"I'll need the key to access the same floor Kiva Kavanaugh is staying on," Ren told her in a low voice, as she stared at Plunkett. He could feel the faint magic of the Leipreachán's glamour and wished he had the ability to draw on so little and do something useful with it.
"Of course," she said, not taking her eyes from the Leipreachán doll.
"Do it now," he told her. "Quickly. And say nothing about this to anybody."
"Okay," she said with a nod.
The receptionist turned to the computer, tapped away at the keyboard for a moment and then handed Ren a plastic, credit-card sized key. "Ms Kavanaugh is on the fifth floor," she said, proof the glamour was doing its job. Kiva never booked into a hotel under her own name, and the Savoy staff would never, in the normal course of events, reveal that someone so famous was a guest. "Enjoy your stay."
Ren took the key. "Why don't you go on a break?" he suggested. "You must be exhausted after all that work."
She looked at him blankly and then nodded. "I am. Thank you."
As the young woman turned and headed toward the back of the reception area, Ren closed the box, ignoring Plunkett's grunt of complaint, and headed for the elevators. He glanced around the fabulous newly-renovated, art deco lobby, but nobody was paying him any attention. He pressed the button to call the elevator and waited an interminable time - although in truth it was probably only a minute or two - before a discreet chime announced its arrival and the door opened. He stepped inside, slotted the card in the panel and pressed the button for the fifth floor. He didn't need to ask the room number. Kiva would be in the Royal Suite. It was her favourite and easier to book than the suites at some of the better known hotels. It was encouraging to think she hadn't changed her routine at all.
That meant she wasn't expecting trouble, which was good for Ren. He wanted to take her by surprise.
It was time to get some answers.
* * *
Plunkett made short work of the lock to the Royal Suite. Ren let himself in, placed the box just inside the front door, and entered the suite, overcome by the unfamiliarity of the place. He'd been gone a long time, and although he knew they'd revamped the hotel quite a bit since he was here last, the differences made him a little uncertain.
"Jon? Is that you?"
Ren froze. He had only a moment to be gone from here, before there was no turning back and for a fleeting moment he wondered if that wouldn't be for the best. There were a lot of old wounds to open here, and he may not like the answers he sought.
"Did you get my ice cream?" Kiva called from down the hall. Her voice grew louder as she neared him. "I know I could order it from room service, but I don't want some underpaid busboy selling my room service orders to -"
Kiva stopped and stared at him. For a moment, neither of them spoke. Ren had time to notice how well Kiva had aged. She must be well into her forties now, but she looked thirty. Was that the result of a good surgeon or was she like him? Did she have enough sídhe blood in her to delay aging? She was wearing a bathrobe and slippers, and her hair was all over the place, as if she'd just woken. Perhaps she'd taken something to help her sleep.
What is it about your perfect life that has always made it so hard for you to sleep?
"Oh, my God!"
"Please don't scream."
"I ... Of course not ..." She looked around uncertainly. Ren was sure she was looking for the nearest phone, but there wasn't one here in the hall.
"Or try to call the police."
Kiva shook her head, studying him in the dim light of the hall. She seemed surprised to see him, but not alarmed.
"I ... I never thought I'd see you again, Ren."
"I never thought there'd be a need," he replied, thinking: What a strange conversation. Of all the things we could be saying to each other, why are we standing here trading banalities?
"Hayley's back too," Kiva said, after an awkward silence.
"Do you know where we've been?" That was the crux of the matter, really. Was Kiva a part of this or just an unwitting pawn?
Ever so slowly, Kiva nodded. "I think so."
"Then we have a great deal to talk about," Ren said.
* * *
"I can't have children," Kiva told him, as she began her explanation.
They had moved into the sumptuous sitting room of the Savoy's Royal Suite. Ren declined her offer to send out for room service, suspecting she might use the opportunity to call for help. Although she seemed unafraid, and was civil enough, Ren didn't know if Kiva had some sort of emergency plan in the event her errant, adopted son ever turned up again. It wouldn't surprise him if she did. Kiva was good at protecting herself.
