Chapter 24 Rafael
RAFAEL
“See if you can buy me some time to chat with the commissioner uninterrupted,” I murmur against the shell of Aisling’s ear. Her scent is warm and intoxicating, a dangerous potential for distraction, but I can’t let emotion slow the momentum Aisling has so gracefully built for me this evening.
The dinner is going exactly the way it needs to, in large part because of the fiery redhead at my side.
That, more than anything, feels like a small miracle.
And while I want to tell her just how damn sexy she is when she’s charming the pants off these politicians, we’re not through the woods just yet.
Aisling gives an airy laugh, her azure eyes soft and inviting as she turns to smile at me like I just whispered sweet nothings in her ear.
Then she brushes the lightest of kisses against my cheek and turns her attention back to the women who sit across from her.
A flawless performance—if only my cock were on board with the idea.
But the chaste kiss is all it takes to have me swelling, straining against the zipper of my slacks.
Shifting subtly in my seat to adjust myself, I take a moment to get my mind out of the gutter and my arousal back under control before I turn my attention back to business.
Commissioner Doyle couldn’t have offered me a better setting for tonight’s mission.
The restaurant is discreet luxury.
Dark wood, low light, a wine list that could buy a small island. The kind of place where power doesn’t raise its voice because it doesn’t need to.
The commissioner fits in seamlessly, relaxed in his tailored suit, his wife warm and observant at his side.
And Aisling… Christ.
She’s utter perfection.
Not in the ornamental way so many women at these tables try to be, but sharp and alive.
She threads wit through conversation with perfect timing, offers a smile when one is needed, a thoughtful pause when silence will speak louder.
She makes the commissioner’s wife laugh with stories about Ireland and her family, about stubborn siblings and loud dinners, and when the commissioner’s attention drifts to me, she never once looks bored.
She looks proud to be my wife.
I hate how much that thought tightens something in my chest.
Between anecdotes and shared jokes, I talk shop.
Carefully.
Strategically.
Nothing overt.
Nothing that could be repeated without sounding paranoid or criminal.
Just enough to paint a picture.
The Tanakas are destabilizing the city.
Their internal fractures are making things messy.
Messy tends to spill.
Chicago doesn’t need that kind of mess.
The commissioner nods along, sipping his wine, offering murmurs of agreement.
He talks about resources being stretched thin, about prioritization.
About how unfortunate it is that he can’t always control certain… isolated incidents from occurring outside his direct purview.
I don’t doubt it’s much the same thing he and Tatsuo discussed before the Yakuza came to wipe my family out, but then, I can’t hold grudges against a lack of loyalty when money and flattery are the only languages the commissioner speaks.
And I intend to own both fields from now on.
By dessert, I’m satisfied.
By coffee, I’m confident we won’t meet with any resistance when it comes to bringing the Tanakas down.
And all the while, Aisling has been winning over the women at the table, so by the end of the night, it feels like we’ve all been longtime friends.
“We’ll have to have you over for dinner soon,” the commissioner’s wife insists, squeezing Aisling’s hand as we head to the door to collect our coats.
“Oh, we would be honored, right, Love?” my wife gushes, turning to me with wide-eyed enthusiasm.
“Absolutely,” I agree from two steps behind her, where I’m walking with Commissioner Doyle.
And as the women collect their jackets, he claps me on the shoulder. “Your father would be proud,” he says, his eyes gleaming with affection.
The compliment lands like a bruise.
I highly doubt it.
My father was never proud of his sons—me and Sandro least of all.
But I’m not doing this to honor his memory. I’m doing this for my brothers, so no one in their right minds will ever dare to think of coming for our family again.
Still, we leave with smiles intact, the night crisp and clean as we step onto the sidewalk and go our separate ways.
Our car is waiting just down the block, my men falling into stride behind us as we make our way down the sidewalk.
Beside me, Aisling’s steps are calm and confident, her heels striking a beat that matches the rhythm of my heart.
I don’t know what I expected when I agreed to our arrangement, but her performance tonight went above and beyond.
She truly is the perfect Mafia bride, an asset any man would be fortunate to have on his arm, and I don’t doubt that her subtle way of pulling strings is going to get us a lot farther that I would have made it on my own.
My brothers and I are used to brute forcing it—and while I have a healthy respect for strategy and charm, Aisling takes it to a whole new level.
I’m starting to wonder, if I put her in charge, whether she might not find a way to get Tatsuo himself eating out of her palm.
But he’ll never be that fortunate. Not after what he and Kenji have done.
Still, I can’t help but smile as I glance down at Aisling from the corner of my eye.
I know it’s not a permanent arrangement, but I can’t help but recognize how lucky I am to have her as an ally.
And it doesn’t hurt that just looking at her is a gift on the daily.
I know the thought is wrong.
I shouldn’t be entertaining it, but watching her tonight—watching her so often in the time since our wedding day—I find it near impossible not to have those kinds of thoughts.
We’re almost to the car when it happens.
A prickle creeps along my spine, a wrongness I’ve learned to trust even when I don’t want to.
And instantly, my senses are on full alert.
That’s all the warning I get, though, before I catch movement to our left.
A man steps out of the shadows, dressed all in black, looking for the world like a phantom as he moves without a sound.
He’s fast—too fast for a regular civilian or homeless man.
His posture is wrong, his center of gravity low, coiled.
I see the blade a half-second before he raises it, glinting under the streetlight, and my heart stops as I realize he’s coming straight for Aisling.
“This,” he snarls, Japanese accent unmistakable, “is what happens when you sleep with the enemy.”
