by Sienna Blake
It’s late. I’m in one of the guest rooms, sitting up in bed, while she’s taken Magnar’s room; I insisted. Told her that she’d feel more comfortable in a familiar room, a bed she’s slept in before, that already smells of her.
It’s not the real reason.
Through the laptop screen in front of me I watch as Waylyn drops the shopping bags onto the bed Magnar left for her earlier.
Magnar would kill me if he knew I wired up his master bedroom.
He asked me to find out the girl’s secret. He doesn’t need to know my methods. I’d never lie to him but Magnar never asks how I get something done.
He and I both know that he’s better off not knowing.
Waylyn starts pulling out clothes from the shopping bags. Denim jeans, white and grey t-shirts with various sleeve lengths, black lace-up boots and a leather jacket.
I snort. Magnar’s dressing her like he dresses himself.
I pause when she pulls out a lacy green bra and underwear set from a Victoria’s Secret bag. I’m mesmerised by the movement of her fingers over the lace. I bet the colour is going to look incredible on her creamy skin, set off against her light-brown hair.
I can barely breathe as she tugs off her tights and slips off her tunic.
I should look away. Give her some privacy.
But I just can’t.
Her body is slender yet curvy in all the right places. Small waist, soft thighs. More than a handful of ass and tits.
She takes the tags off the set. Watching her dress is almost as hypnotic as watching her take off her clothes, her fingers deftly latching the bra hooks behind her back, her hips shaking as she tugs up the lace panties.
She is gorgeous.
Stunning.
Even as she brushes down at her hips in that self-conscious way that women do when they wish there was less of it.
Or the way she turns to the side and sucks in her stomach.
Don’t you dare, I want to yell at her, you are fucking perfect the way you are.
But I can do nothing but watch.
As she lies back on the bed.
As she slides her palms across the smooth skin of her neck, her chest, her stomach, her thighs.
Watch as her hand strokes become firmer, surer.
My cock reacts in a way I didn’t think possible for me. Not anymore. I find I’m gripping the sheets with my fists so hard I’m about to tear them.
When she spreads her legs and slides a hand between them, slipping under those panties, I’m cursing the camera angle for not letting me get a good view.
I can hear her, though, hear the way her breath gets heavy, peppered with soft moans.
I can see the way her head rolls back, her lids closed, lips parting slightly. I want to force that mouth open with my fingers before feeding her my cock.
I want to smell her skin, the musky scent of her arousal that her fingers are sliding through. I want to rub myself all over her so that I smell of her.
I want to taste her. Lick her sweat from between her tits, suck the honey off her clit.
Feel her under me. Over me. Around me.
“Magnar,” she gasps just loud enough for the camera to catch it.
My skin grows taught.
A twinge of something sharp slices through me.
Jealousy.
Fuck off. I am never jealous. Because I never want anything enough. Least of all jealous of Magnar. Of my brother. The man who’s done so much for me. Accepted me for the ruined shards of a man that I am.
The hand between her legs moves faster, the soft, wet sound proof of how turned on she is.
Her other hand shoves that new bra down so she can pinch hard at her nipple. It appears she likes pain as much as pleasure. I want to do that for her, even if she’s thinking of someone else.
“Harder…X,” falls from her lips.
My cock swells to bursting.
On the screen, her hands pause. Her mouth drops, as if she can’t believe she invoked my name out loud.
Why would she say my name?
I have no time to question it any further.
Her body relaxes and her hands pick up the pace. “God, yes…”
Of its own volition, my hand shoves down into my pants, grasping at my rock-hard cock, the laptop almost flipping off me in my haste.
“Oh, fuck…” Her body bows up off the bed as she comes. Her toes are curling, her hips bucking up to meet her hand. The fingers of her other hand twisting mercilessly at her nipple, her cry muted as she tries to contain it.
It tips me over the edge. I come hard, like a fucking teenager with my hand down my pants.
