Chapter 1
Ráth Finnéin, Ireland
She should probably stop staring at him and make a run for it, but as Lasarín lay there, most likely dying from the brutal beating that she’d just endured, she couldn’t help but run her eyes over him. She just...
She’d never seen anyone like him before.
She took in everything from the messy, short black hair that he’d rammed his fingers through every time she’d tripped over her own two feet to the muscles flexing in his large arm as he pinched the bridge of his nose before dropping her gaze and taking in rope after rope of golden muscle that made up his torso and released a heartfelt sigh.
“Lad?” came the heavily sighed response that reminded her that she was here for a reason.
Revenge.
“Aye?” Lasarín managed on a murmur as she began blindly searching for her sword only to grumble when she couldn’t find it and forced herself to roll onto her side and somehow ended up on her stomach with her face in the dirt.
That was followed by trying to get her trembling arms to cooperate and push herself up only to give up, groan, and mutter, “Kill. Me,” against the dirt.
“How about we just try again, lad?” Shayne, the man who was in charge of turning her into a soldier, said, sounding amused as he grabbed hold of the back of her tunic and picked her up.
“I’d rather ye just end it all,” Lasarín said, gesturing for him to get on with it as he placed her on her feet only to end up grabbing hold of her and righted her again when her legs threatened to give out.
“Yer getting better, lad,” Shayne lied as he leaned over and picked up the wooden training sword and went to hand it to her only to frown when she mumbled, “My arms,” when they refused to cooperate.
“Perhaps we should call it a day,” Shayne said, nodding solemnly as he glanced around them only to frown. “Where’s yer shield, lad?”
“It broke my last fall,” Lasarín said, glancing down at what was left of her shield and found herself wondering if she was going about this the wrong way.
She had other options, ones that didn’t involve her being brutalized every day.
She could probably find hemlock by the river that she’d passed to get here, but since the king used food testers, that would probably end with her head on a spike.
She could grab the knife she’d hidden along with her real clothes in the woods, but since the king was always surrounded by guards. ..
Maybe she should dress as a servant instead and wait for the right moment to make him pay for what he did to her mother? Lasarín wondered as her gaze shifted to the large round house that was surrounded by guards. Then again, if he recognized her...
She was going to have to follow through with this plan, Lasarín decided with a firm nod that somehow caused her to stumble until the large man that had fallen for her disguise reached over and palmed the top of her head and held her still.
Once he was assured that she wasn’t about to trip over her own two feet again, Shayne dropped his arm aside as he ran his eyes over her, taking in what was left of her beautiful blonde hair, the smudges that she’d placed strategically on her face to make herself look more like a boy and the tunic she’d taken from a village two day’s walk from here before he took in her arms and legs, which, admittedly, were smaller than the other lads that had been sent to the king to train and frowned.
Nodding, Shayne followed her gaze to the king’s house and-
“Ye want ta tell me why yer dressing like a lad, lass?” Shayne asked as his gaze cut back to her, making everything inside her go still.
“I’d rather not say,” Lasarín said as she sent a wistful glance back towards the woods.
“This is usually the part where ye make a run for it, lass,” Shayne drawled as she heaved a sigh.
“My legs stopped working,” Lasarín admitted, gesturing for him to get on with it, knowing that there was no point in trying to run at this point.
“That’s unfortunate, lass,” Shayne said as he reached for her and-
Granite Falls, New Hampshire
Present Day
This had to stop, Ashlyn thought on a groan as she blindly reached over to shut her alarm clock off only to remember that she’d never made it past the couch last night.
God, she was tired.
Between this last case and the dreams that she’d been having for the past month, she was running on fumes. She needed sleep, but every time she closed her eyes, she dreamt about him and when she wasn’t dreaming about him, she was thinking about him and she had no idea why.
The only thing she knew was that she needed it to stop.
She needed to stop dreaming about him, thinking about him, and more than anything, she needed this feeling, this desperate need, to go to him to stop.
She didn’t want him, didn’t need him, but no matter how many times she told herself that, Ashlyn couldn’t stop thinking about the deeply disturbed man that she found naked in the emergency room a little over a month ago.
Every day was worse than the last, leaving her feeling on edge.
She’d hoped by finding out everything that she could about Shayne that she would be able to move on and forget about him, but unfortunately for her, it just left her with more questions.
Questions that she didn’t have time for, Ashlyn reminded herself as she reluctantly got up and made her way across her studio apartment, pausing along the way to shut off her alarm clock before she grabbed her kit from the closet.
She carried the plastic box into the bathroom and placed it on the counter as she looked at herself in the mirror, taking in her short black hair, the tattoos marking her neck and arms, the piercings lining each ear before taking in the one on her lip and-
“That might have been overkill,” Ashlyn said, sighing heavily as she reached up and carefully removed the fake lip ring and tossed it on the counter.
That was followed by all the fake earrings lining her ears as well as the fake belly button ring before she reached up and began the long process of removing her wig.
She removed the clips one by one before working the wig free from her scalp, leaving behind the makeup that she’d used to blend the edge of the wig with her skin.
Once she removed the wig, she tossed it on the counter and began removing the cap, revealing the loose Dutch braids that she’d secured to her scalp.
