4. Millie
4
MILLIE
As I drive up the rough gravel track, the horizon opens, and my chest expands. Then there’s the line of blue on blue where the ocean meets the sky, with streaks of cloud and seagulls wheeling overhead. A light breeze shakes the spindly grasses growing at the edge of the beach, and the sun is gleaming white as dawn creeps up behind us.
This place is a bittersweet memory of childhood. Being neglected, feral kids was a good thing in the long summer break when we spent all day making sandcastles and playing in the waves or the woods beyond the sand dunes.
The track turns and leads to the side of the cottage, and I draw to a halt in the little parking space. Noah still hasn’t sat up. He has totally ignored me since dawn, presumably asleep.
“I’ll be back in min,” I choke out, then throw myself from the car without looking around at him. Noah’s annoyed, I’m sure. Who wouldn’t be after being cuffed and kidnapped? Never mind how furious and difficult this week is going to be while I try to straighten him out.
Will a week be long enough? I push that fear aside. It has to be. And though I don’t have much time, I need a moment to myself before I start this self-imposed job. Just an opportunity to have a pee and brace myself.
There’s a nick of pain as I let myself into the cottage. This will be my last visit here, and I somehow doubt that helping my brother overcome addiction is going to be a cheery farewell.
I take in the familiar surroundings. The cottage is tiny, just two rooms upstairs and a bathroom that has seashells and white wooden boards with dusky-blue tiles. It’s perfectly clean since the fab local lady we employ—employed—has sorted everything after the last rental guests. When I’ve washed my hands, I check the kitchen cupboards and fridge, and it’s all ready. Plenty of fresh fruit and veg, some protein and cupboard basics, plus bags of good microwavable stuff to munch on when we don’t want to cook, and the waffle maker I bought a few years ago. The perfect indulgent, quick hot food.
We’re all set for what I know will be a difficult week, but I’m certain we can change the life of the man I kidnapped, because I care about him. He’s my only family, even if he has messed up.
That doesn’t mean it’s going to be easy.
Back outside, I breathe in the clean scent of the sea and ignore the butterflies in my tummy. I love it here. So, so much. It’s beautiful, wild, and untamed.
“Alright! Wakey-wakey!” I approach my car with false chirpiness. “Ready for your beach holiday? Very wholesome!” I pull open the door and look down.
It’s empty. My heart drops through to my feet.
“What?”
He must have crawled over the seats and got out from the front. As I turn, both my hands are snatched in strong fingers, and yanked back in a move I recognise from learning in a video, and using last night. There’s the snap of metal and I gasp. Soft handcuffs tighten on my wrists before I can jerk away.
“Well?” says a deep voice from behind me. An Irish accent that’s smooth as butter but dark as the bottom of the ocean.
Adrenaline spikes out from my chest, down my arms and legs. I’m shaking as I twist around, eyes wide. And I look right at… Broad shoulders, covered with a rumpled forest-green shirt and charcoal suit jacket.
My heart smashes against my ribs as I tip my head back, up and up, over his open collar, past gleaming silver necklaces, to a short beard. Until I’m looking into a pair of eyes that are such a bright green they seem poisonous in the pale, sparkling morning light reflecting from the sea.
Finn Kilburn.
The blood drains from me like the tide pulling back.
My mouth falls open and is dry as sand. Fear shoots down every limb, vivid and hot.
It immobilises me.
He’s as gorgeous as I remember, and my memory has been extremely active since we met. But in the low light of the pub, I didn’t see the details that make him all the sexier. The scar over his generous top lip that I couldn’t help wanting to kiss. His outrageously long black eyelashes. The distinct lump of his Adam’s apple, and the whorls in his stubble.
And he looks furious.
I’m shaking.
I’m caught by my brother’s boss. Finn Kilburn is dangerous and his silence and the way he’s staring at me prickles my skin. The Irish Kilburn kingpin is charming but deadly, and he seems a bit crazy right now, his eyes glittering as he examines me.
“Where’s Noah?” I croak.
“I came out to tell you that your brother couldn’t come home tonight.” Finn raises one dark eyebrow. It has a nick in it. Another scar.
Oh my god. I think… I may have forced the billionaire mafia boss of the London territory where I live into the back of my car, and took him to a seaside cottage.
