by Fox, Nicole
I watch Saoirse’s face as she steps into the room. Her eyes go wide with awe as she pirouettes slowly on the spot, unsure what to even look at first.
I start to see the castle through her eyes.
From a girl who came from nothing, this must all seem so extravagant.
“It’s a lot, I know,” I say, placing my hand on the small of her back. I probably shouldn’t, but the urge to touch her is overwhelming.
I’m looking for any excuse to do it. This tour feels like sufficient cause.
“It’s amazing,” she says at last. Her eyes fall to me. “Did you come here often as a kid?”
“We’d spent a few odd summers here once in a while,” I admit. “But then… we stopped.”
“Why?”
I feel my jaw snap shut.
It’s habit more than anything else. And thankfully, she doesn’t notice, because her attention has turned to the massive portraits that sit above the stone fireplace.
“Are those family members?” she asks.
“Yes,” I confirm. “Da hated the portraits. Morbid old bastards, he’d always say. But Ma ruled the roost here. He let her have her way when it came to décor.”
“They’re all so beautiful,” Saoirse observes, walking down the line to gaze at each one carefully.
“This is your father?” she asks, pointing at Ronan’s solemn depiction.
I nod.
“And your mother. And Sean. And you. And Kian. And…”
I’m hoping she won’t stop at the last portrait in the line.
But of course she does.
I can’t really blame her, either. Aoife has the kind of face that catches a person’s eye. Huge, dewy eyes, a petite nose, high cheekbones, slight dimples, and a soft, secretive smile that still manages to look innocent.
“She’s beautiful,” Saoirse murmurs, turning to look at me again. “Who is she?”
I don’t answer. Probably because I’m trying to figure out how to tell a story I promised never to tell.
I feel Saoirse’s eyes fall on me when the silence lingers too long. The question in them is obvious.
She’s know I’m keep something from her.
She’s standing directly in front of Aoife’s portrait, and I can’t help but compare their features.
Aoife’s beauty is different. Subtle. Calm
Saoirse’s beauty is bold and loud. It sucks up the air in the room so that you can’t concentrate on anything else, like fire consuming every last morsel of oxygen.
“More secrets,” Saoirse guesses.
“I’m sorry.”
She looks down to hide the hurt in her eyes. But I don’t have to see it to recognize it. I can sense it coming off her pores.
I can sense everything about her, really.
She swallows my attention whole, burns it to ash, demands more.
And I feed it to her. Again and again, I give her all of me.
I never had a choice otherwise.
“It’s okay, Cillian,” she says. “You don’t owe me any explanations. You don’t have to share your secrets with me. Come on, let’s finish the tour.”
She turns to leave, but I grab her arm and she freezes instantly.
“I do want to tell you things,” I whisper fiercely. “It’s just that some secrets are hard to share.”
She frowns as she processes that. Then she glances back over her shoulder at the portrait of Aoife.
“She’s my sister,” I explain.
Saoirse’s eyes snap back to my face. “You never said you have a sister.”
I nod. “I did. She died almost thirty years ago now, when I was a little boy.”
Saoirse’s eyebrows rise with shock. “Thirty years ago?”
“Ma and Da were very young when they married,” I explain, taking her hand instinctively. Our fingers wind together as I walk her back over to the portrait. “When Aoife was born, Ma was still a teenager, hardly nineteen. They didn’t have Sean until more than a decade later. He and I were still in diapers when Aoife was nearing adulthood.”
Saoirse’s fingers tighten around my own.
“This story doesn’t have a happy ending,” she predicts. It’s a statement, not a question.
“Nobody really knows how mafia rivalries starts a lot of the time,” I go on. “It’s usually about money, business disputes. Something dry and unimportant.”
I pause and fumble for words.
I never do that. I always know exactly what to say. But this—Saoirse and Aoife and the castle and all these old memories being dragged back into the light of day—is ruining me from the inside out.
“But with the O’Sullivans and the Kinahans… Well, if you ask the right people, they’ll tell you exactly how the rivalry between the two families started.”
Saoirse looks up at me with those impossibly blue eyes.
“And it started with Aoife?”
I can only nod.
Saoirse turns her eyes back to the portrait of my sister, undoubtedly trying to figure out how this unassuming young woman could have started a mafia rivalry that has spilled so much blood for so many years.
I find my voice again. “She was only sixteen when she caught the attention of Colm Kinahan. He was the heir to the Kinahan mafia throne. Fifteen years older than she was, but he became obsessed.”
“Sixteen is a child,” Saoirse rasps.
Then she seems to understand the irony of her statement, given the husband she has, and her mouth clamps shut.
“To my parents, she was a child,” I agree. “To Colm Kinahan, she was a woman, ripe for the plucking. He approached my father and asked to marry Aoife and unite our two clans once and for all.”
“Your father turned him down?”
“Actually, my father thought it was a good idea,” I tell her. “It was Aoife who refused. And Da wasn’t about to force her to marry a man she didn’t want to marry. Da tried to sweeten the rejection with money, business deals, and more. But Colm only wanted Aoife.”
