“We can’t,” I repeated the standard answer I gave him every time he brought up the idea there was something more between us.
“I know the rules, Emilia. But the leaders voted unanimously to change the name of the organization, specifically for you. You don’t think they’d make this exception?” This was the first time he’d suggested that.
His gaze went to my mouth and took a tortuously slow journey down my body once again before returning to meet my eyes. My nipples betrayed me by poking through the thin material of the sports bra and tank top I wore, clearly on board with his plan.
“Sex, then,” he said gruffly. “Screw that part of the rule. The League doesn’t control your body.” Sean crossed his arms over his chest, defiance in his stance. “You’re okay with casual sex, right? Problem solved.”
“That’s not . . .” He cut me off by moving back into my space and bringing us nose to nose, then lowered his head to find my eyes.
“You slept with Luca Moreau. Well, you fucked him, so why not me?” He backed up, his words like calloused hands scraping over my skin. “I’ll tell you why. The men from your past didn’t make you feel a damn thing, and that’s your safe place.”
Low fucking blow. An intentionally painful one meant as payback for the many times my rejections must have burned him. “How dare you throw my past with Luca in my face. You know nothing about it,” I responded, rage bubbling to the surface. “You wouldn’t even know had he not mentioned it in front of you.”
“Right. You’d never open up and tell me shite, would you?” He waved a dismissive hand in the air, but he was far from done talking. From unleashing whatever he’d kept buried beneath his walls of muscles for who knew how long. “What you feel for me scares the bloody hell out of you.”
I was stunned into silence at his accurate assessment but damned if I was going to give in. I couldn’t do that to another person I cared for. So I said nothing. And my heart broke a little at the defeated look on his face.
“Emilia, just admit you’re scared of what you feel. At least give me that. And I’ll stop fighting for you. I’ll give up and walk away. Fuck a blonde or two like you seem to want me to,” he hissed, his eyes laser-focused on mine, challenging me, daring me to say it.
“Sean, we only gave in to lust and shared a kiss moments before you became a leader. We never even slept together,” I added in a low voice.
He pulled his head back a fraction as if I’d slapped him. “Not everything is about sex.”
“Says the notorious Irish player.” I’d allowed my anger to answer for me once again instead of facing the truth of his words.
He leaned so close the scruff on his jaw nearly touched my skin. “I’m not that man anymore,” he responded between barely parted lips. “And after two years of spending time with you, I don’t believe for one bloody minute I’m alone in my feelings.”
Of course I had feelings. Those feelings were why I was at this gym, hoping to knock them out of me.
But the only love I’d ever borne witness to was my father’s love for me and his screwed-up love for a married woman.
I didn’t know how to do love. How to comprehend what I felt for Sean and make sense of it because I’d never experienced such emotions before.
“How about we stick to why we’re both here at the gym?” I bowed out of one fight and launched myself into another one. One I was better equipped to handle. I tossed an elbow, and he allowed it to hit him square in the face.
His mouth tightened as he pinned me with narrowed eyes, and damn if my desire reached for me like a long-lost lover. Angry, I tossed out another shot, but he blocked this one.
And the sparring began. We went at it hard. Fast. Rough without him ever actually inflicting pain. Damn him for finding a way to be gentle when I just wanted . . . well, I wanted to punish myself. But the pain in my heart, I couldn’t seem to punch that away.
I dropped onto a folding chair by the mat about twenty or thirty minutes later. We were both sweaty and breathless.
“I can’t change,” I said in a defeated tone, hating myself for that. But he needed to hear this. Clearly, he did, because he kept pushing the conversation of there being an us whenever we had two minutes alone ever since that kiss at my house last year. “You can’t expect me to. I made my father a promise, and that promise can’t include you. League rules or not.”
He was quiet for a moment, silently processing my words. “What promise?” he asked, his tone soft this time.
I shook my head, opting to ignore his question. “And I don’t want you to change for me. You can stop fighting for . . . us.” If somehow I’d been stringing him along, allowing him to believe there was hope because a part of me wasn’t ready to let go, it had to end. We had to focus on defeating The Alliance.
His long legs closed the space between us in three quick strides. “Emilia, I’ve been changing every second of every day since you walked into my life.” The deep timbre of his voice rolled over my skin, but at least I’d distracted him from pushing for answers about my promise to Papà.
“That’s different.” My protest sounded pathetic. It felt weak.
“Everything I’ve done has been to protect my family and to protect you. To be with you.” He stretched out his arms, palms up. “But you want me to fuck some blonde, huh? That’s what you want? You want me to officially turn my back on the fact that when we’re in the same room together, I can barely breathe because you steal the air from my lungs?”
I slowly rose to confront him. In as steady a voice as I could manage, I said, “I want you to be happy. But you won’t find happiness with me. It’s not possible.”
He shook his head, frustration clinging to his expression. “Fine.” He nodded as if finally coming to terms with the conditions I’d set out since he took over as a leader in March of last year. “Find someone else when you want to fight. Just call me if you have League business to discuss.” He went for his white tee and pulled it over his head, rolling the material over his slick abs. “I’m done. You think I should date? Screw around? Fine, you win.” His tone was eerily low. Distant.
