Which means he needs legitimacy.
He needs my father’s only living daughter.
He needs me.
And that’s what brings me here today, back to Southie for only the second time in six damn years. I’d have never come back here at all if I could help it, but that was before I got set up.
That was before I owed a million freaking dollars to the Italian mafia out in Vegas.
I was the talent at that card table, Nico Vecchio was the bankroll, and the whole thing was supposed to be a sure thing — a rigged game.
And it was, just not the way I thought it was.
So now I’m here, about to sell my soul to the devil. Because how does Mick get legitimacy? By marrying into the family. Specifically, marrying his son Tommy into the family. Mick pays my debts, I get Nico and the Italians off my back, and I get my life back.
That’s an entirely debatable sentiment, though. Because in exchange for this, I have to do something for Mick.
I have to marry his son.
You know what, let’s just call this the worst day of my life, and that’s saying something.
“Do we have a deal, Aela?”
I turn and look out the window again, looking out at the grey, rain-slicked streets of Southie.
I never wanted to come back here, but here I am. Because I’m out of options. I’m out of moves, and out of cards to play.
“So, do we—”
“Yes.”
I whisper the words, still not looking at him.
He raps his knuckles on the desk between us, blowing smoke out through his nose and sighing contentedly. “Good. Good. This is excellent news. You’re doing the family proud, you know.”
No, I’m not.
“I’ve got your dad’s house all set up for you — temporarily, of course, until the wedding. After that you and Tommy will move in together.”
My skin crawls.
“You’ll have whatever you need,” Mick goes on, oblivious or not caring about the sour feeling welling up inside of me. “You’ll be treated with the respect your father would have wanted. And protection, of course.”
“Protection?” I frown and glance back at Mick as he drags on his cigarette.
“The Russians,” he glowers. “Those commie fuckers have been pushing hard into our territory, trying to stir up some shit. You being back puts a bit of a target on your back Aela.”
Well, shit.
Anything else want to happen to make this day worse?
“So, I got you a bodyguard.”
Mick buzzes his intercom to the waiting room outside his office. “Get in here,” he growls before glancing back at me with that big fake smile.
“Don’t worry, you two know each other.”
Behind me, the door to the office opens.
“Aela”
My heart freezes, and the floor drops out from under me.
Not him.
Literally anyone but him.
Slowly, I turn, and slowly, the past comes rushing up to pull me back under.
Because there, standing in the doorway looking as gorgeous, and as dark, and as dangerous, and as beautifully broken as the day I ran away from him and this place, is the last man I wanted to see back here.
His ice blue eyes flash that dark, smoldering fire as they lock onto mine.
“Hey, Aela.”
My name from Liam Roarke’s lips shoves me right back there. My name from that mouth sends shivers down my spine, and heat through my body, even six years later.
But this isn’t then, and I’m not that girl anymore. That girl was naive enough to want this boy to hold on to her, to ask her to stay.
This boy who took her innocence.
The one who was her everything.
Six years ago, this was the boy I loved.
But that was before it all changed. That was before my whole world shattered.
That was before he broke my heart.
And now?
Well, now it seems he’s my personal bodyguard.
Six years ago, I got as far away from Liam Roarke as I possibly could.
Something tells me, I’m about to be closer to him than ever.
Just wonderful.
Chapter 2
Aela
The man standing in front of me is bigger, darker — a more intensely brooding version of the boy I used to know.
The one I loved.
His once shaggy dark hair is shaved short on the sides now, the top slicked back and to one side which only helps to accentuate his strikingly chiseled face. The shadowed hollows of his cheeks, the angular jawline, the strong chin, and those absolutely perfect lips. He’s older, of course, but there’s no mistaking the Liam I used to know, standing there in the doorway staring at me with all the fierce intensity of the last look he gave me that day six years before.
We were kids back then, and we didn’t know what the hell we were doing. Well, or at least I didn’t know what I was doing. All I knew back then was the forbidden temptation of the boy from the streets.
I mean, we were all from the streets in the neighborhood back then, but Liam Roarke was different.
Or maybe it was just the way he looked at me.
The way he stirred something in me.
The way I could never say no to him.
The way we got swept away in the type of forever romance you only think exists when it’s your first.
Ours was a secret, and I think that’s what appealed to us. The hiding away from everyone else. The looking over our shoulders. The knowing if my father found out there’d be hell to pay.
We thought we had forever hidden in the shadows back then, but that’s before things hit a boiling point.
That’s before Sheila died.
Things were rough back then, with the turmoil back in Dublin spilling over into the streets of Boston. There was the impending war with the Albanians, the Feds knocking down people’s doors, Liam’s brother Gray going to jail.
My older sister Sheila dying the way she did was the final breaking point for my father, and I was on the next plane to boarding school in Switzerland, leaving everything behind.
Everything like Liam.
But it wasn’t me leaving that did us in. It was him pushing me away before I even left.
