Page 89 of Irish Brute
“Eat your breakfast,” I say. “Then get up to your room for studies with Mr. Bell.”
She pouts, looking at the tall-case clock. She should have an hour before she starts her lessons. I’m supposed to take time with her, draw her out, ask how she is this morning, what she did over the weekend while I was gone.
But she’ll just stare at me. Just look at me with those eyes that are so like Birte’s…
“Grace!” I shout.
Fairfax comes in from the kitchen, wiping his hands on a towel.
“Where’s Grace?” I ask.
“Upstairs,” he answers. “Same as she is every morning at this time.”
“Fetch her. Tell her to take Aiofe for a walk.”
Fairfax glances out at the window. Snow fell last night; there are at least three inches on the ground.
I scowl, even though he doesn’t say a word. “They can go to the greenhouse,” I say.
But I don’t want to think about the greenhouse. I don’t want to remember the Irish garden in the heart of all those hothouse plants. I don’t want to smell the honeysuckle, to taste something even sweeter as Samantha moans beneath me, panting and gasping and sighing as I break her for the fifth time?—
Christ. I shove back from the table, sending my butter knife clattering to the floor. I don’t know which saint’s responsible for hiding the reactions of a grown man’s body, but I pray someoneintervenes to keep Fairfax and Aiofe from noticing my cock’s unfortunate timing.
Upstairs in my office, I wish I’d had the presence of mind to grab a cup of tea on my way out of the dining room. I need something to settle my mind. And my stomach, too.
I collapse in my desk chair and rub both temples with my forefingers. I haven’t been in ribbons like this for years, not since Madden and I were lads, stealing Da’s whiskey and topping off the half-empty bottles with water.
I did all that drinking after Samantha left. I finished off all the Jameson in the suite. I switched to Bushmills when my tongue didn’t know any better, and to vodka when I needed a little more pure anesthesia.
And all that time, I tried to figure out how things went arseways with Samantha.
Nearly two months, she’s been wearing my signet around her finger. For seven weeks, she’s called herself my bride. She took my collar a week ago, ready and willing.
But she doesn’t trust me.
She didn’t tell me what happened that night on the mountain—the stupid mistake of a scared twenty-one-year-old kid. But that’s not the worst of it.
She didn’t come to me when Russo made his threats.
She grew up surrounded by organized crime. She knows the way our business works. She understands how we find leverage, how we lean in, how we press and we press and we press until we find the breaking point.
That’s what Russo tried to do to her shoulder. That’s what he did with my shipping container, why I’m out two hundred and fifty mill. If Samantha had told me straight after the flower show, we could have broken the fecker together. Clipped his nails. Pulled his fucking teeth.
But she didn’t trust me to keep her safe.
Fuck! My arm stings like I’ve shoved it into a bed of nettles. I look down to see I’ve scratched my way through my scar. Blood oozes down to my wrist. Swearing, I dig in my pocket for my handkerchief.
I pull out my phone too. Automatically, I check the screen, to see if Samantha’s left a message.
Of course she hasn’t. I blocked her. I figured I’d done enough damage, shouting in the Rittenhouse suite. I didn’t want to say more, something she’d never forgive.
And now, a whole day later, I’m no closer to knowing how to talk to her.
I’ve got easier problems to solve, ones that boil down to dollars and cents. I need to run the Fishtown Boys the best I can with the noose Fiona Ingram looped around my neck.
I should have my Clan Chief here, but I’m not ready to talk to Madden. Not when he warned me I would lose the shipping container. Not when I have no proof Samantha is innocent.
So I tell myself this is all a money matter instead. I’ll work with my Quartermaster. Fix the bank, and everything else will fall into place.
