Page 64 of Her Irish Savage

I’m stunned, like a fish yanked out of water. My brain has stuttered to a stop. But I feel him force my head back. I know he’s raising my face to his. His lips grind on mine, his teeth backing up his demand. As he settles his body against me, the dead weight of his erection pushes into my belly.

With a wordless cry, I bring my knee up, as hard as I can. I feel the breath whoosh out of him, and I shove him off my body.

My fingers scrabble on the door. The knob catches, and I think he’s locked me in, but then it finally turns, and I gulp a breath of fresh air. I run blindly down the hall.

Tumbling into the kitchen, I fight off waves of nausea. I want to spit out the disgusting taste of my uncle. I want to rip off my clothes, everything he touched, everything he ruined.

“Fiona!” Patrick says, and it takes me a moment to realize he’s holstering his gun.

I throw myself at him, desperate for his touch to scrub away Uncle Aran’s. I try to disappear inside him, grabbing at his shoulders, at his back, at the hard, tight muscles of his ass.

“Hush,” Patrick says. “I’ve got you.” There’s more, in Irish. He calls mecailín beag; I know that’slittle girl, and that’s all right, that’s what I want, what I need.

“Uncle Aran,” I choke out. “He wants… He says… He…”

Patrick’s palm brushes over the red marks my uncle left on my arm. I don’t have to tell him. He understands exactly what my uncle wants. He looks toward the office, and his hand drifts back to the holster nestled under his arm.

Oona says, “You’re in thedún, Paddy. Don’t be a fool.”

He looks like he wants to argue. Instead, he pulls me a little closer before he says to Oona, “I’m taking her out the back.”

She twists her hands, but she nods.

“Come on,” Patrick says to me. “Daddy’s got you now.”

Disapproval blooms on Oona’s face, the same as eight years ago, when I told her what I did to Father Colin and the others. But she crosses to the steel door that leads outside, shooting all five bolts with fingers strong from kneading bread. Poking her head out, she looks left, then right like she’s expecting company.

“Go on, then,” she finally says, directing her words to Patrick. “Get her out of here.”

His arm is heavy around my waist. I lean into his strength, letting him half-carry me down the three concrete steps. He hurries us down the brick walk to the street.

Before we duck out of sight, Oona calls out from the top step. “We haven’t finished our conversation, Paddy Moran.”

He waves a hand over his head, a signal that’s equal parts acceptance and refusal.

“I’m sorry,” I say, after he’s helped me into the Land Rover and taken his own place behind the wheel.

He’s checking the mirrors, calm, methodical, like anotherman might tie his shoelaces. But I see the look he throws at the glove box. I wonder what weapons he has stashed in there.

“Hold on,” he says, his attention snagged by something outside the car.

By reflex, I follow his gaze—just in time to see the two guards at thedún’sfront door assume tactical stances in the middle of the road, raising their guns with stiffened arms.

24

PATRICK

My fingers spread wide across the back of Fiona’s head as I shove her to the floor of the car. “Stay down,” I growl as she protests. Flooring the accelerator, I fight the gut-wrench of desperation as the engine shrieks before the wheels grip the road. The Bell clangs, loud and clear inside my head, urging me to wheel around and send those shitehawks running. Driving away from Southie gunmen is starting to feel far too familiar.

This time, no shots are fired.

I don’t know if that’s because Dowd calls them off, shouting orders through their high-end earpieces, or because they think better of starting a shooting war in the middle of Boston, or maybe it’s the unmarked car I hurtle past at the end of the street.

The brain squirrels start justifying the space they take up inside my skull. I’m handling half a dozen things, and I’m ready to manage twenty more.

One hand hovers over Fiona, as if that will keep her safefrom danger. I’m steering clear of the curbs, grateful the Crew’s ban on parking still applies to this street, glad I don’t have to lose time sideswiping vehicles. I’m watching the eejits in my rear-view mirror, making sure they lower their arms, waiting for them to holster their weapons. I’m thinking of where I’ll take Fiona, where she’ll be safe, where we can be certain no one is following us, because the last thing I want is to draw Dowd’s men to the Back Bay apartment. I’m watching a group of boys beside the streetlight, still dressed in their Sunday best, and if they’re anything like I was at that age, they’re lying about touching some girl’s tit or getting a hand beneath her pants, but all I care about now is that they don’t decide to dart across the street, don’t decide now’s the time to head home for Sunday roast. I’m watching Michelangelo Barbieri stare at me from behind the wheel of his Chevy Tahoe, a paper cup of coffee halfway to his mouth.

Mike Barbieri.

---