CHAPTER ONE
NOLA
“How did I let you talk me into this?”
Looking up from my suitcase, I see Remi glaring at me from her perch on the end of my bed in our shared hotel suite. “What’s that?” I pretend to not know what she’s pouting about because in all honesty, her attempt of anger and sadness is a cute look on her.
“You made me leave my baby at home. What if she needs me? What if she forgets who I am?” Her bottom lip pops out, showing exactly where her just as adorable daughter gets her looks, as she crosses her arms in a half-hearted attempt to mean mug me.
Remi and motherhood are two peas in a pod. As soon as her little girl was born, and even when she still had the bun in her oven, I knew she was going to be an amazing mom. Remi is kind and sweet and cares about everyone around her like they are family. Add in the protective nature she’s picked up from her guard dog of a husband, and stand back—Remi is a fierce, strong, and protective mother.
Those same attributes are her Achilles heel in a way, especially this weekend. We’ve only been away from home for five hours and she’s ready to bail on our getaway and head straight back for the nest.
It’s Friday afternoon in the middle of March and Remi and I, along with our caravan of bodyguards, just arrived in Frisco, a city just north of Dallas, for the Motorcycles, Mobsters, and Mayhem book signing. Remi’s husband Tadhg has work things to deal with this weekend, so he sent an entourage of his men to drive us the four and a half hours north from where we all live in Houston.
The level of protection that comes with Remi being the wife of a made man is nothing like I grew up knowing, but the last two years of being her friend has gotten me used to the tagalongs. Sometimes it’s a little overboard, but knowing the guards being with us keeps us safe, and makes Tadhg happy, which then makes Remi happy, I can’t complain. She is my best friend and I’d deal with fifty mafia henchmen to keep a smile on her face.
“Remi, we’re only going to be gone for a day and a half. Máire will be perfectly fine with her Da and Nana.” Grabbing a hangar from the closet, I hang up my dress for tonight’s dinner and plop my behind down on the bed next to her and grasp her hand. “I know this is the first time you’ll be away from her overnight, but I won’t let you back out now. You knew you’d try, so you made me promise not to let you, remember?”
“I know,” Remi says with another sad pout. “I know she’s safe and home with her Da, but it’s still weird not just having her in the next room. I miss her so much already even though Tadhg has already text me a dozen pictures of her.”
“You deserve this vacation, Rem.” I pull her into a quick, tight hug, before we flop on our backs and stare up at the ceiling. “Hell, you’ve pretty much be on go-mode from the day you met Tadhg at that airport back in Chicago almost two years ago, and Máire isn’t even a year old yet, she won’t remember you being going for one night. You need some time to yourself.”
“And how will I be by myself when I’m in a room with hundreds and hundreds of other people?”
Her question makes both of us burst out into a fit of laughter. “Book friends are different. We don’t poop our diapers, or spit up our food, or scream and cry when we’re tired.”
“That last part isn’t exactly true,” Remi reaches over and waves her hand in my face. “I’ve seen you get awfully grumpy when you’re hangry.”
“Like you haven’t done the same.” I sass her right back with a hand of my own in her face.
Letting out a deep sigh, Remi sits up. “But you’re not wrong. I need a little ‘me time’, and what better way to do that than with a few hundred book friends.”
“You got that right, sister.” I jump up from the bed and hold out my hand for a high-five. “We’re here to have fun, talk books, meet new friends, get selfies with hot book cover models, and relax. Then tomorrow night we will get you back to your kiddo and Mr. Hottie and all will be back to normal.”
“I can’t believe you still call Tadhg that,” Remi chuckles and throws a bailed up pair of my socks at my head. “It feels like forever ago when you started that nickname.”
Two years ago, the book signing we’re attending this weekend was held down in Conroe, just outside of Houston. Remi lived in Chicago at the time, which is where she is from, and her travels down to Texas is how she and Tadhg met.
After her flight was delayed overnight, then canceled the next morning, Remi was stuck in a hotel near O’Hare airport. She had just gotten the notification from the airline that she had no flight to Texas, when a tall, messy blonde, tattooed stranger approached her and offered her a ride on his private jet—enter Tadhg O’Carroll, the man I’ve referred to as Mr. Hottie since the moment she introduced him to me over a video call.
Seeing a woman in distress, Tadhg swooped in and saved the day for Remi.
You see, Tadhg is the second son of the O’Carroll Mafia family, the strongest Irish criminal family in the state of Texas, and far beyond. When he and Remi met, Tadhg tried to keep his true identity and what his life all entails from her, but the secret didn’t last long. After a failed attempt by a Russian idiot to kidnap her, ended with Remi unconscious in the hospital, Tadhg was forced to lay all his cards out on the table when she woke up and tell her who he really was. Their journey may have started as a bumpy ride, but their love has only grown stronger since and is something no one can deny.
“Remi . . . a stór,” It’s Saturday morning, and as I walk out into the living room of our suite to finish getting ready to head down to the book signing, I can hear Tadhg trying to talk Remi off the ledge again. That man may be a lethal assassin, but he is a giant, mushy teddy bear when it comes to his wife and daughter. “The guys will be ready to drive y’all home this afternoon when you’re done maxing out my credit card.”
