by Sienna Blake
I walk gingerly to his side and place a testing hand on his back. It’s hard, wide and warm under my palm.
He doesn’t move.
I slide his gun out of his waistband. Damn, this thing is heavier than it looks. Magnar makes it look so tiny and light with the way he handles it. I turn the safety on and set it aside on his side table, rubbing my palms after I’m done. I hate guns. Hate them. They make my skin crawl.
I struggle with his shoes next, his giant boots, laces that seem as thick as my fingers. Jesus, he has big feet.
Big feet.
Which means big…
I blush from my head to my toes and thank God it’s dark in here and Magnar is pretty much passed out, so can’t see how fecking worked up I’m getting just taking off his shoes.
I almost laugh when I spot his socks.
One of them is blue with unicorns on them and the other is rainbow striped. I never ever would have guessed that the King of Ireland’s underworld would be wearing such colourful mismatched socks.
There’s more to Magnar King than meets the eye.
After much struggling, I manage to roll him over onto his back. He’s like a giant oak tree. I undo his belt and tug it out of the belt loops. He lets out a mumble.
I stare at his shirt and jeans. There is no way in hell I am getting those off him without the assistance of a crane. He’ll just have to sleep in his jeans, then.
For a moment, I stand there watching him, he seems so much more peaceful with his eyes closed. I dare to step closer and brush some of his hair from his cheek.
He turns his face into my palm, brushing my skin with his mouth.
Tingles rush up my arm.
“Thanks, Caitie,” he mutters before letting out a giant snore.
Caitie.
He called me by his wife’s name.
A tiny piece of my heart breaks right there.
What am I doing here?
Did I imagine Magnar would turn out to be the white knight I’d been dreaming about for five years?
Stupid girl.
I turn to leave, to steal out the way I came, silent as the night. I’d find another place to hide. I’d survived this long. I didn’t need Magnar’s help. He’d likely think I was a figment of his imagination in the morning. A product of his drunken grief.
A large steely arm wraps around my waist and yanks me back.
Oh, shit.
I tumble against the mattress and stop flush with Magnar’s body as he tucks me against him, his arm securely around me. My entire body erupts into flames. Heat and fire. And yet, I feel safety and warmth.
Everything I’ve been aching for.
Magnar
I’m lying in bed feeling heavy, a strange mist around me. I can’t move my limbs. I’d be terrified if there wasn’t a warm soothing presence next to me.
A face appears out of the mist. Soft and feminine and oh, too familiar.
“Caitlin,” I breathe.
“Hello, big man,” she says, smiling.
She looks as beautiful as the day she died, the day she was taken away from me. Long wavy auburn hair, strong jaw and those sharp dark eyes shining with more wisdom than her twenty-eight years.
Somewhere deep inside me, I realise that this isn’t real. That she’s gone and will always be gone. I must be dreaming.
But the rest of me doesn’t care.
I wrap my arms around her and tug her against me. She feels so good, so warm and…real.
She giggles softly against my chest. “I missed you, too.”
I brush her hair out of her face, a face that, to my dismay, seems slightly fuzzy. Horror slides down my spine. I’m forgetting her. I’m forgetting what my wife looks like.
“I’m sorry,” I choke out as guilt wraps her cold fingers around my throat.
“You don’t have to be sorry,” she says. “It’s not your fault that you survived. But that is all you are doing. Surviving…but now you have a chance to thrive again. You have a chance to move on.”
I flinch. “What are you talking about? I won’t ever move on from you, Caitie. I can’t forget you.”
“I know you won’t. I’ll always be here.” She places a hand on my chest over where my heart still beats despite being broken all those years ago. “But you have to let go of me. It doesn’t mean you love me any less. I want you to be happy, Magnar. But you have to let yourself be happy.”
I’m silent. Caitlin, as usual, is right. I haven’t really been living these last few years. I’ve been surviving, going through life like an automation of Magnar King. A hollow, guilt-ridden machine.
“She’s very beautiful,” Caitlin says.
I freeze. Guilt seeps into my bones as I remember Waylyn, as I recollect the feelings coursing through my body at her nearness, feelings I’d not had since Caitlin.
Flashes of last night come back to me. Waylyn taking me to bed, taking off my shoes and belt. She took care of me. She’s stayed by my side to make sure I was comfortable.
It’s been a long time since anyone has taken care of me. A slice of pain goes through me. I miss it. I miss the feeling of having a woman in my life, a partner, a lover, a friend.
Caitlin nods. “See.”
I’m not sure what she’s talking about. At least, maybe I’m not ready to see it.
“I have to go now, big man. Remember what I said.”
I shake my head. “Don’t go. I don’t know what to do without you, Caitlin. I’m just so fucking lost without you.”
But she’s already fading. “Don’t worry, Mag. You’ll find your way.”
I grip her tighter as if I can stop her from turning into mist. She feels so solid and real in my arms. I capture her plump mouth and lick across her lips, begging to get inside her once more.
She opens up for me, moaning around my tongue as I explore her.
She tastes different.
Smells different.
