by Sienna Blake
I looked over to find Rickie moving from the back towards the guards. Thank God.
I waved at him. “Rickie, they won’t let me through.”
“It’s alright lads, we know the girl.” Rickie waved me past the guards. I breathed a sigh of relief as I passed the guards, shooting them a satisfied smirk, despite myself. “Am I glad to see you,” Rickie said to me.
“Rickie, please, is Danny still here?” Dear God, tell me he was still here.
I paused outside Danny’s dressing room where Rickie had left me. Taking large gulps of air into my lungs. What if he didn’t want to see me? What if he’d moved on?
Come on, Ailis, you drove across the damn country to see him. You can’t turn back now.
I knocked. Upon hearing a “come in” in a familiar deep voice that made my stomach flip, I pushed open the door.
I stepped inside and closed the door behind me. Danny was sitting in a chair, his shoulders slumped over, his elbows on his knees.
I just stood there, frozen to the spot, unable to take my eyes off him. Unable to say anything despite there being so much to say.
He finally looked up. “What do ye—?”
At the sight of me he leapt to his feet.
“Dearg,” he said, his voice thick. “Is that really you?”
I nodded. “I saw you on The Graham Norton Show,” I said. “I…listened to your album. It’s so good, Danny. So damn good.”
He took a step forward, his hands flexing out, then dropping as if he wanted to grab me but wasn’t sure if he should. “It’s all for you, you have to know that. Everything. Every song. Every word. For you.”
A sob caught in my throat. “Danny—”
“Wait, I’m not finished.” He took another step towards me, hesitant, testing, as if I were a scared animal who might run away at any minute.
“I got everything I ever wanted, only to realise that I need you to make any of it mean anything. But I didn’t deserve you.”
“No,” I agreed quietly, “you didn’t.”
He nodded, no defensiveness on his face. “Someone much smarter than me told me that I had to work to become the man you deserved. I think… I hope I’ve done that. I hope you’ll give me a chance to prove it to you. I’m praying that you believe in second chances.”
I nodded, taking a step towards him. “I do.”
He closed the gap with one long stride. “You…” He cupped my face. I could scarcely breathe. “I’m so fucking in love with you.”
“Danny,” I half begged, half whispered, my fingers clawing at his shoulders. If I didn’t kiss him soon, I’d die.
He yanked me to him, his lips crashing into mine. Our mouths open, our heads tilted and every single emotion built up over the last two years crashing over me.
We’d always been like two stars orbiting each other. Finally colliding. Our lives crashing into each other.
I had loved Danny since I was fifteen. Since he first crashed into that empty room.
Since the first angelic note out of his mouth to try to calm my crying.
Since his very first kiss.
He pulled away and rested his forehead on mine.
“Be my girlfriend, Ailis,” he breathed.
All this time that’s what I wanted to hear.
I let out a long sigh. “No.”
He froze. “What?”
I opened my eyes and looked at him square in the face. “No, I won’t be your girlfriend.”
He blinked at me, obviously stunned.
“But if you asked me out on a date, I’d say yes.” It took everything in me to hold my smile in.
A grin broke out on his face.
“We start again, Danny,” I said. “We do it properly. One step at a time. We get to know each other, really know each other again.”
He nodded. “Yes. Okay. We’re dating.”
I rolled my eyes. “You still haven’t asked me out yet.”
“You’re going out with me.”
I rolled my eyes again, but it was half-hearted. Demanding git. “You obviously don’t understand the concept of ask me out.”
He crushed me against him. “You are mine, Dearg. You’ve always been mine. If I have to take you on a thousand fucking dates to prove it to you, then so be it.”
“You still haven’t asked for a single one.”
“I’m getting to it.” He stared right into my eyes. “Ailis, will you let me take you to dinner? Right now? Lamb Madras, Indian hot?”
He always remembered.
I grinned. “Hell yes.”
79
____________
Ailis
Several years later…
I stood in the wings of the Royal Albert Hall in London, my nerves like electrical wires alive with a current.
The most handsome man who ever lived was onstage. The crowd roaring as he finished a solo number.
Danny O’Donaghue.
International indie rock legend.
Wild.
Dangerous.
And mine.
Danny shook his hair out of his face and slung off his guitar, handing it to a stagehand before grabbed the microphone out of its stand. He thanked the crowd as he waited for the applause to die down.
