15. Cian
Chapter 15
Cian
I don’t know if someone opened a club in my chest or what, but my heart won’t stop thundering against my ribs. In my current state, even sitting still presents too much of a challenge.
Not after the events of the last twenty-four hours.
I’m standing on a sandy curb outside Dish Waikiki. The sun dips toward the clear, blue-green waters, bathing the world in a peach haze. I wonder if every night here plays this way, with dusk swallowing the town whole as the tropical day dims to breezy night.
The outside of Dish Waikiki reminds me of a planetarium. Windows and retractable walls enclose the round restaurant. A mural on one side draws the eye, neon blossoms exploding off the building’s teal outdoor paint. Monday through Thursday, the place apparently closes early, so here I lurk, waiting for Harper to finish up.
Through the restaurant’s windows, I watch while Harper and her colleagues rush around. But every time my eyes find her face, I picture my seed all over it and have to glance away as lust and guilt hit me square in the gut.
The offense I took at Finn’s words when he told me to control myself with her? Man, what a fucking hypocrite I am. Harper Brennan turns me on so much, I’m incapable of lying about it anymore.
The truth is horrible, worse than I ever imagined, but in that dusty old room, with Harper on her knees and my dick in her mouth, I lost myself.
Guilt bears down on me, crushing me flat.
When I space out long enough for the guilt to recede, another bomb explodes in my brain.
My boyfriend didn’t know.
Harper’s excuse to that asshat she works with. That’s all it was. An excuse.
So why did Harper using that word, even as a ruse, tranquilize me like a damn dart?
The rage her would-be escape attempt ignited in me was blinding, but those two words— my boyfriend —siphoned half the force right out of the fury animating my limbs. With just those two little words, she bowled me over with such ferocity that I followed her straight into that closet.
I could shoot myself.
Rocking back on my heels, I tighten and unclench my fists, trying to let it all go. But the truth won’t stop glaring at me.
I’m coming undone in more ways than one.
What the fuck is happening here? Harper never gave me the time of day before, but now that we’re alone together in the Pacific Ocean, our dynamic has changed? Did I miss something back in New York? Were things between us not the way I’d always imagined them?
Before this trip, I thought Harper Brennan went through men like candy just because she could. Apparently, I was wrong. Her innocence arrests me.
The fact that I was the first man to ever put my mouth on her, and the first man she ever put her mouth on, pleases me in an inexplicable way.
And when I touch her, I no longer feel alone. I’m not sweltering in an open flame, battling to impress an unassailable woman who’s haunted my every waking hour for months. Years.
Instead, touching her feels right, like we both belong in each other’s arms.
The emotion unsettles me. I don’t want to analyze it. I just want to stretch Harper’s tight pussy for a few—or several—uninterrupted hours so we can both move the fuck on with our lives.
Premonition breaks my focus on Harper. My nose twitches, and my shoulders stiffen like I’m being poked.
Someone’s close by, watching.
I force my body to relax. If they know I’ve sensed them, they’ll bolt before I get the chance to clock their face.
My eyes skate through the throngs of foot traffic and cars gliding past on Waikiki’s main avenue. A black Ford idling half a block up the road catches my attention.
On a street full of cars with windows down, sunroofs open, and convertible tops back, this car stands out. The blacked-out windows on the passenger side is rolled down an inch, with cigarette smoke drifting out of the narrow opening.
Uneasiness cracks open in the pit of my stomach.
Two men dressed like tourists in Hawaiian shirts, khaki pants, and shades step out of the car. Their faces, hardened and marked by years of violence, give them away. I’ve tucked guns into my waistband enough times to know when someone’s packing.
The armed men slip toward a side entrance of the restaurant, and I duck through the front doors almost as fast.
The crack in my stomach widens.
I left my gun in the car.
Fuck.
Servers are bussing tables and turning chairs upside down, while others sweep and mop. Harper’s behind the bar cataloguing receipts when the unmistakable pop-pop-pop of a modified semi-automatic shatters the air.
Harper is no stranger to gunfire. At the first pop, she grabs the employee nearest to her and shoves them down behind the counter before dropping out of sight as terror overtakes the place. People dive under furniture, scrabbling, scared. Every violent impulse I’ve had the past two months flares to life.
I flatten myself against a cool brick wall. The two gunmen stalk into the room, heads swiveling, searching. They can’t see me, and they won’t.
Not until it’s too late.
“Evening.” The bigger of the men addresses the room, waving his weapon around like a hand. “We’re looking for somebody you know. Cough her up, or we kill every single one of you.”
While Bozo’s enjoying his five minutes of fame, I drop low and skirt around a group of booths, still out of sight.