Magnar
I stride into Gallagher’s gym located in one of the canal buildings. It’s part gym, part fighting studio. Our headquarters has its own private gym but I like training here when I need to get some space. And right now my head is fucking whirring.
In one of the rings is the last person I expect to see here.
Declan Gallagher, the current world number one MMA fighter and owner of Gallagher’s Gym.
“Dex,” I call out to him. “Aren’t you too fucking famous to be training here with us commoners?”
“King,” he calls back. He halts his sparring session and pats his opponent on the shoulder before sliding through the ropes and landing gracefully on the ground.
I don’t know how a man his size, six foot two of solid muscle, can move the way he does. Lightning fast and as graceful as a jaguar.
We greet each other with a fist bump and a quick shoulder hug.
“What’s the craic?” he asks.
“I thought you don’t grunt with us low-lifes anymore.”
Declan let out a snort. “Never forget my roots, brother.”
X originally introduced me to Declan, back when he’d been an up-and-coming fighter in his early twenties. X and Declan had been through juvi system together. Declan’s past rivals X’s in darkness.
We, the King family, have been a silent investor in his career. It has worked out well for him and us.
“Heard you opened another gym over in London,” I say.
“Yeah, in East London. Gotta make hay, ye know?”
I nod. “Would’ve thought you’d slow down now that you’re happily married.”
He grins. “Never. If anything, she gets me all fired up.” He shoots me a wink. “Now, tell me about this woman who’s giving ye grief.”
I flinch. How the fuck did he—?
Dex gives me a look. “It’s written all over your face, mate. Spill it.”
I let out a sigh. “Yeah, well. There’s nothing to tell.”
“Not yet.” Declan gyrates his hips like a lap dancer. “But once the lucky lady gets a taste of the King she won’t want to go back to knights and pawns.”
I shoot Declan a warning glare. He might be a better fighter than me, but I have about twenty pounds on him and would get a few solid hits in before he took me down.
Dex gets a series of catcalls from across the gym which he laps up, placing his hands behind his head, lifting a cocked leg up as he fucks the air.
I roll my eyes before making my way over to the squat rack and start loading on plates for a warm-up set. I feel like today is going to need a heavy fucking leg session.
Declan appears at the other end of the barbell and shoves on matching plates. Thank fuck, his hip thrusting has stopped. “I’ve been telling you for ages, it’s about time you moved on,” he says as he clamps the last plate into place.
“I have not moved on.” I slap a pad around the barbell for my shoulders.
Declan raises a thick eyebrow. “You telling me that if roles were reversed, you’d be sitting up in heaven wanting your old lady to stay single, unhappy and dried up for the rest of her life?
“Exactly.”
“What was I thinking?” Declan claps his hand against his forehead. “As if they’d let your grumpy ass into heaven.”
I throw a half-hearted punch at Declan and he dodges it easi
ly.
He clasps my shoulder. “Caitlin would want ye to be happy, King. If this girl makes you happy, then go for it.”
If only it were that simple.
Magnar
It’s late by the time I shower and change at headquarters. My body is groaning but at least I’d been able to not think about Waylyn for two hours or so. Sort of.
First person I seek out once I’ve claimed a room and dumped my shit is Liam.
“King,” Liam says, when I corner him on one of the upper level chill-out spaces, “I left you messages. I have news.”
“Talk to me.”
“Apparently, Keegan’s bride has gone missing,” he says, eyes twinkling.
“Ye don’t say.” I don’t tell him yet that I already know. How the bride in question is probably in my bed right fucking now. “What have you been able to find out about her?”
“Nothing much. There’s a birth certificate that listed a Maria Grace. Four-year-old Waylyn was removed from her mother’s care when Maria was placed in a mental health facility. Unfortunately, Maria died a few years later. Waylyn was placed in a convent by Maria’s brother and schooled by nuns until she was thirteen when she was removed by Keegan. She’s been living with him as his ward ever since. Cut to today, when their wedding is announced the day after she turns eighteen.”