“Sean, wait,” I hurriedly called out, and hell, I even threw a hand in the air to try and stop him as he lifted his bag, preparing to walk away.
He stopped moving but remained turned to the side, offering only his profile.
I wanted so badly to explain. Tell him I wasn’t simply afraid of the feelings he evoked in me. I was petrified.
But . . . “Tomorrow. We all need to have a meeting. It’s time we move forward with the next stage of our plans.”
His shoulders flinched, the slightest hint of disappointment evident. His bicep holding his black duffel bag flexed and tightened.
Maybe Holly was right. There was a lot he kept buried beneath the surface, but would he eventually lose control? Would the calm and controlled Sean McGregor snap?
I didn’t want to be the cause of that.
“I can’t be like Sebastian.” No amount of observing Holly and Sebastian’s love for each other would teach me. I’d been naïve—a fool. “I can’t fall in love,” I whispered, shocked by what felt like tears pricking the corners of my eyes. “I don’t believe in—”
“Fairy tales?” he asked while quickly glancing at me, his eyes cold. A disappointed expression pointed my way. “You don’t need a hero to save you. I got it.”
I closed my eyes and brought my hands to my hips.
Fairy tales?
My twenty-first birthday . . . Vegas.
I’d subconsciously blocked out much of that night, redacted all of the events prior to the trauma of Chanel’s death. Those details I remembered vividly, and I’d spent years blaming myself for my friend’s murder.
But more had happened the night she died. More I hadn’t let myself remember until now.
My hand went to my stomach, and I closed my eyes.
Clooney.
Oh fuck.
Chapter Four
Sean
Blondes. What th
e hell was with Emilia’s delusion that I preferred blondes?
I slapped my MacBook closed on my desk at the headquarters of McGregor Enterprises and loosened the knot of my navy-blue tie.
Her words last night had been pinging around in my head all day like one of those little metal balls inside a pinball machine.
And knowing I’d have to see her for League business tonight had me on edge.
I leaned back in my black leather reclining chair and closed my eyes, trying to force myself to relax. There was a mental transition I always tried to make, to shift my mindset from CEO to League leader before I left the office. Scotch usually helped, but my assistant had forgotten to refill my decanter, and I’d been too busy to do it myself. It hadn’t been long since it was full, so apparently, I was drinking too much as well.
I left the gym last night feeling like a beaten man. Even though I’d been tired, both from physical and emotional workouts, adrenaline still coursed through my system. I was wound up, and rather than get myself into any more trouble, I went straight to my flat in the city and directly into the shower. I figured maybe a session with my hand might take off the edge, but of course, all I could think about was Emilia’s luscious red lips wrapped around my cock as I jerked off. Considering she was the core of my problem, not even blowing my load had calmed me down.
A knock at my office door had me growling out, “What do you want?”
I cursed at my arsehole-ness when I spotted Anna in the hall through the narrow window by the door, then quickly rose and waved her in. “Sorry. Bad day.” I felt more like a gobshite when I saw she had my nephew with her.
As Braden came running in, I circled the desk to get to him. He was going on two. Time had flown by since The League, and well, The Alliance, had entered our lives.
“Hey.” I scooped Braden into my arms and balanced him on my hip. Thank God for the little squirt. Finally, someone to help get my head back on straight. “I wasn’t expecting you two.”
Anna closed the door behind her and brushed her strawberry-blonde locks off her shoulders and to her back. “I’m meeting Holly for dinner. Sort of a kid date while y’all have your meeting.” She hadn’t lost her American Southern drawl during her time in Dublin, and I knew my brother loved it.
My thoughts unexpectedly whirred back to the Italian League leader and the meeting later.
What promises had Emilia made to her father before he died?
I set Braden down on my chair and carefully spun him around a few times while he clapped and cried, “Again, again.” It sounded more like “arghhh-gen,” which actually got a laugh out of me.
“So.” I set my palms on the top of the chair to steady it as Braden rose to his knees and started pounding on the wireless keyboard with his fists.
The laptop was shut, so he wouldn’t accidentally be sending an email to our distributors in Asia to cancel some big shipment.
“Oh shit.” Anna hurried to the desk chair.
“No worries.” I smiled when Anna scooped him into her arms and away from trouble. She gently set him down on the floor in front of my desk after blowing a raspberry on his cheek, making him wriggle and shriek. She was a great mother and had a kind heart. My brother said it was Anna who’d pulled him away from the edge of darkness and into the light.
I’d witnessed the transformation firsthand, and once Adam had become a father, those changes were even more pronounced.
His hands, once used primarily for fighting, tenderly cradled his baby and changed nappies, or diapers as Anna called them. And as gentle as he was with his son, becoming a father had also managed to make him harder. Tougher. A fierce need to protect his family radiated from him, especially once Cole and I joined The League. The threat of danger striking close to home was a real possibility.
Anna and Braden were the exact reasons we hadn’t wanted Adam involved, but he’d asked more and more questions about League affairs over the months. Went so far as to offer ideas on how to handle The Alliance. He became so insistent that we allowed him to join our meetings, thereby making him sort of an honorary silent member.