Caitlin used to smell like lavender and of the soil in the garden she liked to tend. This Caitlin smells like cinnamon and vanilla.
Before I can analyse the meaning of these two differing scents, her tongue brushes against mine. She presses her breasts against my chest, short-circuiting all thought. Heat flares in me like a dragon waking from a thousand-year sleep. This need, this want has lain dormant until now. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted Caitie as much as I do now.
I roll over her, pressing her into the mattress, forcing her legs apart with my hips. I settle between her soft thighs and sink further against her. She feels…different, softer, but dear God, she feels too damn good for me to question it.
Our kisses deepen and I begin to rock my growing erection against her lower belly. Her thighs lift, her calves rubbing the backs of my legs until her ankles are wrapped around my back, coaxing me closer.
I growl into her mouth.
I need her.
Need to take her.
Need to feel the yielding softness of my woman as I plunge into her.
“I want you,” I mutter between kisses. “Fuck, I need you like I need air.”
She gasps, and the sweetness of her voice triggers something in me, yanking me towards full consciousness.
“Then have me, Magnar.”
I freeze.
That’s not Caitlin’s voice.
This isn’t my wife.
My eyelids snap open.
Instead of Caitlin’s face underneath me, it’s Waylyn’s.
Mouth open, eyes glazed over with lust, her hips rocking up to mine. She stops when she realises I’m not responding, her eyes widening and focusing on mine.
She’s so fucking beautiful.
Despite the guilt threading through my veins, I’m still rock hard. Even more so now that I’m looking at her face, hearing her shallow hungry breaths, seeing the need in her eyes.
But…Caitlin.
I can’t betray her.
My wife’s words echo in my head. “You have to move on. It doesn’t mean you love me any less. I want y
ou to be happy, Magnar. You have to let yourself be happy.”
“Magnar?” Waylyn asks, her voice a whisper, a host of questions unspoken.
For a moment, we just stare at each other, two lonely people who have found each other, who could share a kind of peace with each other. Share joy. Breathe each other back into life.
She could breathe me back to life.
I could let her.
All I have to do is lean back down and kiss her.
All I have to do…
The door to my bedroom bursts open with a bang. I jolt into action, adrenaline rushing through my veins as my hands automatically search for my gun at the base of my back. It’s not there. Where the fuck did I put it?
My next instinct is to block Waylyn with my body and steel myself for the round of bullets that are sure to follow.
“Morning, sunshine!” a female voice I recognise calls.
A familiar figure stands in my doorway, her smile dropping like a stone when she looks past my shoulder and realises I’m not alone.
Ah, fuck. Of all the rotten fucking timing.
It’s Charli.
Waylyn
“Morning, sunshine!” a vaguely familiar female voice calls from the open door.
Magnar shields me with his body. Then freezes, his shoulders relaxing a little.
The woman at the doorway is stunning. Curly brown hair with reddish highlights, and I can tell it’s natural, not from a salon or bottle. She has dark chocolate eyes, huge and sharp, set in her pale face. She stands with a confident air and has a look about her that warns you she’s not a woman to be fucked with.
I can’t help the twinge of jealousy. I wish I were as sure of myself. I wish I gave off that sexy, confident vibe. I’m just too timid. Too invisible.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Magnar barks.
She slams her hands down on her hips. “Well, good fucking morning to you too. I called you last night several times and left several messages and nothing. I came over here like a good girl to make sure your ungrateful ass wasn’t dead and what do I get? You giving out to me before I’ve even had my morning coffee. Coffee which I brought over, by the way. From 3FE too, ’cause I know how you are with your fancy-ass coffee, you bean snob.”
“Charli,” Magnar warns.
Charli.
Charli, the sexy voice from the voice message last night. The “I love you” message. “I miss you” message.
This is his lover.
And I’ve just been busted in his bed.
“Nothing happened,” I squeal.
The two of them pause their glaring at each other and turn to look at me.
I sit up and tug the sheets up under my chin.
To my surprise, Charli lets out a laugh before turning back to Magnar. “If I’d known you had company I would have brought a third coffee over. That…” Charli punches Magnar on the shoulder as she passes him. “…is for not letting me know and making me seem like a rude bitch. She gets your coffee for that.”
I’m in such shock at being busted—not even having done anything, really—that her flippant tone doesn’t register.
Charli walks right up beside me on the bed.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, as I fight not to cower from her.
Charli blinks down at me. “What?”
“Nothing happened. I swear. He was half asleep, had no idea what he was doing.”
“Jesus Christ,” Magnar mutters as he rubs his face in his hands.
Charli grins and glances between Magnar and me. I expect a punch in the face—she seems like the kind of girl who punches, previous case in point, not slaps.
Instead, she holds out a hand. “I’m Charli. Magnar’s daughter.”
Magnar
I sit watching Charli and Waylyn sitting at my breakfast bar, chatting over their takeaway coffees. While I sit here being ignored, muttering to myself like a madman, drinking coffee that I had to make myself. It never tastes as good as the stuff from those professional coffee machines. I thought about buying one, but I like the ritual of walking down to the local café every morning and clearing my head. Plus, I’d have to learn how to use one of those big-ass machines, and I’m not good with technology shite.