Aisling whirls, her blue eyes growing round as she spots the man coming for her mere seconds before he’s on top of her.
Time fractures.
My body moves before my mind catches up, instinct screaming louder than reason.
Wrapping an arm around her waist, I drag Aisling back just as he lunges, the knife slashing through the space where her throat had been.
Genevieve flashes through my head—the blood, her wide, unseeing eyes.
Not again.
Firmly placing Aisling behind me, I shield her with my body as I catch the man’s arm. I can feel the strength there, the training as he twists, pivoting to break my hold.
He’s good—far better than the butcher—and he’s here to kill.
But I’ll be damned if I’m going to let him touch my wife.
Gripping his wrist with all my strength, I wrench it in the opposite direction, straining tendon and crushing bone as I force the blade upward, out of harm’s way.
Then I yank it free from his hold.
Rather than conceding, the man goes for Aisling again, sacrificing his weapon with the intention of killing her with his bare hands.
Something inside me snaps.
Before he can take a step, I drive the knife into him.
Once.
Twice.
A clean, efficient motion drilled into me from years of violence I pretend doesn’t live in my very bones.
I’m not naturally inclined to violence like Miko and Sandro—far less interested in the heat of the fight.
But right now, my blood is boiling, and all I see is red.
The would-be assassin collapses at my feet, breath rattling out of him in a wet gasp before it stops altogether.
Silence crashes down.
It happened so fast, my men didn’t even have time to come to my aid. But now my guards are on us in an instant, weapons drawn, eyes scanning for any further sign of danger.
One of them swears softly. Another drags the body back into the shadows of the alley like it’s refuse.
I barely register their actions as I turn to check on Aisling.
She’s frozen, eyes wide, breath shallow, staring at the dark stain smearing the pavement.
“Aisling,” I say, my voice rough. “Look at me.”
It takes a second, but she does.
“Are you hurt?”
She shakes her head. Once. Then again. “I don’t think so.” But her voice is distant, detached, like her mind is somewhere far away.
I pull her against me without thinking, my hand cradling the back of her head, shielding her from the scene, even though it’s already burned into both of us.
“Get rid of the body,” I bark to my men.
Then I’m steering Aisling into the open door of the car, my arm locked around her as if she might vanish if I loosen my grip.
She’s trembling against me, shock coursing through her in silent waves, and as soon as the door closes, warm air enfolding us, I’m gathering her into my arms as if I can physically stop her from falling apart.
The ride home is a blur as I focus my attention on Aisling’s blank stare, her dangerously pale face.
Murmured words of assurance don’t seem to register with her, and my stomach coils with anxiety as I start to wonder if she did, in fact, get injured.
But when I gently search her, keeping one arm wrapped around her waist as I adjust her jacket to check for signs of blood, I come away with nothing.
Finally, the car pulls to a stop in the driveway, and I usher Aisling up the front steps and into the house, steering her toward our bedroom, where she can fall apart behind the privacy of closed doors if she needs.
Easing her into the reading chair, I leave her just long enough to pour her a stiff drink from the small bar cart we keep tucked in the corner of the room.
She accepts the whiskey without a word and simply stares into its amber depths, her breaths coming shallow and fast.
“Drink, dolce,” I say gently, guiding the crystal tumbler to her lips.
She obeys, guzzling the shot like water, coughs, then covers her mouth with the back of her hand as she steadies, color returning to her cheeks. Her hand stops shaking.
Finally, she looks at me—really looks at me. “You saved my life,” she breathes.
The disbelief in her words hits harder than the knife ever could, but I continue to kneel before her, my hands rubbing friction up and down her arms in an attempt to warm her. “You couldn’t have expected me to just stand aside and watch you die,” I rasp.
Her head shakes slowly, her eyes glossing over as the tip of her nose starts to pinken. “I don’t know how to thank you,” she whispers.
There’s a beat of silence, thick and charged.
The house feels too quiet.
Too empty.
And yet the noise inside my head is blasting at full volume. “You don’t have to thank me,” I say. “I won’t ever let anyone touch you.”
As if taking note that I’m touching her, Aisling’s gaze drops to my hands, which still grasp her arms with near desperation.
For the first time, I notice they’re stained red—a stain I’ve spread to the fabric of her beautiful white peacoat.
It’s an ugly reminder of the fact that I’m so capable of violence—that my world is too easily capable of tainting hers.
And though it tears me apart to do so, I release her, rocking back on my heels to give her space.
“Don’t go,” she pleads, sliding forward on her chair to close the distance between us.
My breath catches as her warm scent invades my nose, making my muscles coil with anticipation.
I shouldn’t want this.
I shouldn’t feel the pull, the heat rising low in my gut.
Genevieve’s ghost looms, heavy with accusation, but Aisling is here, alive and safe.
And she’s looking at me with a vulnerability that threatens to undo me, a desperate need that calls to my very soul.
Everything I’ve been holding back surges forward, raw and consuming, and it shatters the last of my resolve.
My eyes drop to her full, inviting lips, and I lean in at the same time she does.
We come together with explosive heat, the kiss fire—immediate and devastating.
Every unwanted emotion bursts to life inside me, desire running rampant through my veins.
Aisling’s whiskey glass thunks as it hits the floor, and then her hands are fisting around the lapels of my suit jacket as if to anchor herself.
My palms find the soft silk encasing her waist, and I drag her from her chair as I pull her close.
For one suspended, dangerous moment, nothing else exists.
And I don’t know how I’ll ever let go.