Page 6 of Kissin Irish by Morgan
The door opened and closed again. I could only imagine the struggle behind the grunts and groans as Villain dragged in Irish. My brother chewed him out. Someone had to be holding him back. Kingpin? No, I smelled the heavy sweat of one of our enforcers, Goliath.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Irish complained in his charming accent. “You don’t have to haul me. I’m sorry to your sister. I’m scarlet, I really am. I must be bleeding garbled, though I’ve only had a couple pints. Maybe Villain put some yokes in my beer. I really thought she was Charlotte Jones. I would’ve never...”
“The gold digger?”
“Ye mind yourself about my lass, Villain.”
“Cece looks nothing like Charlotte,” Villain muttered, out of the side of his mouth.
The way he said it was a dig at me. Fucking Villain, the asshole. Feeling my hair, I’d gone through the motions to look presentable, but I hadn’t looked in a mirror in three long years. And well, if I had, I hadn’t seen anything staring back at me. And I’d seen Charlotte Jones before back when I could see. Evidently, she was still hotter than me even if she was a gold digger. I unexpectedly felt embarrassed about being seen naked by Villain, by Irish. Used to being ignored completely, the emotion overwhelmed me. Wrapping my arms around myself, I felt my cheeks get hot. Then I remembered the color red. They all would know I was mortified which made it even worse. I also figured out what Irish meant by saying he was scarlet.
“My Charlotte’s a ride, so it is.” He might as well have sung her name. “I’d eat the tires off the truck that brought her knickers to the laundry.” His breath hitched after he said that, too. Sometimes I had no idea what in the world he was saying, but clearly, he was infatuated with the woman.
Okay, Irish clearly had a girl. Charlotte, the gold digger. I felt sick to my stomach. I wasn’t jealous, was I? That’d be utterly ridiculous.
Irish continued, “Don’t get me wrong, Cece’s some feek, as well, as well.”
My brother made some noises after that, so I assumed Irish somehow meant I was appealing to him. Warmth spread all over me.
Kingpin barked, “Explain yourself, boy.”
“It was a wee dark in the locker room. I searched for the light switch, and a woman called my name. I was supposed to meet my Charlotte, so it was.”
“Is this true?” Pagan asked me.
“Yeah, Irish bumped into me and steadied me. I said his name, well, because I knew it was him.”
“By his accent?” Kingpin asked.
“No, I didn’t say a word,” Irish answered him. “Charlotte was the only one who knew I’d be there. I’d told Paisley to tell you I was in the Jacks…the toilet. Only cause my lass was waiting for me, ye see.”
I clarified, “I knew it was Irish from his scent. I’d just been cleaning the locker room.”
“At night? Without Jass? Where’s Waldo?” My brother started.
“Waldo?” Irish asked. “Like the wee striped guy?”
Pagan blew out a breath. “Waldo’s her guide dog, shit for brains.”
I explained, “I usually clean up in the arena the morning after a fight. But I couldn’t sleep. Jassica was out like a light.”
Irish asked, “Why weren’t you at the party?”
I shrugged my shoulders, not wanting to say that no one would take me. Jass had her reasons for not showing her face around the club much. So, when I was there, I was pretty much on my own. And I couldn’t be in all that noise alone. I almost complained how I couldn’t be at the bar tonight because it’s St. Paddy’s Day, a holiday the club celebrated solely to get as drunk as possible, therefore extremely deafening. I wouldn’t be able to rely on my ears, but that was a secret about being blind I decided to keep.
“You shouldn’t be out without Jass or Waldo if you’re not behind the bar,” Pagan scolded me like he were my father. Nothing new.
Kingpin sounded inpatient. “Back to what happened.”
“Anyway, I wanted to get a head start on my job around here,” I said to remind them that I worked here. Sometimes it felt like everyone forgot. I earned my keep. I didn’t deserve to be treated like a child. “I was gathering towels in the locker room for the laundry. I dropped them when Irish bumped into me. He smelled just like the towels.”
“Sweaty?” Irish asked. “I swear, I showered.”
I smiled. “No, it’s whatever you smell like.” I wasn’t about to tell them what. I didn’t know if I could describe the earthy fragrance. “Everyone has their own scent, to me anyway.”
“Irish Spring?” Pagan made a stupid joke about the green soap at the man’s expense.
Villain chimed in, “Get to the part where you’re naked.”
