Page 67 of Claiming Genevieve

I’m still rock-hard, eager for her again. I could take care of it, give myself a release at least, but I ignore it. I don’t want my own hand.

I want my wife.

—

In the morning,when I come down for breakfast, Genevieve is nowhere to be seen. It doesn’t take a genius to know that she’s avoiding me, but as much as I want to, I don’t go and look for her. I finish my breakfast alone instead, and then head to my office, intending to call Dimitri first thing and see what he might have uncovered about Chris.

I know Genevieve doesn’t want him dead. I know that for her, having lived a more normal life, that seems like a horrifying extreme. Even for me, having been raised in and around the mafia, the idea of taking someone else’s life isn’t something I’d consider lightly. I don’t have the taste for violence that others do, like Dimitri’s brother Alek. I’ve never been a violent man.

Not until the day I saw Chris strike Genevieve, and I discovered for the first time what it felt like to want someone else dead.

Now, he’s tried to kill her. My wife, the woman I love… the future mother of my child. I still don’t know if I’m fit to inherit all that my father has built, if I can handle the responsibility of everything that he wants to pass on to me, but I know one thing for sure.

I need to make sure that man can never harm Genevieve again, or I’m not fit for anything at all.

Dimitri answers on the second ring. “Rowan. How’s Ireland?”

“Bonnie, as always.” I sink back into my leather chair, rubbing a hand over my face. I’m exhausted from last night, and I try not to let it show through in my voice. “How are things in New York?”

I’m asking about more than just the city, and Dimitri knows it. “He covered his tracks well, Rowan. If he put out the hit on her, I’m not finding any evidence of it. Alek is talking to his contacts in the more… criminal part of the underworld. Someone he knows has a lead on a contract that was put out on someone that fits Genevieve’s description. But tracing it back to Chris?—”

“You don’t need to trace it back to him,” I bite out. “It was him. You know that as well as I do. Just tell me what I need to provide for you to pay out the contract, and what you need from me to put an end to that fucking asshole. That’s it.”

“We need to be sure it was him, Rowan,” Dimitri says patiently.

“I know it was?—”

“I agree with you,” he interrupts, his voice firm—the voice of apakhan. It irritates me that he’s using that tone with me, speaking to me as someone below him, instead of his peer. But I’m not the leader of the Gallagher family yet, and it’s never irked me before the way it does now. “But think, Rowan. If we assume and itwassomeone else, then they’ll just send out the contract again. While we’re focused on Chris, the real culprit will still be going after Genevieve?—”

“Who the fuck could it possibly be, besides him?” I demand, and Dimitri sighs.

“Someone who wants to strike at the Gallagher family,” he suggests. “Someone who has paid enough attention to what’s been happening, bided their time, and knows that we’d assume Chris is the one responsible—the one with the motive and who has made threats already. Someone who could use him as a cover. We need to besure, Rowan.” Dimitri pauses. “You’re in Ireland. She’s as safe as she could possibly be. Let your father and Alek and I handle things here.”

I run a hand through my hair, my jaw tightening. For all that I know, I’m helping to protect Genevieve by being here with her, by bringing her to Ireland and keeping her safe here, but being unable to do anything about the situation back in New York still makes me feel helpless. Relying on others to deal with Chris, instead of taking the fucking bastard out myself, makes me feel helpless.

“Just protect her,” Dimitri says, as if echoing my thoughts. “I’ll call you when we have more information.”

Genevieve manages to avoid me for the rest of the day. The manor house is large, with gardens and a greenhouse, and a library, as well as plenty of other rooms for her to lose herself in. I don’t chase her down, once it becomes obvious that she’s trying to avoid me, but I can feel myself getting more restless throughout the day, my mind drifting back to her again and again. If it were entirely up to me, I’d have kept her in bed all day today, and fucked her over and over until it was physically impossible for me to become aroused again.

So why am I waiting?I ask myself, as my frustration reaches a peak around dinnertime. The agreement is that during this one week, we’ll do everything in our power to make sure that Genevieve ends up pregnant at the end of it. That means sex.Lotsof it. So why am I not doing exactly what I want?

The truth, I know deep down, is that I want her to want me of her own volition. I don’t want her in bed on a technicality, I want her there breathless, dripping, as desperate for me as I am for her. But that feels like an impossibility.

So I’ll take what I can get.

My mood is considerably worse by the time I come down for dinner. I see Genevieve already in the dining room, wearing a dark red silk dress with thin spaghetti straps and a floaty hem that comes down to just above her knees in the front and below in the back, her hair loose over her shoulders. Just the sight of her sends a jolt of hungry desire through me, and when a maid walks past me with a pitcher of water, I put a hand out to stop her.

“Sir?” She looks at me with confusion.

“I want privacy. Tell the rest of the staff to not come in until I call for someone. This room is off limits until I say otherwise.”

The maid bobs her head, quickly darting out of the room, and I turn, closing the heavy wooden doors to the dining room.

“Rowan?” Genevieve’s voice floats toward me, confused, and I pivot on my heel, crossing the room to her in three quick strides.

I reach for her waist, pushing the place settings on the table aside as I lift her up and set her on the edge of the table. She gasps, pushing at my chest, her eyes going wide.

“Rowan! This isn’t?—”

---