I abducted the wrong man. Not just a mistake. An absolute disaster .
Possibly a fatal one.
“I’m so sorry.” The words stumble out. “I didn’t mean to, honestly. I’m really so sorry. Please don’t hurt me.”
I should run. I cast my gaze around. We’re in the middle of nowhere, a very long walk to the local village, never mind anywhere that might help me. The isolation is what makes the cottage so tranquil, and perfect for Noah’s enforced recuperation.
Even so, I eye up the dunes. Could I get ahead?
“Don’t even think about running. I’ll catch you.”
Heat floods between my legs, and I gasp. Looking back at Finn, his face is like thunder.
It shouldn’t be hot.
He’d be faster than me. There’s no point in trying to escape, and yet, the instinct to do so is there anyway.
“I’m really sorry.” I wince again.
“Are you?” he asks, regarding me from head to toe in a way that makes me flush to the tips of my hair in its sensible ponytail.
“Yes! I meant to kidnap my brother!” Where is Noah? I almost ask. But he’s probably fine. Likely made his way home on his own, maybe via the bookies. He’ll assume I’m asleep. Or if he notices I’m not at our tiny apartment in Kilburn, he’ll think I’m on shift at the hospital.
We often miss each other because of my weird job timing. I gulp.
It could be days until he even realises I’m gone. And then how would he find me? No one knows I’m here.
I’m stuck alone, with a powerful mafia boss who is known for laughing while he kills people. But Finn Kilburn is not smiling right now. He’s looking at me with a serious, intent expression.
“You kidnapped me, though.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?!” I bleat. “That could have prevented this.” And probably I’d have been murdered just outside the pub.
At least I got a nice setting for my last breath. Eleven out of ten for planning.
“Are ye victim blaming, now?” he replies in an affronted tone.
“No!” Crap, no . What is it about this man that makes me incapable of stringing words together in a normal fashion? “Not at all. Totally my fault. I’m the arsehole. I deserve no donuts…”
I shut my mouth. The “death or donuts” phrase from the Fulham mafia is not the sort of idea I want to put in the kingpin’s head.
“But…” he says, rough and inviting.
“I would have stopped. You could have told me,” I whisper. Barely audible.
“Wanted to see what you’d do.” He shrugs, but his brows are low. “Good craic, too.”
“Fun?” Living in Kilburn means I know plenty of Irish words. Being kidnapped is good craic ? Is he nuts? I think I’m hyperventilating. I tug at my hands, but they’re secure in the cuffs. How did he get out?
“I was in shock, to be sure.” The reply is obviously insincere. “Maybe I still am.”
“I can help.” I’m desperate now. More apologies. That’s what’s needed. “I’m a nurse. You could unlock me, and I’ll check you over, then drive you straight back to Kilburn. No harm done. Can we just forget about this?”
“I will, yeah.” His voice drips with sarcasm. “Abducting a mafia boss is no big deal. Zero consequences.”
“I’ll take you home to London.” The more I try to fix this, the more furious he looks. “Right now.”
All those things I said in the car… And I sang.
Oh noooo. I sang that song about falling in love and I day-dreamed about this man.
“Think I’ve spent enough time in your shite car for now,” he snaps.
“It’s not shite…” I begin and he gives me a dark but somehow pitying look.
“You kidnapped me, pet.” His voice goes hard. “You’ll have to pay.”
An emotion skitters down my spine. Fear, but also excitement, I think? Like a scary movie. “What do you want?”
He looks down at me, gaze lingering on my mouth. A flash of pure arousal lights me up. “Everything.”
I bolt.
Barging out of his hold, I head for the beach without even thinking. I make it two steps, then three, and by the fourth I think I might get away. Adrenaline surges.
This is good, right?
Then I’m seat belted by a pair of massive arms and hauled against a solid body. Abdominals, thighs, hard pecs.
“No, you don’t.” Leaning down, he spins me around, grabs my bottom, and tosses me over his shoulder.
I shriek, and I can’t even catch myself as I bounce on his back, only just avoiding face-planting on his arse because my hands are in the cuffs behind me. Then he’s walking and I’m staring helplessly at the toned buttocks of the man I accidentally kidnapped.
They are, undeniably, very nice.