Page 72 of Her Irish Savage

I won’t look away. I won’t let her escape that easily.

And I see the moment she decides to trust me. Her lips open. She sucks my thumb inside.

“Good girl,” I tell her, as she tastes her own honey. Shecloses her eyes, but she pulls hard with her lips. She circles my thumb with her tongue.

I forget whatever stupid ideas I had about taking it slow, about staying controlled, about making this first time last. She’s too slick, and I’m too hard. She shifts her arse, letting me sink even deeper into the heat between her thighs.

“You’re the best girl,” I tell her. “You’re everything I’ve ever wanted. Sweet Jesus, little girl…”

She’s a miracle, because she’s already coming again. And feeling her break around me, knowing she was afraid but I’m the one who gave her courage, that I’m the one who made her feel safe, who gave her the strength to trust me again…

There aren’t words for how it feels to come inside her, without a johnny between us. All I can say with that first miraculous pulse is, “You’re mine, little girl.” And then, each time I seize inside her: “Mine. Mine. Mine.”

And when she whispers, “Thank you, Daddy,” my heart is as full as my body is empty.

We sprawl across the bed, sweaty and sticky and naked. My breathing slows before hers does. I keep one possessive hand on her hip.

Which is why I feel her body move before I hear it—the echoing gurgle of an empty belly. She tenses for just a moment, and then she laughs. “Oh my God,” she says. “I’m starving!”

I want to keep her locked in the bedroom for a while longer. See how many times I can make her come in a single hour. Shower with her and watch soap sleek over the waxed V between her thighs. Lace her into one of those leather things until her tits push up like a buffet.

But she’s my little girl. I’m her Daddy. I’m responsible for her.

So I haul my arse out of bed and make her the sort of breakfast she deserves.

27

FIONA

There’s a problem with having a rogue witch send you ten million dollars over the course of six weeks: You need to manage ten million dollars.

The first account number I gave Rónnad was for a checking account. I realized my mistake after the first day. I set up an offshore savings account, something invisible to the US authorities. Tax sheltered. Secure.

But getting money from that account into a form I can give to the Corman museum turns out to be a lot trickier.

The Irish mob used to be expert at laundering money. We had cash-based businesses, everything from laundromats to casinos. Legitimate customers handed over their money. We inflated the numbers with our dirty wealth, depositing fresh, clean funds into lawful accounts. Everyone went home happy at the end of the day.

But the world runs on credit cards now. And even gambling—traditionally the Old Colony Crew’s greatest cash cow—now thrives on the Internet.

I spend days trying to come up with a solution. I have some decent ideas for cash-based businesses. Nail salons. Strip clubs. Food trucks, farmers markets, and good old-fashioned barber shops.

But none of them makes ten million bucks in a couple of months.

I finally give up and do what I should have done in the first place. I call Quentin O’Roark.

I have his number in my contacts, same as I have Uncle Aran and Keenan Rivers, all the men who ran my father’s empire. I use a burner, so I know he won’t pick up, but I trust he’ll recognize my voice when I leave a message: “Q. Meet me at three, tomorrow afternoon. Main Reading Room of the Boston Public Library.”

I figure Uncle Aran will be allergic to the place; there is absolutely no chance he’ll show up to force his claim on me. But the next day, as I’m getting ready to leave the apartment, Patrick insists on coming along.

“No one will try anything in a place that public,” I say.

“You aren’t stopping me,” he says. “So why don’t we just skip over the arguing stage?”

I roll my eyes. But I’m secretly glad to know I’ll have him by my side. “Fine,” I say. “Be an overprotective old man.”

“Spoken like the brat you are.”

I stick out my tongue. Patrick says, “Don’t write checks you aren’t willing to cash.”

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