Chapter Text
The name ‘Morrough’ gnaws at Helena like a bad tooth. She tries to ignore it, to wear it down into submission, but the ache persists.
It's half an answer to one of the many questions she agreed not to ask Ferron and that's almost worse than no answer at all. Like slotting a puzzle together only to find half of the pieces missing.
She tries to distract herself with work. And then, on rare days off, with research into Ferron's mother's condition. Helena flags every discrepancy she comes across in her chart, pores through journal articles for treatments they haven't tried, even some that haven't yet been approved for public use.
It isn't until a morning in April, when sleep evades her for hours, that she relents. She pulls her laptop out from under her bed and types the name into the search bar.
Of course, it’s far too vague a search to turn up any meaningful results. She tries “Morrough AND boxing” and then “Morrough AND Ferron.” Her fingers tingle when she scrolls to the bottom of the first page of results and finds a news article from over a decade ago.
She clicks it, reading so fast the words blur together and she has to stop to slow herself down.
High Rise Incorporated and Ferron Real Estate jointly announced a merger agreement in which all existing properties under the Ferron domain are set to be absorbed by High Rise Inc. The newly combined company is estimated to have a value of approximately $3 billion, including the assumption of debt.
High Rise CEO Cetus Morrough and Ferron CEO Atreus Ferron released a joint statement ensuring the merger will only have a net positive impact on their current and future development partners. Per the statement, Morrough will retain the role of CEO while Ferron has been named the Senior Director of Real Estate Planning.
A picture of the two men is clipped at the bottom. Atreus both does and doesn't look like Kaine. Same dark hair and austere features. The eyes are different though, Kaine's signature piercing grey nowhere to be found in his father. When Helena searches Atreus’ name, she quickly finds an obituary dated four years ago. A massive and sudden heart attack.
Morrough is much more difficult to track down. Helena finds references to him in several more news articles, all detailing various mergers and business dealings. Morrough tends to be described as a figurehead more than anything. A rich and powerful CEO interested in acquiring as many businesses around the city as he can with the intent of taking them over or bleeding them dry.
No personal details are ever included in the articles. When Helena searches social media for his name, no accounts pop up. Beyond his business dealings, Cetus Morrough is a ghost.
- - -
An early spring rain falls from the sky the next time Helena is summoned to the old apartment building. Ferron had sent the usual text asking if she could come and she'd replied yes, after verifying the extent of his injuries. No stab wounds, no concussions, no active bleeding.
Helena hesitates outside now, growing damper by the second and yet not quite ready to face him again. She'd treated him so terribly last time, snapping at him and insinuating he was holding her against her will when all he'd done was offer her a place to rest.
She hadn't intended to spend the night there or to end up tucked snugly in Ferron's arms, but it happened and she isn't entirely sure what to do next. Say something? Say nothing? Pretend she's above it all or like it isn’t unusual for her to spend nights in strange apartments with even stranger men?
The door to the building creaks open before she can decide, Ferron appearing on the other side.
His expression is infuriatingly unreadable as he looks at her. “What are you doing out here?”
Helena freezes as if caught in some terrible act, then tries to shrug the feeling away. “Nothing,” she says, a bit too brightly. “Just enjoying the rain.”
“Right,” he says, unmoved. “You probably shouldn't linger out here. We aren't exactly in the best part of town.”
“Right, uh, yes. After you.”
Ferron gives her a look as he swings the door wide and beckons her in. Her shoulder brushes his chest as she walks inside and Helena jumps as if she’s been burned.
She takes her time removing her coat, then shaking out the rain from her hair. When she finally turns to look at him, he’s openly smirking at her.
“What?” she asks, incensed.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“No, but you have a look.”
Ferron shrugs, a touch too innocently for her liking. “No look.”
There’s a distinct unevenness to his gait when he joins her at the table. She sighs inwardly as he lowers himself down into the chair. She never thought to worry much about the lower half of his body, but apparently no limb is safe when it comes to underground boxing.
“My ankle,” Ferrons says when Helena kneels down to look. “Twisted wrong on a dodge.”
Helena rolls his pant leg up to find his ankle swollen to twice its usual size. She presses her fingers around the ligaments, checking for fractures. “How far did you walk on this?” She looks up when he doesn’t answer her. “How far, Ferron?”
“I’d rather not say,” he says tightly.
“Why?”
“Because after my slip up with Morrough’s name last time, I’d rather not pass you anymore informational ammo.”
Helena rocks back on her heels. “What on earth could I learn from you telling me you walked two blocks versus twenty?”
“Oh please,” he sneers. “Like you wouldn’t take that and immediately do a search within the radius for…” he seems to catch himself, swallowing thickly before continuing, “...for anything vaguely boxing related.”
