Chapter Sixteen Tiernan
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
TIERNAN
“Fuck.”
Pressing my hand to a four-inch gash in my torso to stop the bleeding, I collapsed into the passenger seat next to my brother in his nickel-gray Porsche.
Fintan floored it before the cops arrived to scrape off the body I left three streets down from Fermanagh’s. An Albanian aspiring mobster had tried dealing meth on my turf and had the audacity to stab me when I informed him he was trespassing.
Sighing, I tossed the two bullet cases I collected from the crime scene into the central console for my brother to get rid of.
I hated amateurs. People should have to pass a bar to get into the field of organized crime. I swear my line of work attracted the stupidest people on planet Earth.
“Do you have to bleed all over my 993 Turbo, Tierney boy?” Fin flicked his green eyes to me. I knew he was only half joking. He loved that bleeding car.
“Drop me off and I’ll walk home.”
“Home!” he roared. “I’m taking you straight to the hospital, little brother.” His breath reeked of whiskey.
“I’ll wrap it up when I get back.” I removed my hand from the stab wound, peering at it through my black dress shirt. Blood gushed out in a thick river. I groaned, pushing the base of my palm back onto it.
“You sure?” Fintan had one arm slung against the open window.
“Positive. I’m not going to Barnabas at two in the morning unless I need my head stitched back to my body. Even then, I’d probably cab it to Presbyterian.”
“Why not?” Fintan pushed, scowling at the road ahead. “Natalie works there. She’s always happy to see you.”
“I bet she is. I put her through med school.”
Natalie was a poor girl from the neighborhood who needed a leg up. She also happened to prefer anal, so we’d had an agreement of sorts, where I paid for her school and, in return, she was my fuck buddy. I hadn’t seen her in almost a year, though. Not since she started her residency.
“Drop me at Fermanagh’s,” I said. “And for shit’s sake, go over the books again and tell Da to send someone to pick up the supplies in the port.”
“Whatever you say, lad.”
“You’ve enough alcohol in your system to drown a mermaid.”
“I only had a couple pints,” he mumbled defensively. “I can hold a drink, ya know.”
“The problem is you usually hold eight or nine. Per night.”
He sulked. “I said it’s under control.”
“Tell that to your 200K debt in your own bleeding casino.” I rarely broached this subject, but I rode a criminal high whenever I was in pain. It got my dick hard and I tended to look either for a fight or a fuck. And since fucking wasn’t in my near future, I chose a fight.
“I’ve made progress, mate. I did.” His fingers danced around the steering wheel, knuckles paling in anger. “I’m going to therapy now. Putting in the work.”
“How long since you hit the blackjack table?”
“Over three weeks. I swear on my life.”
I narrowed my good eye at him.
He laughed nervously. “I mean it! Ask my therapist.”
There was no need. I had eyes in every underground casino the Callaghans and Ferrantes owned.
I nodded. “Keep that shit up, Fin. Once we go after the Bratva, all of us become targets. You need to stay sharp.”
“I am, brother. Mionnaím ar uaigh ár máthar.”
My jaw clenched. Tierney and I knew very little Gaeilge. Not for lack of desire on our part.
I’d never set foot in my own motherland. Neither did she.
Everything I was—the accent, the tradition, the pride, the flag—was a sham.
Da was an Irishman. So was Fintan. Not us.
Tierney and I had always been a separate unit from them.
Only difference was, I loved Tyrone and Fintan ferociously, never held what happened to us against them. Tierney never forgot and never forgave.
“How’s Maggie doing?” I changed the subject.
“Riding my ass about proposing, now that my wee brother is married. Gave me a deadline until Christmas. And Becky?”
“Why would you ask me about a slag I see every other month when I have a wife?”
“She isn’t much of a wife, though, is she?” He parked the Porsche in front of Fermanagh’s, cutting the ignition. “I don’t like what this is doing to your reputation, brother. Being accused of sleeping with this girl-child. I still think it was a mistake.”
“It’s done now.” I popped the door open, swinging my leg to the sidewalk.
Dizzy. So dizzy. Fuck.
Before I got out, I glanced behind my shoulder, pausing.
“Did you forget something?” Fintan blinked.
“Yeah,” I said. “Drink on the job one more time, and I’ll kill you.”
_______
I staggered into my dark apartment, clutching at my chest.
Perhaps skipping the hospital was a mistake, after all. I based the change of heart on the three liters of blood I smeared across the staircase like a human fucking slug.
With a hiss, I dragged myself along the hallway to the master bedroom, crashing against the wall, marring it in red. Once in my bathroom, I flicked the light on and unbuttoned my dress shirt.
I was no pussy, but this was a serious knife injury. He went deep. I was surprised there wasn’t an exit point.
Sensing my need for privacy, my wife, who had never shown interest in spending time with me, appeared at my bathroom door. Now she wanted my company. She wore her pale hair in a messy bun, and a white satin babydoll that really brought out every delectable curve in her body.