“The next number, I can’t do alone,” he said. “So I’d like to introduce to the stage the most beautiful woman in the world, and a fucking saint for putting up with me…” The crowd laughed. Danny looked over to me and our eyes locked, a smile drawing across his beautiful face and lighting up his eyes. “My wife, Mrs Ailis O’Donaghue.”
Love swelled up in my chest so hard I thought I might explode.
I walked out onstage and reached him just as the opening strings of “Finally”, the first duet we’d written together as a couple, began.
I wasn’t playing guitar for this number. Neither was he.
It was just Danny and me holding our microphones, singing to each other.
For each other.
Danny reached out and cupped my cheek as he sang,
“We were just kids.
When we met so long ago,
I’m sorry to say,
That I treated you that way.
But I had to grow up.
I had things to learn.”
“I had to grow into myself,” I sang.
You had to earn,
My love. To gain
Respect for yourself,
A path that nobody else,
Could walk…”
I was transported back to the hospital room where it all started, him sitting on my bed with his guitar, us singing, our voices weaving together in harmony, us falling in love as teenagers. Then to those small college recording studio rooms in Dublin where we fell in love again as adults.
And finally here…onstage as his wife.
“But finally…”
“Finally…”
“I learned my mistakes.
Finally…”
“Finally, we healed the breaks.”
“And finally…”
“Finally…”
“Finally, we became whole.
Finally…”
“Finally…”
“You gave me your all.”
We sang this last line together before he leaned down and claimed my lips. I wrapped my arms around his neck and melted into him, microphone still in one hand.
I didn’t notice the guitar strings fading.
I barely heard the crowd going wild.
Because no matter where we were on this earth, when he kissed me, my world shrank down to us.
He had me. All of me.
And I had him. All of him. Heart, body, and soul. Every note and verse and melody was mine.
Finally.
Epilogue
____________
Ailis
Several years later…
“The winner of the Grammy is…Ailis O’Donaghue!”
The applause ripped through the crowd and I wondered, could you die from too
much happiness? How did I deserve all this? How could one person be allowed so much joy?
“Ailis could not be here tonight,” my manager said as he accepted the award on my behalf. Danny held the tiny screen in front of my face with the live feed to the Grammys.
I smiled. “That’s enough.”
He turned it off and kissed me long and deep. “Congratulations, Ms Grammy Winner.”
I smiled, my heart so full I thought it might burst. But it wasn’t from the win.
Yes, the win was nice. Yes, the win was professionally gratifying. Especially because Danny had written the album with me—in between making love and him cooking us breakfasts—he had produced it in his own studio that he’d opened up in Dublin, and because we had made something incredibly special during the recording of this album.
The special tiny bundle of joy now asleep on my chest.
Our first baby.
A girl.
Who we’d named Casey, after his mother.
“I love you, Dearg,” he whispered.
“I love you, too.”
I had everything I never knew I wanted. Everything I could ever dream of.
Nothing, not even a Grammy, could top what I had right here with me. My husband and my baby.
My loves.
My family.
My two favourite songs.
The End
Dear Reader
It’s always a pleasure and pressure to write a novel set in a real city. I’ve tried to keep that balance between what is real and what works best for the story.
The Dublin Royal College of Music does not exist. But the beautiful old town of Dublin does as does Marsh’s Library. Dublin’s old town is one of my favorite areas to walk around in this city I live in and love with all my heart. I hope you get a chance to visit one day. Look me up if you do!
I’ve tried to stay true to Irish speech and culture. Any mistakes are all mine and not meant with any offense.
I hope you enjoyed Professor’s Kiss!
Declan’s story is in the works.
PS. Yes, I know Danny has the same name as the lead singer of the Irish band, The Script. I like the name and the band. But my Danny is in no way a representation or likeness of the real Danny O’Donaghue.
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Have you read Diarmuid’s story in Irish Kiss?
Saoirse
I wanted him since the day I met him. Bearded, tattooed and tall as an Irish giant. He was more than just handsome, he was drop-dead gorgeous. And the only one who ever truly cared. It didn’t matter to him that my father was a criminal and my mother a whore. He saw me, understood me.
I could be anything I wanted, he said.
Except his.
Because I was too young and he was my Juvenile Liaison Officer.
Diarmuid
It’s been years since I last saw her. No longer a girl, she has the body of a woman. When our eyes met again, I saw the only one who ever broke through my asshole mask. She never judged me. She saw me, accepted me.
She could be anything she wanted.
Except mine.