All these things tie in with Waylyn’s story. “Who’s Waylyn’s father?”
“Birth certificate doesn’t list anyone. But I know that Maria was living in the US when she conceived. Came back to Ireland and had Waylyn a few months later.”
I thank Liam, telling him to keep digging, before I say goodbye. My mind is whirring through all this new information.
The rooms at HQ are simple, decorated like comfortable hotel rooms, tasteful but characterless. It’s a far cry from my penthouse master bedroom.
No sooner than I’ve turned in, does a knock come at my door. I let out a silent groan. This is why I usually avoid staying at HQ. Everybody wants to come chat.
“Yeah?”
Jace steps into my room and shuts the door behind him. “What’s the craic, brother?” He sits in one of the chairs facing the bed, his fingers drumming against his inner thigh, a clear sign that he is nervous. His gaze darts over me. “How are you…feeling?”
I snort. “I’m fine, Jace. Quit mammying me.”
Jace’s eyebrows narrow. “You don’t look hung-over.” He leans in and sniffs. “Don’t smell like the Teelings brewery.”
I punch him lightly on his shoulder. “That’s ’cause I’m not.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Did Charli pour all your whiskey down the drain?”
“No.”
“Then how are you not having your stomach pumped from drinking for twenty-four hours straight?”
“I just…didn’t drink all that much.”
He harrumphs. “Charli did that?”
I don’t correct him. Waylyn did. She cut me off this morning. She stopped me from drinking today.
And for some goddamn reason, I listened to her.
Not that I’m a cunt, but I don’t even listen to my own daughter when she tries to mammy me.
This fact settles uneasily on me.
Waylyn is having too much of an influence on me, too quickly, too damn easily.
Waylyn
When I wake, X is already waiting for me at the kitchen counter, just where I’d left him last night when I went to bed. Not a hair is out of place. No pillow creases on his perfect skin, no bags, no hooded, half-asleep eyes. Did he even sleep? Is he even human?
“Morning,” I say.
X pushes a takeaway cup at me. I take it and a waft of coffee hits my nose. He must have gone out for it before I woke.
I let out a soft groan. “A girl could get used to this.”
The corner of X’s lip tilts up. Was that a partial smile?
I take a large sip. Black with one sugar and a hint of milk. Exactly how I like it. X was paying attention yesterday when I fixed myself a coffee.
This hits me like a slap. No one has ever noticed my preferences or cares enough to recreate it for me.
Tears rim my eyes. Stupid. I look away before they have a chance to fall.
X is by my side in an instant, his hand on my elbow. “What’s wrong?”
God, his voice. It’s like liquid bass, vibrating through my body, trickling into every last corner, shaking awake things in me that I never knew existed.
I shake my head.
His other hand comes to my chin, lifting my face to his.
I can’t hide from him. Can’t hide from those laser eyes that see right into me. “My coffee is perfect,” I blurt out. “No one has ever…” I choke. And try again. “No one has ever…”
I can’t. The emotions are too real. My nerves too frayed. Everything I’ve been through… All that I escaped… It’s all battering up inside of me. If I say one more word, my carefully constructed shield of cards will come tumbling down.
All over a cup of coffee.
A perfect cup of coffee.
X’s eyes darken, thick brows furrowing. Then they spread in realisation. His cold eyes grow warm. Almost soft.
I expect pity… Even I pity me. But something even more dangerous appears on his face.
I understand.
I start to sob. Wild uncontrollable sobbing.
X’s hands release from me as if I’ve burned him. Without his support, I sink to the floor, pressing my face into my palms. It’s like a fucking dam has burst. I am breaking apart and I don’t have the strength to hold myself together.
“Waylyn,” I hear X say, his voice sounding panicked. “Stop. Stop crying.”
This only makes me sob even harder.
“What do I…?”
I reach for X. I need him. Need comfort. Need something to cling onto so I don’t tear into pieces.