Waylyn and Charli are getting on like a house on fire. Figures. Seeing as they’re basically the same age.
Holy fuck.
I almost slept with an eighteen year old.
I almost forced myself onto an eighteen year old.
She was into it as much as you were.
I ignore that voice. And make a mental note to ignore any and all funny feelings I may or may not get around Waylyn.
She is now under my protection. Not under me. She’s my responsibility. And I have to take that seriously, even if she gives me a serious blood-jolting rush. Something tells me she will be the key to bringing down Keegan’s bloody reign.
Charli lets out a sigh and glances my way.
Thanks for acknowledging my presence, daughter dearest.
“As much as I know you’d love for me to stay all day…” she says.
I let out a snort.
She shoots me a glare. “…I best be off. Things to see, people to do.”
She did not just say that.
It’s my turn to glare at Charli. She has the nerve to wink at me. There is no fucking way in hell my eighteen-year-old daughter is doing anybody.
Except I was just in bed about to do someone else’s eighteen-year-old daughter, so—
I shut off that line of thinking. Otherwise, I might go out and have to murder every virile breathing male within a ten-mile radius of Charli.
Charli gives Waylyn a hug. “Hope I’ll see you around soon. Keep this one out of trouble, yeah?” She means me. “That last time that he—”
“Okay, bye-bye, Charli.” I grab Charli by the shoulders and lead her to the door before she can spill anymore of my fucking secrets.
At the front door, my heart pangs when she turns to say goodbye to me. She looks so much like her mother. Same wild reddish-brown hair, same sharp grey eyes. And the mouth on her.
“You know Ma would have wanted you to be happy,” she says quietly.
What the fuck is up with everybody saying that? “Yeah,” I grunt.
“You know I want you to be happy…right?” Her eyes flick past my shoulder to where I’m sure Waylyn is sitting watching us.
“Jesus fucking Christ, did we turn into the feckin’ Brady Bunch? Get out of here, girl.”
Charli laughs before giving me a hug which I return. “I’m just sayin’,” she says as she steps out into the elevator. “Go, fuck, be merry.”
My eighteen-year-old daughter did not just say that. No wonder I’m starting to get grey hairs at my temples.
“Love you, Da,” she calls out as she disappears behind the elevator doors.
I turn around and meet Waylyn’s gaze from across the apartment.
Go, fuck, be merry.
If only it were that simple.
Waylyn
Magnar returns to the kitchen, moving slowly as if he’s not too sure what to do when he gets to me.
“So,” I say, “Charli’s your daughter.” Well done, Miss Obvious.
“Yeah. She’s a real character. Takes after…” He swallows, tears his gaze away from me, the guilt clear in his eyes. “Takes after her ma.”
I nod, my throat feeling swollen. “You still…love her ma, don’t you?”
The only indication that he heard me was the press of his lips.
“What happened back there…what almost happened…I get it that you didn’t mean it.”
Magnar lets out a grunt, turning to me with eyes widening. “You think that didn’t…” His features grow cold, indecipherable. “Yeah, you’re right. It was nothing. Should be nothing. Let’s just forget it ever happened, yeah?” He storms into the kitchen, grabbing another bottle of Jameson from the cupboard and pouring a huge glass.
I leap from my stool and snatch the glass out
from under his nose while he’s screwing the bottle lid back on.
He turns towards me, and I’m met with the full intimidating force of Ireland’s most dangerous, most feared man. “Give that back.”
“No.” I must be fucking insane.
He frowns. “Nobody tells me no.”
I hold the glass out of his reach. Not that I could keep it from him if he really wanted it. “Well, you need to hear no every once in a while. It’s good for ye.”
The glare he gives me is Arctic.
“It’s one in the afternoon,” I say, trying to reason with him.
“It’s five o’clock somewhere.”
“You haven’t even eaten yet.” My stomach chooses to punctuate this moment with a loud, insistent growl.
He grunts. “Fine, let’s eat.”
“You’re out of food,” I say quietly.
Magnar’s face drains of blood. “Holy shit. We didn’t eat dinner last night. I didn’t feed you.”
“No,” I say softly. “You had other things on your mind.”
“What the feck is wrong with me?” Magnar runs a large hand through his long hair, untied and loose around his neck today.
It seems his glass of whiskey is forgotten temporarily. I slide it aside on the counter, making a note to tip it out into the sink when he’s not looking.
“I’ll go get us some food.” He turns and heads towards the front door.
“I’ll come with you,” I say, following him.
“No.” He spins, holding up a hand to stop me. “You stay here. Someone might recognise you.”
I open my mouth to argue that I’m not a fecking prisoner, but then I close it again. He has a point. I didn’t escape from Keegan only to walk right back into his hands because of stubbornness.
“Fine. I’ll have a shower while you’re gone.” I probably stink. A flush goes through me at the thought that I may have not smelled completely like roses this morning while Magnar was lying on top of me. At least I was able to brush my teeth with a spare toothbrush I found before I’d slipped into Magnar’s bed the first time last night. “But…”