Page 39 of Accidental Irish Daddy

He gets out and I follow him. He unlocks the door and lets me in first, then walks in himself and closes the door.

12

Aisling

“Listen—” I start, but he cuts me off.

“You’re going to quit working there.”

I glare at him. “What?”

“You can’t work there and work for me, all right? You’re going to quit stripping and work exclusively for me.”

I cross my hands over my chest and shake my head. “I don’t think so.”

“Why not?” he questions. “Is it money? Because I can pay you whatever you’re making doing both.”

I can’t believe what he’s saying to me. And why? Just because strip clubs offend him somehow?

“First of all,” I say, “you don’t get to tell me where I get to work. I just left an abusive and controlling bastard. I’m not about to bow down to another one—”

“Abusive?”

“Yes, abusive! You can’t hold money over my head and think I’ll just do whatever you want! That’s not how this works! Second of all, as a palliative nurse, I’m a temporary employee. I won’t beworking for you for the next twenty years, so you tell me what happens to me when your mother—”

“Don’t you dare!” He advances on me, getting in my face. “Don’t you speak of my mother!”

“I’m just speaking the truth,” I yell back. “One way or another, I’m not going to be living with you forever, and I’ll have to go back to working in the clubs because I have a responsibility to my sister!”

“Don’t you use your sister to justify working in a place like that,” he growls. “Don’t act like you’re just doing it for the money. I saw you on that stage. Enjoying yourself, were you? Tweaking your tits like a whore—”

I slap him hard, rocking his head to one side.

He closes his eyes in a grimace, then rubs his face as he looks back at me angrily.

“You seem to have forgotten that I saw you looking back. Watching me like a hungry lion,” I hiss, getting close to his face, “I saw the way you drooled over me ‘tweaking my tits’. Like you wanted to be the one doing it.”

My heart is racing as our eyes lock.

I’m so angry at him…and I want nothing more than to hit him, scratch him, bite him…

And I know he sees it. He lowers his hand and says with a sneer. “Slut.”

I hit him again, harder. His head jerks to the side, but this time, he looks back at me with a smirk on his face.

“Fuck you,” I snarl.

“Fuck me?” He laughs, the sound is deep and dark, “You wish.”

I go to slap him again, but he grabs me by the wrist, and I start to struggle, hitting him with my other hand. He dodges and grabs hold of both my hands and twists them behind my back, pulling me to him so we’re chest to chest.

He kisses me hard, and I kiss him back, sucking on his bottom lip…then biting him.

He yanks away, releasing me. I step away from him as he examines his bloody lip. I take a brief look around the little cottage. One room with a living room to the left and a kitchen to the right, stairs up to the bedroom…and a lot of room to move around.

I smile at him as I back up. He smiles back, lust in his eyes.

It takes him two large steps to close the gap between us, but I slip away, side-stepping him.

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