Page 107 of Ireland

“They don’t cover upthatmuch, and you know it. Plus, I know you.” She reached over and squeezed Ireland’s hand. “I’m sorry this is hard for you.”

“Yeah, well…” She was sorry, too. For all of it.

The stage manager approached them briskly, pulling down the mic on her headset to say, “We’re ready in five. Are you good to start?”

“Hell yeah.” Ireland rubbed her hands together. “Let’s raise some money!”

Ronan entered the packed ballroom and surveyed the room for Ireland. Gideon Cross and his wife were the first people he spotted because they remained stationary while guests circled and approached them as if they were royalty with an audience of sycophants. And also because he knew what the Crosses looked like even while masked. He couldn’t say the same for the rest of the attendees.

He still couldn’t quite believe he was there, that Ireland hadn’t removed his name from the guest list. Her phone still blocked his number, and she hadn’t come into the Vidal offices at all. He’d waited for her there all day, wanting her to see that the recording studios were up and running as he’d promised they would be, with Six-Ninths and two young female singers busy inside them all day. They’d all still been hard at work when he’d finally remembered Ireland’s invitation after listening to her voicemails again because he missed the sound of her voice.

Laughing silently to himself, he thought again how humbling it was to be kicked to the curb by a woman who occupied his every waking thought. Hehadknown that she could cut him off at any moment like she did every man she became involved with. And that she would do so quickly.

I’ve never been with anyone long enough for it to become serious, she’d told him. I tend to check out of relationships fairly quickly.

It was some sort of self-defense mechanism, and he would get to the root of it. He’d committed to that decision when he acknowledged the slim chance that maybe she’d ended whatever they had, not because of the reasons she’d given him but because that was what she always did.

He searched for her, his gaze sweeping over the massive room repeatedly. Cross should’ve disappeared in such a crowd of loud colors and outrageous masks. While many of the male guests in the room wore colorful suits in various textured fabrics, Cross wore a standard tuxedo and rather plain mask of pure black with simple embellishments.

His wife was also markedly less flamboyant in her attire than the other women present. Eva Cross’s gown of gray silk draped a petite, voluptuous figure similar to Scarlett’s. Her mask was a feminine version of her husband’s but in silver. She was, however, dripping with millions of dollars in precious gems at her throat, ears, wrists, and fingers. They were sometimes referred to as the Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor of today, with Cross often making headlines for gifting his wife with exceptionally rare jewelry.

A now-familiar sensation gripped Ronan, and he knew Ireland was close. He searched more intensely for her tall, slim figure, unsure of whether her hair would be worn up or down. The music faded into silence, and an announcer’s voice projected from the speakers.

“And now, welcome back our emcee, Ireland Vidal!”

The room erupted in applause. Facing the stage, he watched her enter from the wings with her outrageously sexy feline stride, which was both aggressive and erotic at once. She looked like the goddess she was, her willowy body hugged in an aqua gown that became steadily darker in hue from her hips to the floor as if she’d just stepped out of water. Her mask covered only one eye and was decorated with a profusion of peacock feathers that flared from her shoulder to the top of her head. Her long hair was unrestrained and swayed behind her as she reached center stage. She held a microphone in one hand and a slip of paper in the other.

Ronan had never wanted anything or anyone more. It took supreme effort not to cross the room and climb the stage to claim her, every instinct screaming at him that she belonged to him in some way he didn’t yet comprehend.

“I have what you’ve all been waiting for,” she began, her smile lighting up the room as she waved the paper in her hand.

And then she found him, her gaze unerring and intense. Her smile held firm, but her body went still. They simply looked at one another for a long moment, electric awareness coursing between them.

“Our final bachelor has arrived!” she exclaimed with a fiendish smile, and the room’s energy changed. “He may not be punctual, but he’s worth the wait. Ladies and gentlemen, Ronan McCaffrey!”

Pour l’amour de dieu!

Eva felt Gideon’s arm tense beneath her fingers as Ireland announced Ronan McCaffrey to the room. She tilted her face up to his, about to remind him to keep a lid on his simmering temper when Richard Stanton walked up to them.

Her mother’s widower smiled at them both. “I’m going to call it a night, you two. I was waiting to hear how much was raised, but I’m fading fast.”

“Always good to see you,” Gideon said, loud enough to be heard over the crowd’s sudden boisterous excitement at his sister’s announcement of an additional bachelor to the auction.

She could hear the fury in his voice and noted how his gaze was fixed beyond Richard to someone in the crowd. She was too short to see anything, and her agitation increased.

Her stepfather exchanged a brief backslapping hug with Gideon, then he moved to her and gripped her by the shoulders. He took a long look before pressing a brief, dry kiss to her cheek. He was dapper in his tuxedo, fit and trim as ever. However, time had begun to curve his back, and sadly, slow him down. The way he walked was noticeably stiff.

It hurt Eva’s heart, even as she hoped to be as healthy when she was his age.?

Gideon gently removed her hand from his arm. “Excuse me.”

To her horror, her husband left her side with an angry stride. She looked helplessly at Richard, unable to leave him.

His lips parted as he moved to say something, then closed on a forlorn smile as he changed his mind.

Eva knew he still grieved her mother deeply and that their close resemblance was why he’d avoided seeing her for almost a year after Lauren—the woman he knew as Monica—had passed. She was glad they’d been able to move past that and reach a point where they lunched together at least twice a month and enjoyed the holidays together.?

“Thank you so much for coming, Richard,” she told him warmly, even as she dreaded the possibility of a confrontation between her husband and Ireland’s man.

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