Page 9 of Creatures in the Night

When our cocktail waitress returned with a fresh round of drinks, her yelp drew my attention, and that’s when I noticed Donal’s hand running up her leg, disappearing underneath her short skirt. Donal had a satisfied grin on his face, but the waitress looked a bit surprised, which didn’t sit well with me.

“How’s that working for you, sweetheart?” I asked, looking pointedly at the hand that was probably fingering her by now.

Her face blushed, and that’s when I realized that I shouldn’t have bothered. “I’m good,” she said. “Donal and I are…old friends.”

I gave her a terse nod before looking back up at the stage. As the ebony goddess kept discarding her clothing, I thought about taking her to the back. It was common knowledge that Rebel rented rooms by the hour for those that wanted to partake, so it wouldn’t be that much of an inconvenience to buy myself a piece for the night.

However, the picture of Shea that Declan had put in her file kept nipping at me from the back of my mind. As of this afternoon, I was officially engaged, and it was hard not to think of getting my dick wet with someone else as cheating. While it was true that my marriage to Shea Burke wasn’t going to be a traditional one, we were going to share traditional vows, and last that I checked, forsaking all others was still in there.

“Noah? Are you taking the other one?” Niall asked, knowing me well.

I shook my head. “Nah, lad,” I answered. “You’re welcomed to her as well.”

Niall looked like a kid on Christmas morning. “Don’t mind if I do.”

Letting out a sigh of regret, I finished my whiskey, then stood up to take my ass home. As much as I didn’t want a wife, I was getting myself one, and if I wasn’t in a place like this for business reasons, then I didn’t need to be here.

Why men got married, I would never know.

Chapter 6

Shea~

It was almost the end of my shift, but I didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. With each morning that came and went, I was closer to having to marry Noah Murphy, and my stomach cramped every single time that the thought crossed my mind.

After I’d left my parents on Sunday, I’d gone home, and like an idiot, I’d still gotten on my laptop to calculate all the math. I had spent the rest of my day trying to find a financial solution out of this mess, but I hadn’t been able to come up with enough money that would keep my parents alive. I didn’t even care if we all ended up homeless as long as they got to live, but the math refused to add up to something that would satisfy Declan O’Brien.

Granted, I also wasn’t stupid enough to believe that The O’Brien would let us out of this arrangement, even if I’d been able to come up with the money. For whatever reason, Declan had chosen me, and the reason had to benefit him in a way that I wasn’t seeing right now. However, the biggest mystery was why Noah Murphy? If this was related to Declan’s organization, then he could have chosen to sacrifice any of the single men that worked for him. So, why would he pick someone as important as his cousin?

Now, while I did my best to be an upstanding citizen, you couldn’t live in the state of Maryland without knowing who the O’Briens, Sartoris, or Kotovs were, and you definitely couldn’t live in Port Townsend without having heard of them. So, it was common knowledge that Declan was the head of the Irish Mob, and that Noah was his right-hand man. Even though there were a total of five O’Brien sons by blood, Noah Murphy had become second-in-charge somehow, and as far as I’d ever heard, everyone seemed to be okay with that. Noah also had two brothers that had respectable jobs, but it was whispered that they really worked for the family, which I believed.

There was also the legitimate concern over marrying a complete stranger. Other than the rumors that coated the streets of Port Townsend, I had no idea what kind of man Noah Murphy was. However, if he was Declan’s second-in-command, then it could be argued that it’d be impossible for him to be a good man. Running a multi-million-dollar crime enterprise took the exact opposite of good people, and the fact that the Sartoris and Kotovs outnumber the O’Briens and that they were still in business said a lot if you asked me.

Yeah, I also had no illusions of Noah being faithful during our marriage, but what about the rest of it? Would he let me still work? Would he insist that I become a kept woman? Plus, how did he feel about marital discipline? Was he the type to strike a woman, or would he be more inclined to give me the cold shoulder? Hell, I didn’t even know if we’d be living together. I mean, was this going to be a marriage in name only, or was I expected to lay down for him every night?

I dropped my head back against the brick of the building, then looked up at the sky, willing to search for answers anywhere. While I was a devoted Catholic, I didn’t pray often because I was selfish like that. As long as my life was going well, praying didn’t seem necessary, and that wasn’t true. Prayer was always necessary, and I had a feeling if I began praying for myself now, God would shoot me a side-eye before teaching me a lesson on how it’s not all about me.

“Is it that bad in there?”

I smiled as I lowered my head to see one of my co-workers making his way towards me. Ethan Abbot and I worked the same exact shift, and there’d been a lot of hours clocked in on our friendship. While I’d been working at Donza Medical a lot longer than Ethan, he had a solid five years under his belt here, and with us working the same days and hours, if I had a work best friend, then it was Ethan. In fact, with the hours that we all worked, we blurred the lines between co-worker and friend a lot, and we often all went out together because it was just easier that way. Friends that didn’t understand your hectic work schedule could easily get their feelings hurt when you chose rest over a night out or whatever.

Ethan was also easy on the eyes, and there’d been times when I had regretted friend-zoning him, but over the years, I’d seen workplace affairs blow up in people’s faces, and I’d never wanted to be that person. I’d rather have a one-night stand in the next town over than ruin my reputation as a competent nurse by sleeping with any man that looked my way at work.

Now, that wasn’t to say that Ethan hadn’t hit on me before, because he’d made his feelings about me clear after working together for a few months. Still, I’d been honest about my boundaries, and though he liked to still flirt with me, he respected me enough to let me make the first move if I ever found myself with a change of heart-his words, not mine.

I almost laughed at how there’d be no changing my mind now. Even if Noah had no intentions of being faithful to me, I wasn’t stupid enough to believe that I could cheat on him and not pay a price for that indiscretion. There was no way in hell that Noah Murphy would allow any woman to turn him into a cuckhold unless he was into that sort of thing, which I doubted.

“I’ve just…it’s been a long week,” I semi-lied.

Ethan reached out, then tucked a wayward strand of my auburn hair behind my ear. “Would drinks after work help with that?”

I stared up at my friend, and those chocolate bedroom eyes would be so easy to get lost in. Ethan was what you would call tall, dark, and handsome, and with his considerate nature, he always reminded me of a comfortable chair, cozy blanket, and warm fire. He was exactly the type of guy that could make all of your troubles disappear at the end of the day.

“Drinks right now would help with that,” I joked.

Ethan grinned as he leaned his shoulder up against the wall. “C’mon, it can’t be that bad.”

I eyed him as I asked, “Do you believe in fate?”

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