It was the cold, nonchalant indifference that day, and the way he made sure to shatter my heart completely before I boarded the plane. And when I landed, I wasn’t the same girl I’d been.
I never was again.
Six years ago, Liam Roarke tore my heart out, and now he’s standing right in front of me.
The same damn glint in his eyes. The same fucking smirk on his face. The same dangerous, rough look that drew me in back then.
He’s not a boy anymore, either. He’s bigger, filled out, his shoulders broader, his chest and arms thicker. Scruff covers his grooved jaw, a shadow in his eyes that wasn’t there before.
But it’s him.
It’s the same man that wrecked me before.
“Welcome back.”
Welcome back.
Six years later, and those are our first words.
I ignore him, not trusting what I’ll say as I turn back to Mick.
“No.”
“No?”
“No, no protection.” I shake my head. “This is my neighborhood, I’m fine here.”
What I don’t say is, “I won’t be fine with him here.”
Mick shakes his head. “It’s a non-starter, Aela. The Russians are getting bold, and I’m not chancing it with you being here.” He sighs heavily, placing a dramatic hand over his heart. “I could never forgive myself or the memory of your father if anything happened.”
I almost roll my eyes.
It’s not me he’s worried about, it’s his claim. It’s his tenuous hold on the legacy my father built here.
It’s my deal with the devil.
“Mick’s right.”
I turn back to Liam, scowling. This is not how I imagined our f
irst conversation going, and I did imagine it, many times, which I hate to admit. What we’d say to each other, what I’d say to him. How I’d be so much better than him.
Rich, glamorous, married maybe.
Better off.
Happy.
I’d be able sneer down at the asshole who broke my heart and show him how much more golden the world had gotten for me since him.
I never imagined it like this.
Not broke, in debt and indentured, sitting in Mick’s shitty office back here in Southie owing a favor of this magnitude.
Not needing his help.
“Is there anyone else?”
Mick laughs. “Jesus Christ, kid. You got your dad’s brashness, that’s for fuckin’ sure.” He chuckles. “You two used to be close when you were kids, didn’t you?”
That’s one way of putting it.
“But anyways, no. There’s no one else. Roarke’s my go-to guy for shit like this, and I want him on you.” Mick stabs the air with his dwindling cigarette. “All over you.”
I hate the blush that comes to my face, and I know Liam sees it.
Mick wouldn’t be putting him “on me” if he knew what we used to be. Not a chance — not with me supposed to marry Tommy. If Mick had an inkling how “close” we were back there, he’d have Liam on the next plane to Mars.
That or tied to a rock at the bottom of Boston Harbor.
“You’re not even gonna know he’s there, don’t worry.”
I frown. “Where exactly is he going to be?”
Mick shrugs. “Everywhere? He’s staying at the house with you.”
My jaw drops. “What?” I shake my head. “Look, I’m agreeing to this whole ridiculous thing, alright? I’m here, and I’m saying yes to this absurd agreement. But I do not need to be watched like this.”
“It’s protection, Aela.”
He says my name again, and just like before, heat glows through me.
But I close my eyes and shake my head, forcing myself to push the forbidden temptation of that voice out of my head.
I am not the girl from before. That girl died back there that last night with him. She lost herself in Switzerland. She recreated herself at the card tables of Monaco and Milan. She reinvented who she was in California, and Vegas.
Coming home breaks all that. Coming back to Boston brings that girl from before back from the dead. And seeing Liam Roarke breaks my heart all over again.
But like I said, I’m out of options, and I’m out of cards to play.
I take a deep breath as I turn back to Mick, and slowly, I extend my hand.
“We have a deal.”
He grins, taking mine. “This is good for everyone Ael-”
“Not him.” I jerk my finger at Liam. “Not him.”
I turn before either of them can say anything else, walk right past Liam, and out the damn door, the storm of all those years ago billowing after me.
Chapter 3
Liam
I don’t need Mick’s nod before I’m out the door and chasing after her.
Call it a fatal character flaw — something broken in my programming. Something about her that makes my blood run hotter, and brings out the beast inside.
Shit, I’ve been chasing after Aela Reilly since we were ten years old. And six years away from her hasn’t changed a goddamn thing.
She’s changed, of course. She looks fiercer now, her big brown eyes smoldering a bit more than the girl I knew before. That amber-red hair is longer than it was before, falling in tangled waves around her freckled-face and down over her shoulders.
Back then, she wore sun dresses and Mary Janes — a stark contrast to the jeans, biker boots, and leather jacket of today.
Aela — the girl I pushed away all those years before — right back here in Southie.
I knew this was coming. I’ve known what was going on since that first meeting with me and the other lieutenants where Mick told us the move. I don’t know why the fuck Aela’s agreeing to it, but I know whatever Mick’s got on her, it’s gotta be big.
It’d have to be, for her to ever come back here.
