Page 17 of Redeem Me

‘I told you, a mansion in Malahide.’

‘What are the family like? Who are they? Do I know them?’ Dermot fires question after question without pausing for an answer. ‘Caelon lives in Malahide. I bet he’d know them.’

‘Yeah, about that…’ I twist a long strand of hair around my index finger and tug it hard enough to pull on my scalp.

‘What?’ Dermot’s voice sharpens.

‘Funny story.’ Or not, given what occurred the other night. Better to just come out with it. He’s going to find out I’m living with his best friend sooner or later. ‘It is actually Caelon.’

‘What do you mean, it’s Caelon? What’s Caelon?’ Dermot demands.

‘I’m nannying for Caelon. Well, Orla and Owen.’ Though Caelon could clearly do with some TLC himself. ‘Apparently, he can’t keep a nanny for more than a few months, so yourstruly is stuck with him for the foreseeable future…’ I trail off.

Silence greets me at the other end of the phone. Seconds pass. Then raucous, booming laughter. Dermot’s guffaws echo through my ears.

‘Ha! Talk about baptism of fire,’ he snorts.

‘For him or me?’ I stare at the phone open-mouthed.

‘Well, both of you now you come to mention it. Caelon’s just so…’

‘Sullen? Snappy? Short-tempered?’ I finish for him.

‘Exactly. And you’re just so…’ he trails off.

‘Cheery, patient and empathetic,’ I prompt.

‘Exactly,’ he sighs. ‘And there was me worrying you’d get stuck with another creepy boss who can’t keep his hands off you.’

I wish.

No, Ivy. Nose clean, head down. And not down in my boss’s crotch, no matter how much I keep imagining what he’s packing down there.

‘You don’t need to worry about that at least.’Worse luck. ‘You could have told me about his wife, though.’ I exhale heavily.

‘I would have done, if I’d have known you were going to start working for him,’ Dermot says. ‘Bad business. Really bad. It was a terrible car crash, but Caelon is convinced there’s more at play.’

‘In what way?’ I pad across the plush ivory carpet to stare out over the gardens.

‘The Becketts and the O’Connors have been enemies for years. The families run rival whiskey empires. Weeks after the Beckett brothers helped put Declan O’Connor behind bars, Isabella was killed in an “accident” that makes no sense whatsoever.’

‘But it was a car crash…’ I feel my eyebrows furrow.

‘The guy driving owed the O’Connors a serious debt. The rumour is the debt would be wiped out and his family taken care of if he did this last job.’ Dermot’s voice drops to a husky low.

‘But that’s crazy.’ I rest my palm over my heart.

‘It’s a crazy world we live in,’ Dermot concedes. ‘Caelon has made it his life’s mission to find out the truth, but the only surviving passenger, the man driving the other car, is still in a coma over two years later.’

‘Shit.’ It explains everything about Caelon. It’s bad enough his wife was killed, but to be deliberately taken from him by his family rivals, well, that’s a different type of burden to bear.

‘Don’t say I mentioned anything. Caelon is a private person. He hides his anguish behind a mad quest for revenge. God help the O’Connors if that driver ever wakes up, or if Caelon finds any other form of proof.’

A cold shiver ripples over my spine.

‘I’m glad he has you to take care of the kids, Ivy. But more importantly, I’m glad he values the importance of family. You’re safe with Caelon. He’d never lay a finger on my little sister,’ Dermot scoffs. ‘He knows better.’

I cough to cover the hiss that slips from my lips.

---