But X stands there like a stone, right out of my reach.
“Jaysus Christ,” an unfamiliar male voice cuts through my cave of grief. “What did you do to her?”
I feel a set of warm, strong arms wrap around me, picking me up. I accept this strange presence, this unfamiliar but soothing touch.
“I didn’t do anything.” This is X.
There a pause. I feel us moving then lowering as he sits on the couch with me on his lap.
“I gave her a coffee,” X admits, sounding unsure.
“Sure you did.”
“I—”
“Magnar needs you. HQ. Now. He’s filled me in. I can take care of Waylyn.”
There’s a pause. I feel X’s hesitance, sense he wants to say something. I hear a resigned sigh then footsteps, the front door opening and locking shut.
“Shh, now. Yer all right. Yer all right.” This newcomer brushes a large hand over my hair and rocks me in his arms.
I can only see a large blurry figure through my tears.
Yes, this is what I need.
I press my body even farther into his lap, wrapping my legs around his waist like I’m a baby koala. I push my face into his shirt that smells heavenly. Fresh soap and sandalwood.
He just holds me.
He keeps me from falling apart.
Until the sobs subside. Until I have enough strength to gather all my broken pieces together again.
I wipe my eyes and take a good look at the stranger who knew exactly how to support me.
He’s gorgeous, the kind of boy-next-door gorgeous that would model loafers and polo shirts from Brown Thomas, a high-end department store on Grafton Street. His shock of light brown and sun-kissed hair is styled over his high forehead; an aquiline nose. Kind sea-blue eyes shaped like a cat’s eyes and tanned skin. Lips so defined and plump I am almost jealous.
He doesn’t look like a dangerous gang member. Not like Magnar and X do. Not even with the peek of tattoos on his forearms.
“You must be Waylyn,” he says.
I nod.
“I’m Jason King, but you can call me Jace. Magnar sent me here
to look after ye. Make sure you weren’t scaring poor X.” He smiles, all perfect white teeth.
I find myself wanting to smile along with him.
Yet another King. Are they all this damn gorgeous?
Suddenly, I’m all too aware that I’m sitting in his lap, my legs still wrapped around him and his groin is pressing right up against my core. Shite.
“Sorry,” I squeak, shifting off him to flop onto the couch beside him.
“No bother, dollface.”
I study his face, wondering how he and Magnar are related. “You’re Magnar’s brother?”
“Cousin by blood. Although he might as well be my brother. We grew up together. Him, me and eventually X.”
I make a face at the mention of X.
Jace tsks quietly as he wipes the residue dampness off my cheeks and jaw with his thumb. “Listen, don’t you mind X. He doesn’t mean it.”
I tear my gaze away from Jace as a fresh stab of rejection lashes through me at the memory of the way X reacted when I cried. I thought X and I had connected. I thought he understood me.
Jace continues, “X just doesn’t know how to be…”
“Human?” I say bitterly, only half meaning it.
Jace chuckles. “Yeah, sometimes he seems inhuman. He’s funny about touching people. Don’t take it personally. I’ve never gotten a hug from him in my life.”
What? Who doesn’t like touch? Who doesn’t like hugs?
“He doesn’t touch anyone?”
“No. Well,” Jace continues, “unless he’s killing them.”
I hope to God that Jace is joking. I doubt it, though.
A dark look crosses his face, “X…he’s not had the best life, yeah? I don’t know the details. I’m not even sure Magnar does either. But he went through some pretty horrific shit as a kid. Cut him some slack, yeah? For me?” He gives me a warm smile, one that lights up his whole face and makes a dimple poke out in his cheek.
Fucking gorgeous. My heart does a flip in my chest and I find myself smiling. “Okay. Just for you.”
He shoots me a wink. “Now, how about you and me settle in with a movie. I’ll even let you choose the film.” He says film like fil-um. It’s cute. So not like a tough gang member. I doubt he’d appreciate my saying so, though.