Hell, it’s gotta be huge for her to be agreeing to marry Tommy fucking Flaherty.
When Mick told us the plan last week, it took everything I fucking had not to lunge from my chair and murder him right then and there.
Not to mention his idiot son.
I mean, I get what’s going on here, and I understand the importance of doing your job and following orders when it comes to life in the Dark Saints.
But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.
And it doesn’t mean the thought of Tommy Flaherty putting his hands on Aela Reilly doesn’t make me want to murder him.
So yes, I’ve known she was coming back. But nothing in the world can prepare me for seeing her again. Nothing in the world prepares you to see the girl that shredded who you were, left you gasping for air and wanting more.
Pushing her away back then was the only move. It wasn’t a good one, but it was the only one. With the shit we were up against, there was a point where no one knew if any us was going to make it. Shot by Albanians? Locked up by the Feds? It was happening all around us, and with what happened to Sheila, that was it.
When Jack Reilly sent his daughter away, he made damn sure I followed through to make it happen. And I did. I shoved the only girl I’d ever felt a thing for away, before something happened to her.
Like I said, it wasn’t a good move, but it was the only one.
But now she’s back, and goddamn she looks good.
Of course she does. Of course she couldn’t have come home with some sort of physical disfigurement, or a buzzed head or some shit. Nope, Aela Reilly looks even better than the fantasy I’ve had in my head of her for years.
But it’s not fantasy anymore. She’s back here, in my world, looking amazing, and causing everything I’ve tried so hard to bury inside of myself for six years to burn to the surface.
And she’s about to marry the biggest piece of shit I’ve ever known.
“Hold up.”
She whirls the second I touch her, yanking her arm out of my grasp.
“Don’t touch me!”
“Jesus fuck—” I jump back, my hands up as I eye the blade she’s brandishing in her hand. “Christ, take it easy!”
She glares at me before her shoulders slowly relax.
“Fucking hell, Aela.”
“I don’t need your protection, Liam.”
“Apparently not.” I eye the switchblade in her hand as she lowers it. “They let you through airport security with that?”
“I picked it up on the way.”
This is our conversation. Six goddamn years later, and we’re making jokes about airport security and the fucking knife she’s apparently felt the need to pick up on the way back here. Not exactly the way I imagined this going.
And I did imagine it. Many times.
“Look.” I furrow my brow at her. “I’m not big on this plan either, for the record.”
“And I couldn’t give less of a shit what you’re for or against, Liam. You know, for the record.”
Our eyes lock, the heat palpable in the air between us as I watch her tongue dart out to wet her bottom lip.
“You want to put that away? You’re making me nervous.”
Slowly, her eyes still on mine, she closes the blade and slips it back into the back pocket of her jeans.
“A bodyguard? Seriously?”
“Trust me, I’m not big on shadowing you while you go through this fucking ludicrous plan either, but Mick’s not wrong. The Russians are pushing hard into Southie these days. There may actually be a target on you.”
“Fantastic. So glad to be back.”
“It’s why I’m here.”
Her eyes narrow at me. “Why you?”
“Because I’m good at what I do.”
“And what’s that, exactly?”
She knows what I do, and I know that. She knows what I was ge
tting into before, and she can’t have imagined I’d have stopped doing it since then.
I was good at two things back then: loving her, and hurting people. When she left, I just got even better at the second one.
“You know why me.”
Her lips thin.
She knows.
Because I could and would kill anyone who got close to her. Mick doesn’t know the other reasons I’d do that besides a sense of duty to the family, but it’s there.
And she knows that.
“Jesus, Aela.” I shake my head. This still isn’t the conversation I thought we’d have if we ever somehow met again. “The hell sort of trouble are you in?”
Her silence says enough.
“Bad enough that you’re back here marrying Tommy fucking Flaherty?”
“I’d rather you didn’t remind me.”
“Believe me, that makes two of us.”
Her eyes snap up to mine, and for a second, I think it might happen. For one second, I think we might actually just stop the bullshit, drop the walls we’ve clearly both been building for six years and just say whatever two people like us should say to each other after so long apart.
But then she looks away, that brow of hers creases into a scowl, and her eyes drop to the ground between us.
And the moment’s gone.
“Well this is a thrilling reunion.”
“You now I’m not going away, right?”
Her eyes slide back to mine, full of fire and sass. “Do I have a choice?”
“Not really.”
“Fine, let’s go.”
“Pardon?”
“Liam, I’m tired, and I want to unpack. So let’s go. Mick said my dad’s house was—”
“Bodyguard, sweetheart. Not servant.”
Her eyes narrow at me, and I smile thinly.
“Sit.”
Aela glares at me.
“I need to touch base with Mick, and then I’ll drive you to the house.”
“Whatever, I can get there myse—”
“Sit.”
Her eyes flash at me, and for a second, part of me wonders if this new brooding Aela just might be ready to use that blade in her pocket.
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