“Can I ask you something?” Anna set a Matchbox car in front of Braden, and he immediately began rolling it around and making vroom vroom noises. Once she was sure he was busy, she settled in the chair on the other side of my desk.
Feeling as though I ought to sit too, I removed my tie, tossed it onto my desk, and sank into my chair. “Sure. I might be able to provide an answer.” I winked, trying to lighten the mood and wipe away the concerned look on her face.
Anna’s emerald-green eyes studied me for a moment. “Adam doesn’t talk about League stuff. Like ever. He wants to keep it as far away from me as humanly possible.”
Yeah, just like we tried to keep him away. “I wholeheartedly agree with my brother’s decision,” I said without hesitation.
Anna and Braden were his life. His reason for existing. I didn’t want to picture what would become of my twin if anything were to happen to them.
We weren’t identical, and I’d always believed we had different personalities, but in the last few years, I wasn’t so sure about that anymore. Maybe we were far more alike than I would have admitted in the past.
“And I appreciate that, truly, I do, but—”
“You’re curious.” I had no idea what, if anything, my brother had confided in her, and if she had questions, why didn’t she ask him?
“When I bring it up, Adam gets pissy,” she responded as if she could sense my question. “Then he likes to go and beat up his punching bag at our home gym. I think it stresses him out when he considers the idea that League affairs might bleed into our lives.” She frowned. “Bleed. Shitty choice of words.” She combed her fingers through her hair, adjusting it away from her face again. “When you and I first met when I moved to Dublin as an intern here, I’d always thought of you as this polished, sort of pretty boy.” She circled a hand in the air, closing one eye. “Like you walked off the pages of a Banana Republic or J.Crew catalog.”
“Tell me how you really feel,” I responded with a laugh, not sure how the conversation had veered this direction.
Her glossy pink lips parted, a match to the soft pink of her cheeks. “You’ve changed, is all. You’re more like—”
“Adam?”
She shook her head. “Sebastian.”
Oh. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, unsure whether she was complimenting me or had concerns about my new lifestyle. “So, what’d you want to know about The Alliance?” I’d rather talk about that than myself, I supposed.
The way the corners of her eyes creased had me wondering if she’d thrown me off on purpose to get me to open up. Well played.
Sitting up taller, Anna brought her green gaze to me and said, “I tried researching The Alliance, but I couldn’t find anything about them online.”
“Secret societies do their best to stay hidden,” I said with a small smile. “Adam hasn’t told you anything about The Alliance?”
“Alliance bad. League good,” she said in her best Tarzan impression.
I laughed. Yup, that was Adam. A man of few words. But he would also go to any lengths necessary to protect his wife and son.
“I’ve been totally fine not knowing anything. Mostly. But I overheard him talking to you last night. Upcoming plans for The Alliance or something like that. And now I’m nervous.”
“Did you tell him you’re nervous?” I stood, not sure how to handle the fact Anna was coming to me with this instead of Adam. “You should talk to him. He can take you and Braden out of Ireland.”
She held a hand up and patted the air. “Slow down, Sean. No need for us to flee the country in the middle of the night.” Anna shook her head. “But, could you just help me understand?”
My shoulders slumped. Maybe I was overreacting. I peeked at Braden, who was now pushing the car up the wall by the windows and sat down. “You ever heard of the Bavarian Illuminati or the Freemasons?”
She nodded. “In
movies.”
“Well, those organizations were founded to combat injustices and corruption. And some secret societies were also created to plant agents in corporations or within governments to gain power and influence over world order. The Alliance has had different names in the last few hundred years, but they, too, started like the Freemasons and Illuminati.”
“So, what changed?”
“Too much power. Too much greed.” A direct result of powerful families merging. My impromptu history lesson for Anna suddenly had rule number one of The League circling in my head like a racehorse stuck on go. “Heads of their business enterprises began taking shortcuts to increase their bottom line. They bribed elected officials to obtain government contracts and bypass labor laws. Eventually, they dug themselves into a deeper and deeper hole of illegal activities to the point they saw no difference between trafficking women and producing cars. Money was money. Power was power.”
“Oh.” She frowned. “And what if that happens to The League?”
Good question. “There are specific rules in place to prevent that. And The League is not nearly as large as The Alliance, so it’s more controlled.”
“And once The Alliance is taken down, do you think The League will still be needed? Can’t law enforcement handle everyday criminals?”
“I honestly don’t know.” And that was the truth.
Before I could say more, I cleared my throat and tipped my head toward the door, signaling to her that I spied Adam about to enter.
She startled as if he’d caught her cheating and quickly rose. I fastened my lips to hide a humorless chuckle at the idea anything would ever happen between us.
“Braden,” Adam said, and his son raced toward him like a miniature Olympic sprinter. Adam took him into his arms, lifted him over his head, and spun him around.
He was in jeans and a long-sleeved tee beneath a black leather jacket. I was a bit envious of the casual dress code Adam was allowed to get away with. It looked damn comfortable. Even though he worked for the family business, he no longer wore a suit and tie since he handled our nonprofit organization in addition to running his fighting studio.
The Final Hour (Dublin Nights Book 5) Page 6
