Page 82 of Connor's Claim

He worked his lips, then said, “For the sake of getting answers, sure.”

“Shoes off, and ye can sit on my bed.”

I grabbed the board from the floor that I’d been using as a table and set it on the mattress, reaching to claim the white takeaway bag from a still-scowling Riordan. Even so, he undid the snap-lock buckles of his biker boots and positioned himself cross-legged opposite me. One by one, he helped me line up the different cartons of food.

A little bolt of some unnamed emotion hit me.

I wanted a person.Myperson. Someone I could eat with. Or hug. Someone who wanted me. In a mansion surrounded by my family, happy couples with a thousand kids, or here, with sex everywhere, I felt lonely. I didn’t like it.

“Enough food to sink a battleship,” Riordan observed. “Were you planning to invite someone else?”

“Nope. I just got over-clicky when ordering. It all looked so good.”

“Smells good, too.” He opened a container with ‘beef and green peppers’ scrawled on the lid. Steam rose, mixing with the scent of the sweet and sour chicken I’d opened.

My mouth watered. I grabbed the wooden spoon and the fork the restaurant had provided and handed one over. “I have work in under an hour, so eat now, talk later. Dig in.”

Riordan speared a piece of beef. Chewed it then groaned. “That’s fucking amazing.”

I watched him swallow and held in a sigh of deep need. He raised his head; I snapped mine down to start my meal.

God, he was right. Spoonfuls of fluffy rice, crispy spring rolls, crunchy prawn crackers, it all got shovelled in with the flavoursome dishes. At first, Riordan picked at the food, but the more I encouraged him, the hungrier I realised he was.

When my belly complained, I slowed. “If Moniqua isn’t your girlfriend, what’s the deal?”

“Thought I was the one asking questions.”

I gestured to the mostly empty cartons. “I fed ye, didn’t I?”

“And that gets paid for with my stories?” He reclined.

I chanced my arm. “Everyone needs someone to talk to.”

Riordan watched me for a long moment. “The last thing I need is someone else throwing me under a bus.”

“Has that happened a lot?”

“One story at a time, wild girl.”

Wild… He’d nicknamed me? Fuck.

Unable to respond, I waited, my heart skipping a beat when, at length, he spoke.

“All right. Moniqua was a one-night stand. We met at a party thrown by one of the guys from work. I got drunk oddly quicker than reasonable and woke with her the next morning. Something I have never done in the past and never will again.”

“The drinking part or the casual sex?”

He eyed me. “Anyway, she somehow got my number and texted me a couple of times for a hook-up, I declined, then she changed to daily chats. Wishing me a good morning, that kind of thing. One day she messaged to say she was sick and could I bring over some shopping. I did it for the sake of being a friend. When I was in her flat, a guy let himself in. Her cousin who she told me in a whisper scared her. I hung around until he left.”

Packing away the food, I drew lines in my head and made connections. Genevieve had told me about Moniqua’s gangster cousin because we’d originally thought him the murderer. “Don, right?”

Riordan tilted his head. “I’m not even going to ask how you know his name. So, Don is dead now, and Moniqua was cut up about it. I even drove her around to try to find him when she thought him only missing, and I’m a fucking idiot because despite me laying a clear boundary, she took that to mean we were a couple. Even my sister believed the same.”

“But you’re not.”

“No.”

Through the wall to the next room, a lady gave a low moan.

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