Thirty minutes later, she’d managed to remove all the bobby pins and combed out her long blonde hair before pulling it up into a loose bun at the back of her head and grabbed the hand sanitizer from her kit along with a facecloth and set to work scrubbing off the tattoos that she’d airbrushed onto her skin.
After she scrubbed them with hand sanitizer, she grabbed the bottle of makeup remover and went over her neck and arms again before removing the makeup on her face.
Once she’d scrubbed the rest of the makeup off, she removed the contact lenses that turned her eyes blue along with the bandage that she’d used to bind her breasts to make them appear smaller before making her way to the small shower stall in the corner.
She turned the hot water up all the way before pulling off the rest of her clothes and stepping inside as she went over everything that she needed to do today.
She needed to send her report to the insurance company along with her final bill, check her email, and finally track down the elusive Detective Black. It had been two weeks since he was released from the hospital and she really needed to-
Stop thinking about his brother.
“Stop fucking judging me!”
“It’s a stupid show!”
“It’s misunderstood!”
“It was supposed to be a three-hour tour. Why the hell did they need all that fucking luggage?”
Shayne glared at Finn as he pointed towards his bedroom door. “I told ye never to bring that up again!”
“Because it’s a stupid show,” Finn muttered with a shrug before he disappeared.
“Yer dead to me, ye bastard!” Shayne yelled after the confused bastard.
It was a great show, damn it!
“How are they supposed to make banana cream pie on a deserted island without milk, flour, or butter?” Declean demanded from the comfort of Shayne’s bed.
Shayne didn’t bother answering Declean as he flipped him off and stormed out of his bedroom.
As he walked down the hallway towards Tristan’s bedroom, he cursed Declean and his precious Food Channel to hell and back.
Thanks to that betraying bastard, he now had a craving for banana cream pie and no way of getting his hands on one.
“Sorry, lad,” Quinn said with a shrug as he appeared in front of Tristan’s door.
“Still?” Shayne asked, not quite believing what he was hearing.
“Aye,” Quinn said, chuckling. “Seems the lad really missed her.”
“It’s been two days!”
Quinn simply shrugged as he gestured for Shayne to turn around and leave. Snorting in disgust, Shayne moved to pound on Tristan’s door. Two days with Marty was more than enough, especially since he was bored.
“Think again, lad,” Quinn said, grabbing him.
One second, he was raising his hand to pound on Tristan’s door, and the next, he was standing in the middle of the foyer. It took him a minute before he realized what his brother did to him.
“No fucking way…”
“I’m embarrassed for ye, lad,” Aidan said in a mock whisper as he appeared to Shayne’s right.
“Aye, he just manhandled ye like ye were his bitch or something,” Finn said, shaking his head in disgust. “Are ye really gonna take that, lad?”
This couldn’t be said enough, being alive fucking sucked.
He went from being able to go and do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted, to being completely dependent on his brothers for everything.
It grated in the worst possible way. He couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t pulled his own weight.
Even in his cursed form, he’d taken care of himself, protected himself and Tristan. He’d had a use, but now…
Now, he was completely fucking useless.
His brothers protected him from spirits and fucked him over for their own entertainment to pass the time.
The little brother that he’d been sworn to protect and care for now took care of him.
Tristan gave him shelter, food, clothes, and supported him like he was some fucking child instead of a full-grown man.
He hated it.
He hated this whole fucked-up situation.
He’d been raised to believe that taking charity was wrong.
Unless a man was dead or dying, he should be taking care of himself and his family.
If he’d been back in his own time, he would have simply picked up a sword and sold his services to the highest bidder.
Beyond playing video games, he had no modern-day skills that he could use.
Hell, he couldn’t even drive a car, didn’t have a trade, and at least once a day, he forgot that he couldn’t simply walk through walls and gave his jackass brothers something to laugh their asses off about.
If his brothers didn’t need him to help with the curse, he would have walked head-on into traffic and gladly welcomed the curse back. As much as they pissed him off, he loved them. They were his family. For them, he’d put up with the annoying soulmate that he’d rather throttle than fu-
“Looks like the fun’s about to start,” Finn suddenly announced with a huge smile that actually made Shayne nervous.
“Aye,” Quinn said, chuckling, “someone better go get Tadgh and Liam.”
“I’m on it!” he heard Aidan shout from the upstairs hallway.
Before he could ask what was going on, the doorbell was ringing and the bastards that loved to torment him were trying to yank his shirt off. After a short struggle, they had his shirt off and were shoving him towards the front door.
“What the fuck are ye doing?” Shayne shouted, wondering when the bullshit would end.
“Make sure ta smile, lad,” Quinn said, giving him another push towards the door.
“Aye, it also wouldn’t hurt if ye stopped grinding yer teeth,” Finn pointed out as he gestured towards the door.
“And ye should probably stop clenching yer fists like that,” Aidan said as he popped back into the room.
Shayne’s stomach dropped as realization hit, and when it did, all he wanted to do was make a run for it. When he took a step back to do just that, he found his only exit blocked by Liam and Tristan.
“Just flex a little muscle and you’re in, big guy,” Tristan said with a wink and a chuckle that had him narrowing his eyes on the traitorous bastard as he was once again dragged back towards the door.
As he was shoved out the door, Shayne decided that there was perhaps a slight chance that he’d gone a tad overboard with screwing Tristan over for his own entertainment over the years. When he was thrown into the woman that fate had trapped him with, he decided that payback truly was a bitch.