“Oh God…” Saoirse breathes.
It doesn’t take a genius to see how this ends.
“So he kidnapped her,” I continue. “He married her under duress and did awful things to her. When Da demanded to speak to her, he was denied. Da finally got his men together. He stormed the Kinahans’ property in order to rescue Aoife.”
“And?” Saoirse asks desperately.
There’s a tremor of hope in her question. As though, somehow, I’ll able to give her a miraculously happy ending for her own story.
“Da killed Colm Kinahan himself,” I answer. “Ma was there, too. She was the one who found Aoife, locked in a room at the top of the Kinahan mansion.”
Saoirse grips my hands even tighter as though she’s finally realized where this is heading.
“They had come hours too late,” I sigh. “Aoife had committed suicide before they’d even breached the gates.”
“Oh, God…”
“The Kinahan clan lost their heir. We lost Aoife.”
“And that’s how the feud started,” Saoirse says softly.
“That’s why the Kinahans decided to ally with Brian Murtagh,” I explain. “They needed a powerful ally to help gain power again. They also needed a figurehead, another heir. Brian Murtagh had one.”
“Until you took him out of the running,” Saoirse says.
“I thought I did. But apparently, the fucker’s hard to kill.”
“It’s true then?” she asks. “He really is alive.”
“It seems that way.”
“Cillian—”
“You don’t have to worry, Saoirse,” I insist, noticing the fear in her eyes. “I will protect you.”
“And who’s gonna protect you, Cillian?” she asks.
I stop short, realizing that the fear in her eyes is not for herself.
It’s for me.
“I was born to this life, Saoirse,” I tell her, taking a step closer. The blue in her eyes glitters with unshed tears. “It’s all I’ve ever k
nown. Brody Murtagh may be the Kinahans’ Frankenstein, but that doesn’t make him stronger than me.”
“You don’t know what you’re up against, Cillian.”
I shrug. “I never have. I like it better that way. I’ll figure this out just like I always do.”
“They’ll be out for blood,” Saoirse presses desperately. “Especially Brody. You robbed him of years of his life.”
“It won’t make a difference,” I tell her confidently. “He’s not going to drive me away this time. No one can.”
She shakes her head and turns from me in frustration. This time, I won’t allow it. I won’t let her go. I won’t let her escape the tension of this moment yet again.
One way or another, this was always meant to happen.
Our fingers are still entwined. I tighten my grip on her and pull her into the circle of my arms. She slams into my chest, her eyes going wider from the sudden proximity.
She looks scared.
“Cillian. Let me go.”
“Make me believe you mean it.”
“I do mean it,” she snaps, but there’s no heat in her words.
The other heat is there, though. It’s there between us.
It’s never once been extinguished, no matter how hard we both have tried.
“No, you don’t,” I tell her.
“How would you know?”
“It’s in the eyes.”
I see her bravado start to crumble slowly as my hands snake up and down her back. The dress is soft, delicate. So fucking easy to manipulate.
With my eyes fixed on hers, I pull down the zipper. One tiny metal tooth at a time.
“Cillian…” she whispers.
But it sounds like a plea rather than a command.
“You can ask me to stop,” I tell her. “And I will. You just have to mean it.”
She closes her eyes as my fingers snake down her naked back. She’s not wearing a bra.
Lucky me.
She trembles slightly at my touch, and her eyes open again. The mistiness is gone now.
It’s been replaced by desire.
A desire that’s strong. Deep. Fucking indisputable.
I peel the dress off her shoulders as she continues to tremble. It puddles on the ground at our feet.
She stands before me in nothing but small black panties that set a stark contrast to her pale, milky skin.
I take a step back. I can’t help it.
I need to see her as she is now.
A beautiful, sexy, vibrant thirty-one-year old woman who’s lived and suffered.
And survived.
Her body has changed. The bones of her collar and hips stick out prominently. Her stomach is harder now, and there’s a harsh line that looks like a muscle running down her center. It starts at her full breasts and snakes all the way down to her stomach.
She’s got scars skittering across her. Scars on her hands and legs, on her stomach, on her thighs.
But curiously, her face is free of them.
I grit my teeth as the reason comes to me instantly.
Tristan wouldn’t have wanted to mar her beauty. Men like him pride themselves on appearances. Who cares about the brutality he’s inflicted on her body, so long as society sees her pretty face?
I’m gonna kill that motherfucker.
And I hope that wherever he is right now, some sixth sense warns him of his impending death.
I want him to spend his last few days of life looking over his shoulder, feeling uncertain and nervous. I want the weight of it to grow until the fear starts to strangle him.
That’s when I’ll appear.
“Cillian,” Saoirse whispers, pulling me back to the moment.
I force Tristan out of my thoughts.
Fuck him. He’s not going to take this moment from me.
There’s only Saoirse and me in this room.
And I’m going to fuck his memory right out of her.
“You are breathtaking,” I tell her in a hushed voice.
She starts to say something, but fuck words. The time for conversation has passed.
This is about doing what I haven’t been able to do since I was a teenager—touching the woman I love.