’Cause she’s only seventeen and I’m trying my hardest not to fall for her.
If I give in, she will ruin me.
*This is a slow-burn, angsty love story spanning across a seven-year time period with sexual situations and drug use involving characters under the age of eighteen. Irish Kiss is a complete standalone novel with a Happily Ever After, but damn, it is going to hurt along the way.
Out now
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Keep reading for an excerpt!
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I can’t wait for you all to meet Declan!
Stay sexy,
xoxo Sienna
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Books by Sienna Blake
A Good Wife (Standalone Series)
Beautiful Revenge
Mr. Blackwell’s Bride
Irish Kiss (Standalone Series)
Irish Kiss
Professor’s Kiss
Fighter’s Kiss ~ coming late 2018
Reverse Harem (Standalone Series)
Royally Screwed ~ coming Fall 2018
Three Irish Brothers ~ coming soon
Bound Duet
Bound by Lies (#1)
Bound Forever (#2)
Dark Romeo Trilogy
Love Sprung From Hate (#1)
The Scent of Roses (#2)
Hanging in the Stars (#3)
Paper Dolls
Excerpt of Irish Kiss
Diarmuid fucking Brennan.
I wanted to hit him. I wanted to hurt him. To slam my hand into his chest and smash his heart like he was doing mine.
Instead I pounded the bag, pretending it was his face, as he watched.
“Come on, selkie. You can hit harder than that.”
Damn him.
“Don’t call me that.”
Slam.
Slam.
Diarmuid moved around me, disappearing from my line of vision. I could feel his eyes on me. They dragged across me, burning me, marking me.
“Maintain your guard, selkie.” His voice came from behind me.
God, I wanted to kill him.
I hit the bag again. I felt a slap on my left elbow, lifting my arm up.
“Guard up.”
Infuriated, I grabbed the bag and flung it at him. He sidestepped without any effort.
I slammed my fists onto my hips and sucked in a breath. “What are we doing this for?”
Diarmuid stood, stoic, like an unmovable mountain. “Martial arts will teach you discipline, persistence, grit.”
I gritted my teeth. “Are you saying I have none of those things?”
He studied me for a pause. “I’m saying that martial arts will teach you these things.”
“Because I have none.”
He blinked, his eyes going hard. “You tell me.”
Fuck him.
“You’re punishing me.”
He let out a snort. “What for?”
“‘Discipline, persistence, grit,’” I quoted him. “You think I made a mistake not applying for college.”
His face grew hard, like it had been chiseled out of marble. “You have a gift, Saoirse. You’re wasting it if you don’t do something with it.”
“Fuck you,” I yelled. “You have no right to tell me what I should or shouldn’t do.”
“You—”
“You left me, Diarmuid. You left me alone with no one.”
His face broke into a mask of pain. “You had your ma…” he trailed off.
“My drug-addicted, incompetent, uncaring mother,” I scoffed. “Really?”
“I had no choice, Saoirse.”
“You had a choice. You had a fucking choice and you chose her over me.”
“She was pregnant…”
“So you give up your soul family for a real one? I hope they were worth it.”
His mask cracked open. I saw it; the deep well of pain underneath, of guilt, of regret. I realised it hurt him to leave just as much as it hurt me. I always thought that his decision to go had been easy for him. I didn
’t think that leaving might have torn strips off him, too.
Out now
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Beautiful Revenge
Revenge never looked so sexy...
My name is...was Alena Ivanova.
Five years ago, I made a mistake. A big one. One that cost me the only man I will ever love.
Now in the lonely moors of north England, I live with my cold, cruel husband. My only friend is his daughter from a previous marriage. At least I didn’t starve to death during the bitter Russian winter.
When my husband arranges for a potential investor to stay with us, a mysterious self-made millionaire by the name of Mr. Wolf, imagine my shock when he walks in...
My name is...was Dimitri Volkov.
Until the love of my life broke me.
Five years I’ve worked for this moment. Five years I’ve dreamed of revenge.
But as my eyes rest upon her, I don’t expect to be smacked in the gut with these unwanted feelings. To remember the taste of her lips, the feel of her skin.
I will possess her.
I will consume her.
I will have my revenge.
Warning: Prepare for a broody, angsty, tortured hero. This is a full-length sexy-as-hell standalone contemporary romance with a HEA. No panties needed.
Out now
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Keep reading for an excerpt!
Excerpt of Beautiful Revenge