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Fionn keeps eye contact with me as the doctor works. “My sister?”

“Someone will update you as soon as they can.”

“We’ve been waiting for an update all night.”

“I’ll speak to the nurse once we’re done.”

“Ask whether she’s through the surgery,” I say, a little prickly. “We need something more than another promise of an update.”

The doctor cuts the thread, then reaches for a dressing from the tray beside him. Fionn’s jaw tightens as gauze is pressed over the wound, but that’s all he gives away.

I take everything in because if they release Fionn tonight, I’ll know how to care for him myself.

Gauze. Tape. Painkillers. Clean dressings. I hold on to each practical detail because Fionn is here, wounded but alive, and taking action doesn’t require me to think about anything else.

His shirt and trousers were bagged up and taken away ten minutes ago, and two Gardaí have been stationed outside the door. A detective has already tried twice to question us. Both times, the doctor sent him back into the corridor.

If he tries to come through that door again before someone tells us whether Keira will live, I’ll give him a piece of my mind.

I stand between the examination bed and the wall with my arms folded over a jumper someone found for me. It’s too big and smells of hospital laundry. My damp hair sticks to the back of my neck, and there’s blood beneath my fingernails that won’t come out no matter how hard I scrub.

Some of it belongs to Keira.

Most of it belongs to him.

The doctor secures the dressing with strips of tape. “Keep this clean and dry. The antibiotics should prevent infection, providing you take them as instructed. You’ll need the dressing changed, and I want the stitches checked in seven days.”

“I’ll look after him at home,” I tell the doctor, moving closer.

Fionn’s attention locks on me. For one unguarded second, the hard line of his mouth loosens before he brings it back under control.

He told me before that his ma chose booze over taking care of him. Nothing else has reached inside me tonight, but that brief softening of his mouth does. I inch closer until my hip meets the examination bed.

He sits bare-chested on the edge of the bed, smoke scenting his hair and dried blood marking his forehead. Bruising spreads above his hip beneath the stark white dressing, but even stripped down to his boxers, there’s nothing vulnerable about him.

“I need to see my sister.”

“I’ll arrange your prescription and find out whether there’s been any news about your sister.” The doctor removes his gloves and throws them into the clinical waste bin. “Don’t leave this room until I come back.”

The door closes behind him.

In the corridor, shoes squeak against the floor. A trolley rattles past, and a telephone rings twice before someone answers it.

The closed door stays at the edge of my vision. Keira is somewhere beyond it. So are my brothers, the Gardaí and the first moment I’ll have to admit to myself that Ma is dead.

I move between his knees and wrap my arms around his neck. My first breath against his skin breaks halfway out.

His arms close around me. One hand spreads over my back while the other settles beneath my hair, holding me against the solid heat of his body. Smoke, antiseptic and the last trace of his cologne cling to his skin.

“Seeing ya like that scared the shit out of me.” My voice disappears into the curve of his neck.

“I’m all right.”

“You were shot.”

“Technically, it’s only a graze.”

“A bullet tore through your side, Fionn.”