She scoffs and he continues, “Tell me you didn’t run off and search up Morrough's name after last time, then.”
Helena busies herself with wrapping his ankle, but there’s no denying the bright flush on her cheeks.
“That’s what I thought,” he says darkly. “What did you find?”
“Barely anything.” She keeps her tone light, her hands steady. It only seems to incense Ferron more.
“Then please, share with the class.”
Helena stands back up, arms crossed against her chest. Ferron is trying very hard to appear unbothered, but his hands are clenched tight into fists and she doesn’t entirely understand why.
“I found a few articles,” she says carefully. “About his real estate company and your…your father’s.”
Ferron stands up so quickly he knocks the chair back. It falls to the floor with a heavy thud, the sound echoing around the bare apartment. He paces to the door and back again, limping all the while.
“You shouldn’t walk on that,” Helena can’t help saying. He shoots her a look so furious she clamps her lips together.
“We had an agreement.”
“I know. I’m sorry, I didn’t think it would do any harm.”
He barks a bitter laugh, pulling up short in front of her. Up close like this, his cheeks flushed with anger, he is so stunningly beautiful it nearly distracts from how tired he looks, from the scar marking his temple and lip, from the new growth of grey threading through his hair.
Helena is intimately aware of the limits of the human body, that there is a threshold for how much damage can be inflicted upon it before things start to fall apart. Looking at Ferron now, she worries he’s nearly at that limit, that he’s standing right at the edge, and rather than back away he seems determined to fling himself down into the abyss.
“Do you have any idea what a man like Cetus Morrough is capable of?” he asks her. “The risk you take just from coming here, just from associating with me?”
Helena blanches. “N–no. It’s never occurred to me…”
“Of course it hasn’t,” Ferron spits. “Nothing about your personal safety ever seems to occur to you. Nothing outside the benefit your existence can provide others ever seems to occur to you.”
Helena’s cheeks burn like she’s been slapped. “Fuck you.”
He doesn’t even acknowledge hearing her. Just closes the distance between them so that she has to crane her neck to look into his eyes. They’re black with rage, hard as flint. His hands grip her arms, fingers pressing too tightly to her skin.
“Cetus Morrough killed my father in cold blood. He drove my family to ruins and chained me like a dog when I was most desperate. What do you think he would do to a pretty doctor like you if he knew you were coming here, putting me back together when he's made it clear he wants nothing more than to tear me apart? Do you think he would pat you on the head and send you on your way? Do you?”
Helena’s hands are trembling, but her voice is strangely calm when she says, “Let go of me, Ferron.”
He releases her instantly, blinking rapidly like he’s just coming back to himself. His mouth twists with quick regret. “Marino, I’m sor–”
“No,” she cuts in, taking another step back. “No, let’s not waste time on false apologies.”
He winces like she’s struck him. She almost wishes she had.
Helena presses the back of her hand to her forehead. She takes one steadying breath, and then another. When she finds it in herself to look at Ferron, his face is so miserably upset it nearly manages to soften her.
“I don’t know what risks you expect me to be aware of when you refuse to discuss them with me. You can’t withhold vital information and then get upset when I fail to take that information into account.”
“I know,” he says quickly. “You’re right.”
Helena sighs. “I don’t know what you want from me, Ferron. Do you want me to be afraid of you? Do you want me to be afraid of Morrough? Do you want me to keep coming here to help you or do you want me to leave you to fend for yourself? I can’t keep track anymore and whenever I think I finally have the answer, I’m clearly wrong. So which is it? What would you like me to do?”
Ferron looks at her for a long, long time. “I want you to be more careful," he finally says. “I want you to stop poking around for information on Morrough. I want you to let me know as soon as you get here and not linger outside in the dark, in the rain.”
“Is that all?” Helena laughs, incredulous.
Ferron frowns like he can’t fathom finding humor in any of this. “Yes, that’s all.”
A heavy quiet settles between them. Helena isn’t sure what to do with it, what to do with the thrum of energy that seems to pulse between them. Too much, too little, overdose, withdrawal. It makes her head spin. Makes her body feel in a constant state of flux. Of need.
When he says nothing more, she packs her things and settles her bag on her shoulder. She ignores the weight of Ferron's eyes on her as she walks toward the door.
“Ice your ankle,” she says, never truly able to leave well enough alone. “And keep it elevated.”
“Marino,” he calls behind her.
Helena sighs as she glances back. His expression is once again unreadable, but there's a blaze to his eyes that he can't quite seem to dim.
“What?”
“Just…” he trails, runs a hand through his hair then shoves it solidly in his pocket. “Just be careful.”