"That's the fastest way to end a career with the Matrarchaí, you know," she said, straightening the folds of her robe, perhaps because it was easier than looking him in the eye. She sat on the edge of the sofa as if she was about to take flight. "To be barren is ... well, let's just say, my career prospects were severely limited, until you came along."
No denials, no pleading ignorance ... Ren was almost as surprised by Kiva's lack of histrionics as he was by her honesty.
"Did you know Amergin was going to throw me through the rift?"
Kiva shook her head. "No. Of all the strange things surrounding your arrival, that was the strangest. You just appeared. It really was just luck, Ren, hard as that is to swallow. It started out a normal day on set. Patrick was in the water, doubling for me, and suddenly there you were. Everyone was stunned when he surfaced with a two year old in his arms."
"Actually, I was three."
"And quite blue with cold and fright ... it was a bitter, awful day."
"Darragh believes Patrick Boyle is Amergin's eileféin."
"He's probably right," she said with a shrug. "No matter how random things seem, most events are connected somehow."
"If it was Patrick who found me, how did you become involved? And I mean what really happened, not what you're always telling the tabloids."
She smiled faintly at that, but didn't try to stall. "I'd just found out I was infertile - did you know that's one of the reasons the Matrarchaí like this reality? We have very advanced fertility science here compared to a lot of other realities. It wouldn't surprise me to learn the Matrarchaí funds research into IVF."
"Why?" Ren asked, although he knew he shouldn't let the conversation wander off the point. Delphine's memories could have the same knowledge as Kiva, but it was something he'd never gone looking for, and he certainly didn't have the time to search her memories now. Better to let Kiva tell him what she knew. It was quicker that way.
"It takes a long time to select and breed the next generation of Undivided, particularly when you're working in secret. Many precious years have been wasted on potential mothers, only to discover they couldn't bear children until it was too late."
"So they ditched you because you couldn't have kids."
Kiva nodded. "In a sense," she agreed. "I wasn't cut completely adrift. They found me an agent and helped launch my acting career. The agreement was, of course, that I would always be there if I was needed. In return, I could stay in this reality and lead a normal life." She smiled at him. "I know what you're going to say, Ren. The life we led was anything but normal ... still, it was a vast improvement on the life I left behind."
"So I was the price you paid for your fabulous career?"
Kiva's smile faded. "I did love you, Ren."
Interesting that she said did. Past tense. He let the remark slide. "What did they ask you to do?"
"To adopt you," she replied, with a shrug. "And it was no mean feat, let me tell you. Patrick was quite determined to adopt you himself."
"Why didn't he?"
"He was planning to. Until his wife died."
Ren sat back in his chair, frowning. "I thought Patrick was already a widower when he found me. He met Kerry on set when she was working for you, didn't he?"
"Yes, but only because the Matrarchaí sent her to keep an eye on you. Patr
ick was quite enchanted with the babe he'd rescued from the deep with the strange tattoo on his palm, you see, and so was Charlotte, his wife. As a good Catholic married couple with a child of the same age, they had a far better chance of getting the adoption approved than a single woman like me. Especially back then."
It took a moment for Ren to realize what she was telling him. "Oh, my God. The Matrarchaí killed Hayley's real mother."
Kiva didn't agree with him, but she didn't deny it, either. "Let's just say Charlotte's sudden and tragic demise was ... convenient."
It was becoming quite brutally clear. "So Charlotte dies, Patrick abandons any hope of adopting the child he rescued -"
"And the selfless, wealthy actress he was doubling for steps up to help out by adopting the poor baby and offering him a position on her staff so that he stays connected to the child he saved."
"What was in it for you?" There must have been something, he figured. Kiva was far from a selfless creature.
"The Matrarchaí promised me it would benefit my career if I took you in, and they didn't just mean the good publicity. After I adopted you, I started being offered roles I'd never dreamed would come my way. I suppose you could say I owe my success to you. The Matrarchaí is nothing if not good for their promises."