I just need to get close enough.
Gunfire trills, and screams pierce the air.
My gut clenches, but none of the screams are Harper’s, and that’s all I fucking care about.
The thought of one of these fuckers hurting Harper inflates the rage that bolsters my fingers as I wrap my fist around the center leg of a nearby four-top table. The gunmen, still preoccupied with the terrified, trembling staff members of Dish Waikiki, are unprepared for what’s coming.
If I were in my right mind, I would have waited a few more seconds for the perfect opening. Instead, the moment the big one steps toward the bar, I go fucking ballistic.
Ripping the table off the ground, I hurl it toward them one-handed.
The force of the throw reveals itself a moment later when the table connects with the back of the second gunman’s head. A grunt of pain and surprise folds in with the thwack of wood and metal against skull. The guy goes down with the table, the resonance of the crash bouncing through the space. His submachine gun skids left toward the hallway that leads to the restrooms.
His partner whips back in time to see him fall, but not in time to catch me. I duck low again, silently working my way down the left aisle to get as close to the fallen man as I can.
“Which one of you motherfuckers did that?” Bozo’s tone is laced with acid.
We’re five minutes away from a Dish Waikiki massacre if I don’t get my hands on that gun.
Bullets shatter glass and scar the walls. Bozo’s voice moves farther away as he intimidates some shitless servers, likely cowering under a family-sized booth on the other side of the room.
“Was it you ?”
The growl in his voice tempts me to drive a hot poker down his throat. I can’t see his face, but I can see his partner’s gun. Nearby, the fallen idiot groans and grouses, a bloody gash on the back of his bald head.
I doubted that table would do the whole job. That’s what I’m here for.
Lurching for the gun, my fingers snatch the grip. The noise alerts Bozo. Still crouched low, I fire at his legs just as he swings around.
Bozo unleashes a wounded snarl, the pain forcing him to his knees.
I put three bullets in his partner’s back. Blood pounds hard in my own ears as I watch his spill out onto the hard floor like red ink. My roaring pulse drowns out Bozo’s returning fire.
The searing, biting pain of a bullet grazing my bicep snatches my focus.
Quick as lightning, I take aim at Bozo and yank the trigger back.
Bullets hail at him. Two to the chest, three to the head.
Sobs of delirious panic wade into my ears.
As I get to the bar, I find a huddled Harper shaking. The sight of her fear rekindles my fury. I drop the gun, and when I grab her hand, she doesn’t fight me.
We’re down the hall to the kitchen and through the back door in seconds, speed walking toward Waikiki’s busiest, bustling main street.
Neither one of us speak as I drag her through the crowds, making a beeline for where I parked the car.
Police sirens wail around us as anxious energy swells inside me.
Holy fuck, we are in trouble.
People gawk as we hurry past. I have no idea what that’s about until we’re back in the Porsche and Harper gasps.
“What is it?” My eyes rake her over from head to toe as terror crawls along my skin. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
She shakes her head, eyes glistening, with one hand folded around the base of her own throat. “You’re hurt! You’re bleeding.”
Her rasp is like a death rattle.
I wince when the pain in my arm finally announces itself. The adrenaline in my system must be crashing. My arm hurts like fuck, even though the wound is shallow.
The blood dripping and crisscrossing down my arm like red veins gives off major crime-scene victim vibes.
“I’m fine.” Turning the engine over, I allow myself one last glimpse of Harper’s face.
“No, you’re not.”
She challenges me without an ounce of strength in her voice. Her ragged breathing has slowed, but she’s holding herself like she’ll fall to pieces otherwise.
Maybe she will. Just because she grew up around this kind of violence doesn’t mean she stomachs it well.
This is my job, one I haven’t been afraid to perform since I fucking started. Before that, even. I’m trying to keep my brain at bay, but the reality that I could have lost Harper back there torments me.
My stomach cramps, and bile burns my throat. I haven’t been this terrified of losing someone since I was teenager.
The fear hits hard, like a freight train bearing down on my chest.
My desire to spend more time with her was at the expense of her own safety.
I’ve behaved selfishly. I see that now, and I’ll never forgive myself.
In the uneasy silence hanging between us, she ventures a question. “Who were those men?”
I pull into the street.
“Cian? Who were they?” Her small voice plunges a dagger into my heart.
Once again, I ignore the question. “We’re heading back to New York.”
I won’t tell Harper. She doesn’t need to know De Luca operatives are after her. She’s scared enough. And more than what learning the truth will do to her, I’m afraid of what seeing her in anymore pain will do to me .
Harper won’t be safe until I get her back home.
Neither of us will be.