21. Rowan
21
ROWAN
“W hat?” Genevieve looks at me as if I’ve grown another head. “Why?—”
“We can talk more on the plane. I’m going to call and have them fuel up the jet. Rory, you’re coming with us. If Genevieve needs anything, help her. I have a couple of calls to make.” I glance at Genevieve, who is still staring at me as if she can’t quite absorb what I’m saying. “Lass, go pack. Now .”
I see a brief glimmer of stubborn defiance in her eyes, but to my relief, she nods and heads for the stairs. I can see that she’s afraid, and shocked, and confused, and I wish I could simply go to her and hold her, tell her that it will be alright, and comfort her. But we don’t have the time for that right now.
I’m relieved that my father agreed with me—that the best thing we can possibly do is get Genevieve as far away from here as possible until we can figure out if Chris really did put out a hit on her—and make sure that hit is ended. The best way to do that would be to take out Chris and then pay off the current contract holder, but that’s going to take time. Time that could cost Genevieve her life, if there’s an assassin after her and she stays in New York.
I’m furious that she didn’t tell me about the texts. One look was enough for me to figure out that we’re dealing with someone who has far too high of an opinion of himself, and someone who’s pissed that Genevieve left him for another man… one who is, presumably, more powerful than Chris himself is. For all the connections and money he might have, I’m still the heir to a mafia.
But I can’t stop an assassin’s bullet—not without some time, at least. And I’m sure that’s what he’s counting on.
“I should have bloody killed you the day I saw you hit her,” I growl under my breath as I hang up the phone and head upstairs to pack my own things. Genevieve is standing at the foot of the bed, putting clothes in a suitcase, and she doesn’t look up when I walk in. Her face is pale, and I can see her fingers trembling.
“What am I supposed to do about my doctors?” she asks. “Rehab?”
“We’ll figure that out,” I assure her. “But right now, we just need to get you somewhere safe. You won’t need to worry about any of those things if you’re dead.”
Genevieve’s head snaps up at that. “And safe is in Ireland?”
I nod. “Aye.”
She swallows hard but says nothing else. We both finish packing, grab our bags, and head down to the waiting car for Rory to drive us to the hangar where the private jet is waiting.
“Your father was okay with this?” Genevieve asks as we drive. “With you leaving again?”
“ Okay is a broad term,” I mutter, glancing at my phone. “He’s hoping we can fix the situation quickly. But he’s not about to let his daughter-in-law be taken down by a hitman’s bullet, even if he wasn’t thrilled by our marriage.”
Genevieve blinks. “That’s oddly sweet.”
“No, it’s not.” I look at her, seeing the shock in her expression. “It has nothing to do with feeling. You’re my wife, so you’re family now. His duty is to protect you. Duty and responsibility mean everything to my father. It’s nothing more than that.”
She presses her lips together. “I still think it means something.”
“You can think that if you like.” I’m aware of how curt I sound, but I can’t help it. My adrenaline is high, pumping through my veins, my pulse beating hard in my throat. Genevieve was almost killed tonight. I almost lost her. And that realization is making it more plain than ever to me that I’m not prepared to lose her at all, in any way.
Ever.
But that’s not up to me, and it’s not our agreement. My jaw tightens, and I look away, trying not to think about that just now. I need to be calm. Collected. I need to think about what we do next, and how best to keep her safe.
The memory of seeing her fall on the stage flashes into my mind suddenly. The way she landed and crumpled, like an origami bird crushed in someone’s hand. Not long after I went to her dressing room, after I distracted her, after Chris saw me leaving and went to see her right afterward. An accident that I think she still partially blames me for—and that I know I blame myself for, too.
I have to protect her this time. I have to keep her safe.
If I can’t even do that, then what the fuck am I good for?
I run my hand through my hair, tugging anxiously as the car reaches the hangar. I check to make sure I have the weapon Rory gave me, then wait for him to step out and make sure all is clear before I go around to open Genevieve’s door. Rory grabs our luggage, and the three of us hurry toward the jet.
