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“Yeah. You did.” I shrug. “And I don’t answer to you, Fionn. Why are ya still standing at my table?”

His silence closes the space between us more brutally than his body ever could.

Then he steps back. “Enjoy the rest of your evening, Miss Tallon.”

“I will,” I say, bright enough for the table to believe me.

He turns and walks away.

A woman asks about the fish. The man beside me talks about his wine.

I stare at the envelope beside my plate and slide the certificate free. The men at the docks can have their dinner. Their wives can wear pretty dresses and order from a menu without having to care about the cost.

After I fold the certificate, I shove it into my clutch, tear the envelope in half and toss both halves onto my plate.

Eilish remains with the Harrington-Kinnane party, sandwiched between Fionn and her father.

I get to my feet and glide between the tables with my shoulders level and my chin lifted, letting everyone see a Tallon leaving on her own terms instead of a girl cracked open by a man.

At the doors, my hand closes around the handle.

Everything behind me keeps moving, and I stay facing forward because if I turn now, I’ll search for the one thing he’s spent the whole night refusing to give me.

I open the door and leave my best friend behind with the man I was stupid enough to fall for.

Chapter 30

Fionn

Eilish’s breath whispers down the phone line while I stand at the glass wall of my new penthouse and prepare to tell her something that will start a war.

Graves should be behind me while I make the call. For a mindless second, I wait for his voice to break the silence at my back and glance over at his boxing gloves sitting on the sofa.

They're the first thing I unpacked.

Outside, the harbor is black water, streetlights and cranes looming against the evening sky. Trucks thread between warehouses and perimeter fencing while floodlights burn over the Tallon gates. Beyond them lie the access roads, locked yards, and strips of land no one in my father’s circle bothered looking at twice.

The Tallons own the docks. Through holding companies, I own the routes around them, the warehouses overlooking them and every pressure point that could bring their operation to its knees.

I spent years building the power to rival my father’s. Then he murdered Graves, threatened Sera’s life as the price of disobedience, and my loyalty fucking disappeared.

“Fionn?” Eilish’s voice pulls me back to the conversation.

I clear my throat. “I wanted you to hear it from me before your father hears it.”

“Okay—”

In the glass, my reflection looks calm. Black shirt, sleeves rolled to my elbows and a whiskey in my hand. And I am because I’m ready for the fallout, but beneath the discipline, I’m all alone.

“I’m not going ahead with the wedding.” I bring the glass to my lips and drink to that.

Eilish exhales, and the whisper turns into a laugh before reality hits. “Fuck. Good. Yeah. Okay.”

It isn’t the response my father would expect. He would prefer tears, bargaining, or panic, but mostly he’d expect fear. My fingers loosen around the glass for the first time since I called. Eilish never wanted me. She wanted out, and now I don’t have to turn her into another casualty of my father’s plans.

“Knowing your father, he’ll be pissed,” I say. “Even if you’re not.”

“Are you sure you want to piss him and your father off?”