"Is Kerry actually your cousin?"
"Perhaps," she said. "In another reality, she might be."
"Was she ordered to marry Patrick?"
"Good lord, no," Kiva said, smiling. "She did it because she actually loved him, Ren, or at least she liked him well enough. And poor little Hayley was - tragically - in need of a mother."
Ren wasn't sure he believed that. "Wasn't she good enough breeding stock to produce her own kids?"
Kiva was beginning to relax a little. She sat back on the sofa and crossed her legs, no longer perched like a frightened bird. "Actually, that's surprisingly close to the truth. She'd birthed two or three stillborns in her own reality, I believe, and couldn't have any more children without risking her life. So yes, I suppose you could say she wasn't good enough stock for the Matrarchaí."
"Why bring her here?"
"The story told to me was that Kerry came to this realm because her husband in her own reality was considered a good bloodline, and with her multiple stillbirths, they risked losing his seed. She had to 'die' there, so he could be free to marry again. I don't know much about where she came from. We never spoke of it really, but it had, I gather, an absurdly strict moral code and he was something of a brute, by all accounts. She was more than happy to be rid of him. Particularly when his replacement was a man as gentle and kind as Patrick Boyle."
That was a bit rich - the Matrarchaí concerned about morals. "Why didn't they just kill her off like they did Hayley's mother?"
"Kerry is one of us, Ren. We don't kill our own."
"Just anybody who gets in your way?"
Kiva had the good sense not to rise to that. For once, she remained silent and let Ren ask his questions. "Is Neil adopted, too?"
"No. He was a happy accident," Kiva said. "After the trouble she'd had in her own reality, nobody was more stunned that Kerry when she discovered she was pregnant, although it wasn't an easy pregnancy. In a less vigilant reality, Neil would have been another stillbirth, I suppose."
"Why didn't someone save her babies in the other reality with magic?"
"Magic is only good when you know what it is you're healing, Ren. A well-trained obstetrician, regular ultrasounds and a foetal heart rate monitor are their own forms of magic."
"I'm surprised they left Kerry with you all this time, particularly once she proved fertile." That seemed to be the only thing the Matrarchaí cared about, although Ren was sure there was something else, something more, and it was starting to dawn on him that Kiva may be too far down the chain of command to know what it was. Even Delphine might prove to be nothing more than a loyal lieutenant, rather than the general Ren had always assumed her to be.
"There wasn't much else they could do. By then I was too high profile for someone so close to me to disappear without question and, to be honest, Kerry still had some purpose to the Matrarchaí."
"What purpose?"
"Well, for one thing, you grew up with someone far wiser and more sensible than me to watch over you, and not once has Patrick questioned Charlotte's death. Besides, we were both loyal sisters of the Matrarchaí. They had no need to silence either of us."
"Do you know how insane that sounds?"
She shrugged. "It probably is. But we are mere cogs in the wheel of a vast insane machine, Ren. It was never our job to question the whys and wherefores of what our betters had planned for us."
"Did you never question what they were doing?" That seemed the most remarkable thing of all.
"Most of the girls the Matrarchaí recruits, are just glad to be rescued from a life of drudgery, endless painful childbirths and early deaths," she explained, "often at the hands of a senseless brute more interested in his horses than his wife. Step out into the wider universe before you judge us, Ren. You might be surprised by what you find."
Ren had no intention of tell Kiva just how much of the wider universe he'd seen.
"Did you know I was Undivided?"
She nodded. "The tattoo gave it away. I contacted the Matrarchaí as soon as I saw your hand. Things moved very quickly after that."
"Why didn't you say something to me, when I was growing up?"
That seemed to amuse her. "Would you have believed me if I had tried to tell you that you came from another reality? You thought I was loopy, as it was. And it's not as if I could prove it."
