Page 32 of Legacy Of Ashes
Before I can respond, the door opens. Niamh enters with coffee and flowers, her sharp eyes taking in our joined hands, the charged air crackling between us.
"You look like death warmed over," she tells me. "But breathing, which is more than expected."
"Always the charmer."
"I save charm for people who don't dive in front of bullets." She sets the flowers down, studies the paperwork empire Saoirse's built around my bed. "How long have you been here, love?"
"Since surgery finished."
"Go home. Shower. You smell like a battlefield." Niamh's tone cuts off argument. "I'll watch him."
"I need to coordinate the London shipment?—"
"The business survived thirty years without you. It'll survive three hours."
Saoirse gathers her papers with obvious reluctance. When she leans over to collect files from my bedside table, her dress gapes open. I catch a glimpse of black lace barely containing her breasts, and my vision blurs with want.
I imagine ripping that lace away with my teeth, sucking her nipples until she screams my name. Taking her right here in this hospital bed while machines beep around us.
"Call if he gets worse," she tells Niamh.
"I'll call if he stops breathing. Otherwise, rest."
After Saoirse leaves, Niamh settles into the chair with a knowing smile that chills my blood.
"Twenty years," she says.
"What?"
"Twenty years of watching her like a starving man watches food." She crosses her legs, gets comfortable for interrogation. "The way you look at her—like you want to fuck her against the nearest wall."
Heat floods my face. "I don't?—"
"Please. Your desire is written all over your face." Niamh's smile turns wicked. "The way your voice changes when she's threatened. How you nearly died protecting her. You're mad about that girl."
The truth sits between us like a bomb. No point denying what's obvious.
"Doesn't matter," I say. "She deserves better than hired muscle."
"Let her decide what she deserves." Niamh leans forward. "Power's shifting, in case you hadn't noticed. Saoirse's running this empire while you've been unconscious. Born to it."
I think of her threatening Murphy, making decisions worth millions, taking control like a queen claiming her throne.
"She doesn't need protection anymore."
"No. But she might want something else entirely." Niamh stands. "Question is whether you've got the stones to give it to her."
She leaves me alone with thoughts that burn hotter than the bullet wound. Twenty years of keeping my distance, pretending duty was enough.
But remembering fifteen-year-old Saoirse in that summer storm...
Rain pounds the estate when I hear her calling from the garden maze. I find her soaked through, white dress clinging to budding curves that have no business affecting me this way.
"I'm lost," she says, shivering.
I wrap my jacket around her, lead her home through paths I know by heart. On the front steps, she looks up with those blue-green eyes, rain on her lashes.
"Thank you, Conall."
