Jeremy’s voice had that familiar, velvety quality to it when he finally looked up from the chessboard and said, almost casually, “I bought Kilcoe.”

You blinked, thinking you misheard him. But he only leaned back in his chair, watching you with a faintly amused expression, like he was waiting for the realization to fully settle in. The firelight flickered across his face, catching the gold in his eyes.

“Yes, the whole thing,” he added, lips curling slightly. “Stone by stone. I’ve been restoring it for years. Now it’s ours.”

He said it as though it were nothing at all, like purchasing a fortress was the same as buying a loaf of bread. But there was something in the way he said “ours” that made your chest tighten. Jeremy didn’t toss words like that around carelessly.

“I’ve lived many lives, my love,” he murmured, eyes drifting over the chessboard again, “but I think this—this one with you… is the only one that ever truly needed a castle.”

He reached out and nudged your bishop gently forward with the tip of his finger, not as a move but more like a gesture, something thoughtful, intimate. “It will be wild. Isolated. Untouched. Just sea, stone, and wind. We’ll play chess beneath the towers. You’ll complain about the cold, I’ll insist you’re dramatic. And we’ll be entirely unreachable.”

Then, with a quiet, knowing smirk, he added, “It suits you. The mystery. The haunting elegance. I imagine you in black velvet, barefoot on old floors. You belong in a castle.”

And there it was, just like that, you could already see it. The stormy skies, the sound of waves crashing against the rocks, the echo of your laughter in stone halls. A place untouched by the world. A place Jeremy Irons claimed for you.