Page 48 of The Apprentice
Fionn deserved more than that.
Yet, I still had sex with him, didn’t I?
I’d had ex-boyfriends who reminded me of Eoin, and I’d been fine with that. They didn’t know Eoin, and they weren’t related to him, either. The longest relationship I’d been in had lasted two and a half years, and we’d broken up about seven months before Fionn’s eighteenth birthday party. Fionn had never met Trace, since I’d kept him far away from my work life.
Fuck. I needed to stop thinking about it. Eoin was dead.
“Well?” Sloan’s hard tone shocked me out of my thoughts. “You and Fionnarea thing?”
Conall sidled up beside his partner, and when Sloan raised his arm, Conall snuggled against his body. “It was obvious, though, wasn’t it?” He nudged Sloan with a smirk. “You even told me you thought they were fucking.”
“Pet.” Sloan slapped him on the ass, earning a pleasured hiss in answer. “Language.”
“Are you going to gag me for using the F-word?” Conall stroked a finger down Sloan’s chest. “Because I can get behind that, or should I say,youcan get behindme?”
I cleared my throat to distract them from each other. If I gave them the chance, they’d turn a simple conversation into fucking in a matter of minutes, and while I didn’t mind watching them have sex, this wasn’t the time.
“Fionn’s an adult. What happens between us is private.” I smiled. “Not all of us enjoy an audience.”
Conall’s tongue poked out from the corner of his mouth. “Really? What do you call the whole throwing Fionn over your shoulder at the club, then? Isn’t that how he got into this predicament in the first place?”
“Which reminds me. You called last night to tell me he was at Bellissimo, that you handled it. If it was a sex game, why didyou bother contacting me?” The suspicion in Sloan’s gaze had me shifting uncomfortably. Damn it.
“It wasn’t a lie.” I shrugged. “I didn’t know he was going to be there, which is how it became so public. We hadn’t planned on meeting there.”
“And what?” he drawled, glaring. “You decided to take matters into your own hands?”
“No, he took Fionn into his own hands.” Conall snickered and it earned himanothersmack to the ass, this one harder. A pained sound left him and he huffed. “I thought it was funny.”
Sloan’s lips quirked. “We’re having a serious conversation, pet.”
“What does it matter?” Conall waved his hand at me. “He and Fionn are fucking. They have their kinks, and we have ours. Let them have fun.”
“It matters because Fionn represents my company.” Sloan released his hold on Conall and stepped back, staring down at him with the kind of intensity that would’ve scared anyone who wasn’t his pet. But Conall raised his chin, meeting the look with an expression of defiance. “He must not show weakness.”
Conall gaped. “Really, Boss? Because I’m yours, and you show me off like you’re whipping out your dick and swinging it around in the wind.” He tugged at the red collar around his neck with a forefinger. “You even signed your name with this thing.”
Sloan frowned. “Pet . . . .”
“You can’t have double standards, Sloan. It’s not fair.” Conall’s eyebrows furrowed and he pressed his mouth together. “If showing off your partner is okay for you, it should be the same for him. Let him flaunt Daire and their kinks, if that’s what they want, butteachhim how to look strong doing it—how to not give a shit what people might think of it. How you would, how a boss would.”
I felt like I was intruding in a private argument. While Sloan had softened a lot toward Conall since he’d first claimed ownership over him, Conall didn’t push many boundaries with Sloan. He respected the boss and refused to use Sloan’s weakness for him to get his way. Well, most of the time. At least, when it came to business decisions.
Sloan glanced at me and waved his hand. “Go find Fionn. My pet and I have things we need to discuss.”
I had a feeling instead of discussions that it would involve Sloan’s cock in Conall’s ass as he fucked him hard into submission. Tilting my head in acknowledgement, I left the room and walked down the hall. I passed the nurses’ station again, and before I could ask, Meredith pointed in the direction of the entrance.
“Outside.” Her lips pursed knowingly.
I nodded my quiet gratitude and headed out the doors that led into the waiting room, then out the entrance.
“Stop. The question is simple. How much do you actually need?”
Fionn’s quiet, sad voice caught my attention, and I turned to see him standing with his back to me, still on the sidewalk but closer to the hospital’s wall. His shoulders were hunched, and even though he was no more than murmuring, I would hear him in a crowd of a hundred yelling people. As much as I tried to deny it, his energy called to me.
“I know, Mom. It’s just... that’s a lot of money.”
I tensed.