“Now’s not a good time.” I popped the first aid kit open, lining up Betadine, tape, and gauze on the bathroom counter.
Through the mirror, I saw her examining the trail of blood I left behind, slack-jawed. Eh, so this was why she ventured here. Probably hoped to find me dead.
“Either use that open mouth to suck my cock or walk out of here and let me stitch myself in peace.” I kept applying pressure to my wound while unscrewing the Betadine spray with my teeth.
She loitered at the threshold, likely emboldened by the fact that I was too preoccupied to follow up on my threat. Blood slinked from between my fingers. I needed to call one of my soldiers on-site to assist me.
My wife continued to stare, nibbling on the dead skin around her thumbnail.
“Jesus fuck, Lila.” I swiveled toward her. “Get out. Don’t worry about the blood. I’ll send someone to clean that shit up.”
She grabbed my wrist, her sharp blue eyes dancing like cold fire.
She tugged me out of the bathroom. I didn’t have time for this nonsense, but something compelled me to humor her.
That something was more than likely my moronic dick.
She led me to my bed, where she put a gentle hand on my shoulder and eased me down, fluffing my pillows and laying me across the mattress.
Lila put her palm up, signaling me to wait, then ambled back to the bathroom.
I heard the water in the sink running. She returned to the bed and flicked on my bedside lamp.
I grunted as light flooded the room. My wife parked her pert little ass on the edge next to me, peeling my hand off the open wound.
Clutching my shoulder to keep me still, she used a wet, warm towel to wipe off the blood, then sprayed the shit out of the wound with Betadine. My nostrils flared, the burn eating away at my flesh like acid. “Bollocks.”
She gave me a disapproving glare to let me know she didn’t appreciate my language, then pressed clean gauze to it.
“Get more gauze and tape,” I bit out. “I’ll wrap it up.”
Her gaze dropped to my lips, like it always did. If she wanted a kiss, all she had to do was ask.
She shook her head adamantly, glaring at me as she motioned with her hands. At first, it looked like she was holding invisible cutlery. Then, I realized, she was mimicking suturing.
Something clicked in my brain.
She put me down for elevation, disinfected the wound, and was now draining it before…
Stitching me up?
What was she, a bleeding nurse now?
“If you don’t know how to stitch, knock on Tierney’s door down the hall. She’ll call for help.” Doubtful I had enough time, but I wasn’t in the mood to be poked a bunch of times.
Her eyebrows slammed together. She looked pissed off I doubted her abilities.
“Fine. There’s a suturing kit in the cabinet in the bathroom,” I groaned. “Don’t bother bringing the analgesic spray. I thrive on pain.”
She moseyed back into the en-suite bathroom. I followed her with my eyes, wondering how she was going to get out of this one.
She just revealed her entire hand to me. Not only did she not have any intellectual issues, she also knew how to treat potentially fatal wounds. Did she tend to her brothers like this? The thought of her touching other men—even her kin—made my skin crawl.
Lila returned. She removed the gauze and resprayed the wound to disinfect it, then used the needle driver to grab the needle. Her hands were steady, her breathing calm. Pushing the needle in a ninety-degree angle at the edge of my wound, she began stitching me up.
I stared at her face. She looked like an angel. One I’d very much like to stick my cock into. She sewed with stoic practicality. It was her eyes that gave her intelligence. They saw everything, and I wondered if they also noticed how out of my fucking depth I was where she was concerned.
She was everything I couldn’t control, and it drove me wild.
“How long are we going to do this song and dance for, Lila?” My gaze drifted down her satin babydoll, to those full, perky breasts and tight nipples.
Down her flat stomach, to the junction where her panties were hidden by sun-kissed, slender thighs.
“Where you pretend to be incapable and I pretend to buy it?”
Her throat bobbed with a swallow.
“They call me Deathless, you know,” I hissed, my voice groggy. “I survived six assassination attempts and fuck knows how many more gunfights. Wouldn’t it be ironic if what takes me out is a sloppy stab in the chest by a fucking nobody?”
Lila’s face remained impassive. Her hands on my bare flesh were sweet torture. Her fingers tingled and teased, like little flames licking at my skin.
I wondered what other talents she was hiding.
And if Tate Blackthorn knew about them.
“You should let me bleed out,” I mused, watching her unwavering expression. “You know you want to.”
Not a muscle in that perfect face of hers twitched. She wasn’t going to break. Not even crack. For a reason beyond my understanding, Lila decided to spare my life, but didn’t deem me trustworthy enough for her confessions. For her words.
I focused on the delicate contours of her face, wondering when I last saw something quite as superb. Never, was the definite answer.
“I’m not letting you go, you know.” My voice was calm, final, before I let my eye flutter shut. “You’re mine. Only fucking mine. Till my last breath.”
She pricked my skin with her needle, extra hard.
And I smirked, knowing she heard me.