Page 49 of A Dark Mafia Christmas

Another deep breath. “Ronan Blackthorn isn’t the kind of guy you want to cross. I thought… I thought that if I could get close to him, I could prevent him from hurting anyone else. But now…” She tears her eyes away from the stars fizzing in the sky and looks at me. “Emmett told me what happened at the pub. I’m sorry, Mary. I promise Ronan Blackthorn will never get close to you again.”

The O’Haras are protectors. Fighters. Fiercely loyal people. It’s lovely to know that they want to look out for me, but I can take care of myself. I always have done.

“You don’t need to worry about me. I’m a big girl now.”

Fianna throws her arms around me and hugs me tightly. “For what it’s worth, I think my cousin is an idiot for going back to New York without you.”

“His loss.” Only, I’m not sure if I’m trying to convince her or me.

Fiannaand I move into the hotel a week later.

“It’ll be an adventure,” we tell her family. “We’ll sleep on camp beds until the owner’s accommodation is ready, and anyway, we’ll be too exhausted to care.”

It’s almost true. At least, the exhausted part is.

Once we start stripping plaster from walls and ripping up floorboards, we realize that the building requires a lot more work than we at first thought. Before we can even start renovating, we have to get the building moisture proofed, rewired, and replumbed, which means that we’re practically going to be living on a building site for a while.

Nothing fazes Fianna though. She has her vision, and while the tradesmen are carrying out their work, we start creating mood boards for the themed bedrooms to the backdrop of hammers, drills, and radios blaring out pop music.

Sinead and Erin pop in every day with homemade meals and try convincing us to go home until the place is habitable, but we quickly settle into a routine of waking up early, making coffee over a camping stove, and popping into a nearby café forbreakfast. Besides, I’ve seen the way Fianna bats her eyelashes at one of the electricians, a dark-haired guy called Connor. I think he likes her too because not a lot of work goes on when she’s around, and I’m praying that he'll ask her on a date before the work is completed.

One morning, I wake up later than usual feeling queasy, and almost throw up when I smell the coffee brewing in the small metal pot. One hand clamped over my mouth I wander through the building looking for Fianna. She never said that she was going out early, but when I hear voices coming from what will be the reception area when the hotel opens, I assume that she’s with Connor.

Then I hear a voice I recognize, and my heart starts thumping frantically.

Emmett?

I was going to leave Fianna to it, but I have to check for myself. Opening the door a crack, I peer around the room that’s littered with chunks of plasterboard, tools, lengths of cable, and radiators waiting to be installed, until my eyes settle on Fianna and a man who has his back to me.

My body immediately responds by sending shivers down my spine and a tingling sensation between my legs.

Why is he here?

Why didn’t he let me know that he was coming back?

Why didn’t Sinead say anything, unless she didn’t know either.

I can’t move. I don’t know how Emmett is going to react to seeing me again, and the longer I stand here overthinking it, the more uncertain I become. Perhaps he came here to tell methat he’s never coming back again. Or… My stomach lurches sickeningly, sending another wave of nausea crashing through me when I realize that perhaps he’s here to tell me that he’s getting married … to another woman.

I’m about to back away, grab my shoes and coat, and disappear outside until he’s gone, when he turns around and looks directly at me.

Oh my God, he’s even hotter than I remembered. Clean and hot. And I suddenly feel frumpy in yesterday’s clothes and one of Fianna’s oversized cardigans. I haven’t washed my hair in days, and there’s dirt under my fingernails.

But he’s walking towards me, and I hear Fianna say, “I’ll leave you guys to talk in peace,” and my legs are refusing to cooperate.

Emmett opens the door and eyes me up and down, a bemused smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “I’m quite enjoying your new look. Very … homely.”

“Homely? That’s what you’re going with?”

Because hearing his voice has transported me straight back to our surreal Christmas, and I want to kiss him and feel him inside me and my body isn’t ever going to let me forget it.

“What would you prefer? Comfortable? It suits you. It’s kind of … sexy.”

Okay, what’s going on here? He flies back to New York early, doesn’t even kiss me goodbye, tells his family that we’re on a break, and now he’s telling me that I look sexy? Whoever said that women are complicated?

“Why are you here, Emmett?” Because if this is how it’s going to be for the foreseeable future, I don’t think I can handle it.

His mouth twitches like he has a lot to say and doesn’t know where to begin. Finally, he says, “I wanted to see you.”

---