Page 107 of Illicit Temptation

They’re also witnesses, and now I can’t kill him. Even if I pay them off, or blind them first so they can’t talk. Waterford has a sophisticated forensics team. I won’t get away with pulling the trigger right here right now. I need time to come up with a better, safer plan.

“Darragh will take care of his mother,” I say, wondering what the hell he means,exactly what’s wrong with her.

“I’ll be back for Shea tomorrow.” His glower doesn’t scare me. Not anymore. “You can take one more night to fill her with your seed. I can’t wait to tie her down and lick it out of her cunt.”

Faolan gets in his car and drives off.

My brain scrambles for a way out of this when I hear gunshots ring out from inside the house. Holding my piece in front of me, I rush back inside the house.

Just when I think this situation can’t get more fucked, I find Fergus O’Rourke on the living room floor with his head blown off.

CHAPTER FIFTY

Shea

“Come here, Shea-Lynne,” Darragh says to me, after exchanging a look with Lachlan.

It takes all of ten seconds on the phone with Kieran and then...

Pop pop pop.

Lachlan murders our father in cold blood.

Trace runs into the living room, gun drawn. I leave Darragh, and dive into his arms.

I’m rattled to the core. Da is lying dead on the floor.Dead!I don’t know how I feel. Da was being unreasonable. Still, I didn’t want him dead. I didn’t want this, any of this.

When I push down all the bile in my throat, I turn around and face my brothers. “I’m not marrying MaloneorNico Scava.”

It sits on the tip of my tongue to bring up my faulty uterus. I assume Nico Scava wants kids. Even if he doesn’t, he can find someone else. But the real reason I can’t marry Nico is right in front of everyone. “I’m already married—to Trace.”

Lachlan’s still smoking gun points our way. “Come again?”

I jump in front of Trace. “Three and a half years ago in Vegas. I got...” When he squeezes my waist, I correct myself, “We got drunk. Hooked up. And...got married.”

“Oh shit,” Darragh mutters, holding his head.

My father being gunned down just turned into problem number two.

“Why am I only finding out about this now?” Lachlan glares at Trace, still waving his gun. “Especially when I told you in February we planned for her to marry Nico Scava.”

“What?”My stomach twists, and I nearly vomit. Wrenching away from Trace, I seethe at him, “You knew? SinceFebruary?”

“Shea...”

“You shut the fuck up,” Lachlan yells at Trace. “You planned to keep my sisteras your wifewhen you start gunning down Brandon Keller’s psychopathic allies in Manhattan?”

Trace’s jaw tenses, but Lachlan’s words mean nothing to me. Another language. Trace understood every word with brutal clarity.

“It’s no different from what you do, brother.” He boldly lays that claim to Lachlan since we are technically married. “You keep your wife safe. Do you doubtmyability to keep the womanIlove safe?”

Love... He loves me?

Rage fills my lungs. I don’t know where to direct my anger first or harder. Lachlan and Trace knew of Kieran’s plan to marry me to Nico Scava. A specific person, not just an idea.

“If I can interrupt this talk of secrets, marriage, and love.” Darragh stands over our father’s dead body. “We have to deal with thisandour mother since the nurses left.”

“Malone said he’s coming back tomorrow,” Trace says with no emotion. “Let’s get the fuck out of here. Get your plane ready.”

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