Page 24 of The Irishman's Christmas Gamble
He loosened the grip he’d unconsciously tightened. “Just making sure you don’t slip away from me again.”
Her body jerked a little and she sighed. “You knew I wasn’t going to stay in Finglas.”
“I didn’t mean it that way.” He released her breast to smooth his hand over her hair. “I’ve imagined this for so long that I can’t believe it’s real and not a leprechaun’s trick.”
She wriggled against his erection. “Feels solid as a rock to me.”
He moaned at the blast of sensation. Frankie levered herself up to kneel beside him. Putting her hand on his shoulder, she pushed him onto his back. “I could just look at you forever,” she said, her gaze traveling down and up again, making his cock twitch as though she’d touched it. “I lied,” she said, resting her hands on his chest. “I need to touch you.”
She leaned over, her hair brushing his skin, and kissed first one of his flat nipples and then the other. Her touch ricocheted down to his groin, drawing it tighter. His bollocks were aching. “Frankie, do you mean to drive me out of my bloody mind?”
She laughed against his skin, making his hips flex without his willing them to. Then she trailed her lips down the center of his body, the silkiness of her hair dragging over his skin, slowing as she got closer to the place he wanted her mouth. She traced her tongue along the defined line that ran from his hip to his groin. He held his breath and watched as she braced one hand on the bed beside him and raised the other to feather it across the head of his cock. And then he was lost, swamped by the feel of her fingers, her mouth, her tongue on his straining, yearning skin.
He came with a blast of pleasure, wringing out every muscle and every nerve, emptying him of all thought except Frankie.
When he could open his eyes again, she was sitting back on her heels, a smug smile curling her lips. “You’re a loud one, Keller.”
“Did I say something? My mind was obliterated by a nuclear explosion.”
She laughed once. “A man’s mind is an easy thing to turn blank with sex.”
It hurt him that she thought of it as nothing more than sex, but he wasn’t going to call her out on it yet. She could get mulish when pushed.
She crawled up the bed and fitted herself against his side, her head pillowed on his shoulder. Her fingers drifted over his chest and ribs and then down to his hip, tracing the shamrock inked there. “Tell me what the ‘O’ and the ‘F’ stand for.”
He felt as though she’d slammed her fist into his gut. Dragging in a breath, he forced his voice to sound relaxed. “Can’t you guess about the ‘F’?”
“Not without sounding conceited beyond belief.”
He tried to laugh, but his throat wouldn’t release enough. “Of course it’s for you, ye eejit. I wouldn’t defile my body for anyone else.”
“But you did. The ‘O’.” She said it softly.
He brought his hand over to cover hers, flattening it over the tattoo. “The only other person in the world I love as much as I do you.” He drew in another breath. “Owen. My son.”
Joy roared through Frankie, squeezing tears from her eyes. She’d always hoped that he would be a father. The kids in Finglas had followed him around as though he were the Pied Piper. Unlike most of the older boys, he wasn’t too proud to play soccer with the younger ones, giving them tips on their game. There was so little kindness in their world that it tugged at her heart to watch him on the soccer pitch with the wee ones swarming around him.
“Why are you crying, Frankie?” His voice was tight with some strain she couldn’t interpret and his hand nearly crushed hers against the point of his hip.
She lifted her head to let him see her happiness and found him scowling. “Because you were meant to be a father. He’s a lucky boy, your Owen.”
His face relaxed as Liam closed his eyes and then opened them again. “You scared the shite out of me. I thought you…. But you’re crying.”
“Because I’m happy for you.” She’d cried more in the last two days than in the last five years. “But there hasn’t been a breath of it in the press. How did you keep it a secret?”
Liam wrapped his arm around her shoulders and hitched them both up to sit against the headboard. “There are always ways to avoid the press. And deals to be made with them when you can’t.” His voice went hard on the last. “He lives in New Jersey, so I didn’t get to visit him often.”
“And his mother? I won’t ask you if you’re married to her because you wouldn’t be here if you were.”
He sighed. “Ten years ago I had a weekend fling with a friend of a friend that had unexpected consequences. We were both careful but…things happen.” He shook his head. “Neither of us wanted an abortion, but we also didn’t want a wedding. So I provided the money, and she made a good home for Owen.”
She heard the satisfaction in Liam’s voice that he’d been able to give his son the things he’d longed for as a child. “Is that why you took the job here?” she asked.
“Two reasons. Owen and you.”
The strength of her desire to see Liam’s son shocked her, but she didn’t want to mislead Liam into believing that would change anything between them. “Do you have a picture of him?”
“On my phone, which is somewhere in the heap of clothes in your living room.” His grip on her gentled and she felt his lips against her hair. “A stór, you and Owen are kindred spirits.”
