him believe that she wanted to be mine and mine alone, that should give me the leverage I needed to keep his filthy hands off her.
With a flick of my wrist, a tost descended over us. “I need you to curse my fiancée.”
Tadhg stopped bouncing. “Did you just say yourfiancée?”
“That’s what I said, yes.”
“Since when are you getting married?”
“My relationship is none of your concern. However, her father has ordered her to marry a miserable human, and we need a way for her to bow out of the engagement while saving face.”
His eyes bulged. “Your fiancée ishuman?”
I glared at him.
“And she’s willing to bear a year in the underworld,” he said slowly, as if the words weren’t registering, “to be withyou?”A slow smile hooked the corners of his cursed lips. “And you needmeto kiss her.”
“I need you tocurseher andkillher,” I corrected. Unfortunately, he had to use his vile mouth to do it.
He threw a hand behind his head and settled back down against the pillows, splaying his free hand over his bare stomach. “What’s your lady love’s name?”
I gritted my jaw.
“Come now. I’ll need her name for this.” He rapped his knuckle against the ledger.