Page 16 of Bound

“The way it made me feel was overwhelming, andatthe height of all my emotions, I wasn’t really thinking. Groggy and afraid,for a moment, I wanted to feel safe with you again. What happened… Or what almost happened between us… It was a mistake,” I lie because it wasn’t. In that moment, I wanted nothing more than to feel his lips on mine. Had it not been for Fiona’s perfectly timed interruption, I would have. I would’ve torn the lid off the box that I’ve neatly packed full of all my feelings for him. I would’ve unraveled my heartstrings and let him in again. I would’ve let him shatter me all over again to have a second of him on my lips.

I would’ve, but I’m not going to.

“I shouldn’t have, and I’m sorry,” I apologize again. Declan’s fingers flex around the coffee cup nestled between his palms as he stares at me with a stoic, indiscernible expression. “What were you going to say?”

“That I’m sorry.” His tone is just as flat as his expression. “I’m sorry for overstepping. You’re my employee, and I crossed a line I shouldn’t have.”

As much as I’m ending this before ithas a chance to getstarted, his words slice through me in a way that only he has the ability to do. I blink and take a breath, trying to hold back the tears starting to wellin my eyes.

“Good?” he asks, sliding from his barstool. I nod, terrified that my voice will break and the dam holding back my tears will immediately follow. “Okay. Fiona is still sleeping. I’ve got to get to work.”

The door clicks shut behind him and I wish it were as simple to close the figurative box we opened. But that lidis tattered and torn.

Not too different from the current status of my heart.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

DECLAN

It didn’t feel like a fucking mistake…

Standing in the foyer, waiting for the elevator to take me down to the lobby, I fight the urge to storm back into the apartment. I want to pull her into me and taste her pouty pink lips—like I should’ve last night—proving to her that absolutely nothing about what nearly happened between the two of us was a mistake.

I’m not sorry about last night. Not in the slightest. That isn’t the apology I was ready to share. The apology I wanted to give was the one that is years overdue. The one I should’ve been a fucking man about fifteen years ago.Fuck, if I were a man, I would’ve done it three years ago.I would’ve owned up to how shitty I treated her the moment she reappeared in my life, but I couldn’t.

A small part of me was terrified to open up to her and actually let her back into my life. To admit to her everything that happened back then. I was terrified that if I gave her even the smallest piece of my heart the love it held for Sarah would spill out into the void. And I loved Sarah too much to risk that. To risk losing her and the beautiful family we were building together.

God is a cruel fuck, though, because in the end, I lost her anyway.

Probably divine fucking retribution for the shitty life of sin I’ve led.

And now I’ve lost Quinn, too.

I’ve waited far too long, and now it’s too late. She gave in to a brief moment of temptation, but that’s all it was. A brief moment.It was a mistake.She was resoundingly clear this morning.

My phone buzzes as I step into the cab of the elevator. After pulling it from the breast pocket of my jacket, I swipe open the message from Liam.

LIAM

I’ll be out front in 5

I’ll be down in 2

Finn found Luka and Kira

He’s waiting for us in Brighton

Brighton?

Akim is apparently as useless as he looks. They were hiding right under his nose.

My demeanor is apparently as off-putting as my current disposition. For as chatty as he normally is, Liam hasn’t once tried to strike up a conversation beyond greeting me when I slid into the passenger seat of his Tahoe.

We pull to a stop in front ofa long-forgotten industrial warehouse. Based on its condition and the few people loiteringoutside of it, it’s full of squatters.People don’t give a second glance at the addicts and homeless who live in places like this, making it a great place to hide.

“You’re keeping some friends in some mighty low places if you managed to find them here,” Liam goads Finn.

“Those strippers you lot give me shite about have benefits beyond their perky tits and warm cunts,” he quips. “Some of the girls at the clubs have some serious demons. It just took my girls asking around a little to find someone who had seen something.”

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