"You sent me to a shrink, Kiva. You let me think I was going mad. You stood there and said nothing when that jerk, Murray Symes, suggested I needed medicating for my self-harm issues."
"What was I going to say, Ren?"
Ren took a deep breath. He'd thought the pain was long behind him. "What was the plan for my future, then? Wait until I was grown and have me father a plentiful supply of brats on a long line of supermodels provided by the Matrarchaí's modeling agency, all to preserve my precious bloodline?"
Kiva studied him with a puzzled expression. "How do you know the agency?"
"Long story," he said. "Is that what they had planned?"
"I really don't know, Ren."
He believed her. If what she'd told him was true, Kiva would have had no reason to be privy to the inner workings of the Matrarchaí. "What happened to Delphine's modeling agency after she disappeared?"
"I couldn't say. I don't have much to do with ORM any longer. It's still going, as far as I know. I could ask Eunice. She probably knows."
Eunice Ravenel. The lawyer always arriving in the nick of time to get him out of trouble. The lawyer representing the Boyles in their suit to have Hayley declared legally dead. She was Matrarchaí. Naturally.
"Have you seen Darragh?"
"Your brother?" She shook her head sadly. "I wanted to, Ren. I really did. But they wouldn't let me. It would have been front-page news if I'd had any contact with him. I've seen pictures of him, though. You're very alike."
"We're identical twins."
"Yes, well, that would explain it. Why are you here, Ren? Do you need money? I could arrange for Eunice to transfer some funds to you."
That made Ren smile. "Really, Kiva. You'll arrange to have your Matrarchaí lawyer wire me some money. Are you serious?"
She didn't seem bothered by him calling her out on her blatant attempt to hand him over to her superiors. "What do you want then?"
It was Ren's turn to shrug. He wasn't sure what to say. He just had to be careful she didn't realize he was stalling. "Some sort of closure, I suppose. Some reason for having my life ruined."
"It wasn't the Matrarchaí who ruined your life, Ren. That was done by whoever threw you through a rift in the first place."
"Fair enough. What else can you tell me about the Matrarchaí?"
"I've told you everything I know."
"Not quite
," he said. "Who's running the show these days?"
"What do you mean?"
"Delphine's been dead for ten years. Someone is in charge now. Who is it?"
Kiva was silent for a moment and then she shrugged, as if it didn't matter what she told him. That was a warning in itself.
"Her name is Marie-Claire," Kiva said. "She's Delphine's eileféin, I think. I really don't know her well. I've only met her once."
Ren rose to his feet, hoping Plunkett had done what they came here to do. He didn't want to visit again. He certainly didn't want to engage Kiva any more than he had to. His feelings for this woman who'd raised him were complex and unsettling. He wanted out of here so he wouldn't have to deal with them.
"I should be going," he said, as she also rose to her feet. "You need to be getting ready for BAFTA's."
"You know about that?"
"Why do you sound surprised? Didn't your publicist send out a press release?"
She nodded and plunged her hands into the pockets of her bathrobe. "I never meant you any harm, Ren. You believe that, don't you?"
"Yes," he said, a little surprised to discover he meant it. He doubted Kiva bothered about someone other than herself long enough to waste the effort planning to hurt them.
"Then can I offer you a piece of advice?"
"This ought to be good."
"The Matrarchaí will come for you, Ren. You're special. More special than they ever suspected. You've even managed to lose the tattoo, I see, and that makes you beyond special. It makes you unique. If you've found another realm to hide in, and they don't know where you are, return there now, and don't ever leave it again. It's the only way you will ever be free of them."
It was possibly the best advice she'd ever given him.
Pity he had no intention of following it. "How long after I leave will you contact them and tell them you've seen me?"
"I'll have to call them as soon as you go."
Ren nodded. He'd suspected as much. Fortunately, Plunkett could short out the phones just by touching them, along with remote controls and almost anything else that had a battery in it somewhere. He wasn't sure how much time that would buy them, but nobody would be calling in or out of the Savoy for a while.
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