I move forward. My lips fall onto hers and the magic of our earlier kiss is ignited again.
The same fire, the same passion, the same burning desire for each other.
It’s all there.
There are some things that can’t be faked.
She parts her lips and I slip my tongue inside. I kiss her until her lips are raw and her breath is coming in little shuddering bursts.
Then I twist my fingers into the waistband of her panties and pull them down.
A familiar sense of déjà vu overcomes me. The temptation to retreat thirteen years into the past like I’ve done so, so many times.
Except now, I have no desire to go back there.
Because for once, the present is so much more appealing.
Once she’s naked, she pulls my shirt off, her eyes trailing over my body with an intensity that makes me feel like she’s touching me.
Then she actually does. Her fingers leave little swirls of warmth wherever they linger. They dip down and start to undo my pants. My hands are itching to reach out and help her, to touch her.
But I resist. I let her control the pace.
I watch her as she unbuckles my pants and pulls them down around my ankles. My boxers follow shortly after, and my cock jumps straight out of its confines.
Her eyes don’t leave my cock. She stares as one of her hands wraps around my shaft.
Then she sinks to her knees in front of me. The very sight is enough to make me come, but I bite down and resist the instinct. I will not allow myself to erupt until she does.
She faces off against my cock with the confidence of a woman who knows she can conquer it. Her swollen lips pop open and she slips the head of my penis inside.
I moan as pleasure rips through my body like a fucking lightning bolt straight from the heavens.
This is what we should have been doing the last thirteen years.
This is what they stole from us.
My bitterness dissolves into dust as she takes me deeper into her mouth. That brilliant, warm wetness takes hold of my core and refuses to let go. I watch as my cock slips in and out of her willing mouth.
She sucks on me with the kind of desperation that forces me to concentrate. But I refuse to shut my eyes.
Watching her suck me off, I’ve never been so turned on in my life.
I place my hand on her head, stroking the wild curls into a reluctant submission.
She arches her back and forces my cock in a little deeper.
“Fuck,” I moan as my cock stiffens even further inside her mouth.
The only reason I stop her is because I’m forced to. Another minute of this and I know I’m going to explode down her throat.
Which sounds pretty fucking good in its own right, but I want to save that for another time.
Right now, I want to feel her pussy clench around my cock. I want her breath on my skin and her sweat mixed with mine.
I want all of her over all of me.
Gently, I pull myself out of her mouth. She looks up at me with questioning eyes, glazed over with lust.
Rather than answer, I drag her up to her feet and pick her up before walking her over to the fireplace.
I lay her down on the thick pile of rugs right in front of the stone hearth. Her legs part willingly and I settle between them.
She’s looking up at me with a dreamy expression in her eyes, as though she can’t quite believe we’re here.
That makes two of us.
I slip two fingers inside her, and they glide between her folds easily. She’s so wet that there’s no need to get her more ready for me.
I keep my fingers inside her for a few moments longer, though. If only to hear her fluttering gasps and feel her fingertips scrabble against my pulsing wrists.
When I remo
ve them, I slip my fingers into my mouth and lick her taste off me.
Her eyes go wide at the sight. Her trembling doubles.
Her body is soft and supple underneath mine. I lean down so that her breasts are pressed up against my chest.
Then I push myself inside her.
Her body convulses for a moment and she gasps out as I slide deep into her beautiful wetness. She feels so fucking good that it takes all my willpower not to lose it then and there.
Breathe, you bastard, I roar at myself in my head. Kiss her. Hold her. Make this count.
So I do just that.
I bury my face in her neck and breathe in the heady scent of her.
I maintain a steady rhythm of thrusting until I have control of myself again. Then I let my lips explore down to her beautiful full breasts and the taut pink nipples at their center.
I nip the right one into my mouth and suck on her gently. She gasps at the sensation, her nails digging into my back and snaking down to my ass as I ram myself into her.
Harder with each jerk of the hips.
Harder.
Harder.
I don’t know how I’m holding onto my orgasm. How I’m managing to rein it in. Maybe it’s because the angel beneath me makes me want to fuck endlessly until I die of exhaustion.
“Oh, God, Cillian…” she says suddenly, her eyes flying open.
The way she says my name... It’s almost as though she’s been holding it in this whole time.
But with each thrust, it’s getting more and more difficult for her to do that. She’s bucking beneath me now, trying to pull me deeper, deeper, deeper.
I meet her gaze and I feel that same irrevocable connection that I felt thirteen years ago.
It’s still there, lying between us.
It was always there.
With our eyes on each other, I feel her tighten around me, choking my cock with the force of her orgasm.
Her hands skitter in my hair. “Cillian…!” she half-moans, half-cries.
One more thrust undoes her.
The moment I feel her release, I let myself go, too.
We spasm against each other, each a victim to the most powerful orgasm we’ve ever had. It rocks me from head to toe as she clings tight to me and I cling tight to her.
And then—slowly, slowly—it ebbs and leaves us spent and sighing.
I’m still trying to get my breathing back to normal when I hear her whispering into my shoulder blade.