The night feels warm and heavy, midsummer approaching, and the darkness feels particularly thick. I want to linger—to pull Genevieve into my arms and tell her everything I’m feeling right now—that I will protect her. That she can trust me. But there’s no time. Instead, I lead us both onto the jet, stepping aside so Genevieve can find where she wants to sit.
I see her eyes widen as she looks around, and for the first time tonight, I can’t help but chuckle. “Never been on a private jet before, lass?”
She shakes her head. “Hell no,” she says softly, her eyes darting around as if she can’t figure out where to look first. “I’ve never dated someone with this kind of money.”
“Well, now you’re married to them.” I wait for Rory to stow our luggage and take up a spot toward the back of the jet, before leading Genevieve to a pair of seats near the middle of the plane. The jet is all dark woods and deep red plush carpet, the seats a buttery soft black leather, and Genevieve lets out a small sigh as she sinks down into one of them.
“I think I’d like traveling by plane a lot more if this was always how I flew somewhere.”
“Well, now it will be.”
She looks up, startled, and I realize what I’ve just said. It slipped out without my meaning for it to, and of course… it’s not true. She won’t always fly this way. We won’t always be married. That was the deal from the start, and it’s still the deal now.
Genevieve bites her lip. “Well, for a while,” she amends, and I nod.
“That’s what I meant.”
An awkward silence descends between us as the plane prepares to take off. I look at her—at my wife —sitting across from me, and something in my chest aches… that feeling that I never had before I met her.
I’m getting what I wanted. I’m going back to Ireland. But for the worst fucking reason I could imagine.
And this isn’t how I would have wanted to bring Genevieve to see the place I love, the place that really feels like home to me. But none of that matters now.
I have to keep her safe.
The flight attendant comes to check on us a few minutes later, a pretty brunette in a dark red uniform with her hair in a prim bun that makes me think of how Genevieve always wore hers when she danced. How she still always wears it when she puts it up, as if she can’t bring herself to have a hair out of place even away from the stage. “Can I get you anything?” she asks, handing Genevieve a red cashmere throw blanket and a set of packaged earplugs in case she needs them. “Drinks, food?—”
“Jameson, neat,” I tell her in an exhausted voice.
“I’ll take a glass of wine,” Genevieve says, and then hesitates. “Actually—” she looks at me. “I’ll take the whiskey.”
I raise an eyebrow as the flight attendant walks away. “Have you ever had whiskey before, lass?”
Genevieve tugs one of her lips between her teeth. My gaze instantly drops to her mouth, and despite the fear and chaos of the night, desire instantly floods through me. My cock twitches in my jeans, lengthening along my thigh, and it takes everything in me not to reach for her. “Maybe in a mixed drink,” she says. “I can’t remember.”
“We’ll see how you like it.” I chuckle. “It can be an acquired taste.”
“Just like you?” She raises an eyebrow in a mirror of the expression on my face, and I have to stifle a laugh.
“You’ve never tasted me, lass. You’d never get enough if you did.”
The retort comes out easily, the kind of thing that I say without thinking, but I see her face instantly heat, a flush creeping up her neck and into her cheeks. My cock stiffens at the thought of her tasting me , of those plush lips wrapped around my cock, a fantasy that I’ve had for what feels like an eternity now and will probably never see realized. In that particular moment, I can’t help but think I’d go to fucking hell and back if it meant I got to find out what it felt like to have Genevieve’s mouth wrapped around my cock.
The flight attendant comes back a moment later with two glasses of whiskey, handing one to me and one to Genevieve. When she’s satisfied that we don’t need anything else, she walks away, and I tilt my glass towards Genevieve’s.
“To you visiting Ireland for the first time,” I say with a smile. “ Sláinte.”
She tries to echo it, tripping over the pronunciation, and I smirk at her as she laughs, embarrassment coloring her cheeks. It’s adorable, the most charming thing I’ve ever seen on my otherwise elegant and prim wife, and my chest tightens as I look at her.
I don’t want to lose her. Ever.
The more time I spend with her, the more moments that we have like this—bickering and laughing and teasing each other—the more I don’t know how I’m ever going to follow through on the promise I made. How I’m ever going to sign divorce papers, knowing that it means I’ll never hear her laugh or see her roll her eyes at something I’ve said again.
We drive each other crazy in a way that I don’t know how I’m ever going to live without.
I tip my whiskey up to my lips, relishing the burn, only to hear Genevieve cough a second later, lowering her glass. She looks at me with slightly teary eyes, blinking. “It burns ,” she says, clearing her throat, and I see the glisten of the whiskey on her lips.
I don’t think. I can’t. Something clicks in my brain, something primal and necessary, something that propels me out of my seat and toward her in one swift movement that I can’t stop myself from making. All I can think about is that I want to taste that whiskey on her fucking mouth, and I wrap my hand around the back of her neck, my fingers tangling in her silky hair as I pull her lips to mine.
She tastes sweet. Sharp. Honey and vanilla, and the slightest hint of citrus. My tongue sweeps over her mouth, and I don’t know how I’ve gone this long without kissing her. How I’ve managed not to do it since our wedding day, even when I’ve been inside of her.
I don’t know how I’ll ever stop.
Genevieve gasps, and her lips part under mine. My tongue sweeps into her mouth, soaking up the taste of whiskey and her , and she lets out a sudden, small, startled moan that makes my cock impossibly hard.
All I can think about is her. My arm goes around her waist, lifting her up out of her seat as I stagger backwards to mine, pulling her into my lap. The whiskey in her glass sloshes against the rim, and I pluck it out of her hand, dropping it onto the table between the seats without ever breaking the kiss.
I pull her down against me, down onto the thick ridge of my aching cock, her legs on either side of my hips. For a moment, I can feel her giving in, her back arching beneath the pressure of my arm, her mouth still open against mine as I plunder it with my hungry tongue. I’ve forgotten that Rory is sitting at the back of the plane, that the flight attendant could walk past at any moment—that there’s anyone else on this plane with us at all. The world has narrowed down to the two of us, to how badly I want her.
I reach up to fumble with the buttons at the front of her jumpsuit, and that’s when Genevieve breaks the kiss.
She shoves my hand away before I manage to get more than the first button undone, planting her hands against my chest as she pushes herself out of my lap. She stumbles backward to her seat, her eyes wide and pupils blown, more disheveled than I’ve ever seen her. Her hair is tangled from my fingers running through it, the top button of her jumpsuit undone and showing a small V of pale flesh that makes my mouth water with the desire to trail my tongue along it, and her hands are trembling. Staring at me, she fumbles for the glass of whiskey, grabs it, and downs it in one gulp, coughing as it goes down.
“Genevieve.” Her name is a plea on my lips, a prayer. “ Fuck , lass, I need you.” I start to push myself up out of my seat, to reach for her again, but Genevieve shakes her head sharply, her hand flying up as if to block me.
I sink back down, trying to think past the pulse of lust that’s still pounding through my veins.
“That’s not—” she clears her throat. “That’s not part of our arrangement.” Her gaze flicks from my face down to the thick, straining ridge of my cock, and then away, her cheeks flushed a bright, rosy pink. “No, Rowan.”
There’s a bit of defiance in that no , as if she’s wondering if I’ll challenge it. A part of me wonders if she wants me to challenge it. But I’ve never been the type of man to force a woman to do something she doesn’t want to do. And while every inch of Genevieve’s body in my arms told me that she does want it, her voice is telling me something else.
My cock throbs painfully, and I grab my own glass of whiskey, shoving myself up out of my seat as I do. I throw it back in one gulp, striding down the aisle toward the bedroom at the back of the jet, handing the glass to the flight attendant as I pass her. I can feel my blood pounding in my veins, feel the stress and anger and heated lust of the night on the verge of driving me mad, and I barely make it into the bedroom before I have my pants undone and my cock in my fist.
I lean back against the door, my eyes closed as I run my hand feverishly along my length, trailing my tongue over my lips as I imagine that I can still taste Genevieve on them. Her mouth, sweet and spiced with whiskey, her skin soft under my hands, her body, for just a moment, as pliable and wanting as it’s been in all my fantasies.
She’s all I think about, as I stroke myself relentlessly, desperate for relief.
And her name, I feel sure, is the only one I’m ever going to call out when I come, for the rest of my fucking life.