“I can’t help it that I miss you and Máire.” Remi finishes tying her shoes and waves when she sees me. She has her phone propped up on the coffee table and the cutest blue eyed cherub face is filling the screen. “Morning, Nola. How’d you sleep?”
“Good morning.” I head straight for the white paper cup of coffee, with the all too familiar green face of a smiling woman on it, that Remi is holding out for me. “Amazing, thank you for asking. That bed is like a damn cloud. I didn’t want to get up.”
“If I wasn’t missing home so much, I’d still be under those covers,” she says with a groan, followed by a yawn. “I’ve been up for two hours, and if we didn’t need to be downstairs to get in line in thirty minutes, I’d crawl back in for a nap.”
“I’m glad this is an event that starts at a reasonable hour.”
“Preach,” Remi says after taking a sip of her own coffee.
“And Tadhg, be sure to thank whichever of your guys that remembered my order.” I salute him with my beloved drink even though he can’t see me.
“I’ll do that,” he replies with a chuckle.
“What is your coffee flavor of choice?” A different and deeper voice floats over the phone line and I do everything in my power to not let the feelings it shoots through my body show. Oh, the things I’ve dreamed, imagining that voice whispering dirty things in my ear—it’d make a nun blush and faint from her vapors. Not that I’d ever admit that out loud.
Taking a deep breath to try and calm the crazy snare drum beat that my heart has started, I step a little closer to the phone screen, but not close enough so he can see me, and see the face of the man who drives me wild even though I can never do anything about it.
Fergus Finnegan O’Carroll.
Tadhg’s older brother, also the head of the O’Carroll Mafia family, has sent my heart, and lady bits, into a tizzy several times since the moment we met almost two years ago. It’s like I drew a picture of my dream man, and God created him and plopped his fine ass in front of me to torture me and my dreams for the rest of my life.
With his not long but not too short ultra dark brown hair that I just want to run my fingers through, his sexy as fuck beard that is always neat and trimmed without a strand out of place, and the craziest bright blue eyes I’ve ever seen, it was inevitable that I would have a crush on Fergus and feel the need to change my panties every time he walked into the room. Hell, I don’t think there is a woman who crosses his path who doesn’t, but being more than his friend just isn’t in the cards for me. I hate it, it’s pure torture sometimes, but I’ve gotten used to it. My game face is stronger because of it.
Mixing the thought of pleasure and friendship has never worked well for me. I dated the brother of a friend for six months back in college and it blew up in my face. When I broke up with him, because the feelings just weren’t there anymore, I lost my friend too. When I tried to tell her it was the best for the both of us, because who wanted to be in a relationship with someone who isn’t in love with them, she wouldn’t listen. She blamed me for her brother’s broken heart and we never talked again. It would kill me if the same thing happened to me and Remi if I tried to be with Fergus and it didn’t work . . . it’s just not worth the risk.
“If I had to guess, I’d say you have more creamer than actual coffee in that cup.” Tadhg’s voice snaps me back to reality.
“Hi Fergus,” Remi chimes in, saving me from answering for a brief moment. “And yes, her coffee is more french vanilla than actual coffee beans.”
“I can’t help that I like what I like.” I put on my shielded smile and step behind Remi so I’m also in the camera’s frame. And that’s when I notice something I never expected.
Fergus is wearing glasses! He wasn’t wearing them two seconds ago . . . but it makes his level on the hotness meter skyrocket.
“I knew it,” his eyes lock with mine like the miles between us don’t exist. “Sweet coffee for a damn sweet woman.”
Three, two, one—and my cheeks are on fire. I’ve never been able to hide my blush when flustered, and there is no denying it now. “Be careful now,” I playfully sass him with a wink. “If you keep talking like that, I’m gonna think you’re flirting with me Fergie.”
He squints behind those almost nerdy black rims that give him a little bit of a Clark Kent vibe and it’s like I can feel his growl through the phone. “And what if I am flirting with you, álainn?”
“Alright, alright,” Remi snatches her phone from the table and swats me away with a laugh, “that’s enough of that out of you two. No flirting allowed around my baby.”
“Yes, mom,” I shoot her a wink then stick my tongue out at her.
To be honest, I don’t know if her interruption is a good or bad thing. While I know nothing will come of it, Fergus and I have had a few moments of cheeky harmless flirting, but that’s all it is—harmless. We’re friends who have fun pushing each other’s buttons during innocent moments of fun. He’s never even hugged me, much less been close enough to kiss me or to be anything anywhere near intimate. Hell, this is the first time I’ve ever called him anything other than his full first name. I have no idea where the cutesy shortened version came from, but I can’t say I didn’t get the warm and fuzzies from his reaction.
Ducking back into my room, I take a minute to catch my breath. Shaking out my hands to toss off any residual sexual tension, I’m ready to get this show on the road. I tuck my driver’s license, credit card, and some cash in the front pocket of my shorts, and check myself out in the mirror one last time.
In all black . . . I’m not usually one to toot my own horn, but damn I look good.
Denim cutoff shorts hug my backside like a second skin, a cropped t-shirt with a pink skull makes the under peekaboo highlights in my chocolate brown hair pop, and Converse Chuck Taylor low tops finish off my look. I’m comfortable, and cute if I do say so myself.
Remi is still talking to Tadhg as I unfold my utility cart on wheels and walk back out to where she’s waiting by the suite door.
“And don’t think I haven’t seen that spreadsheet you put together, wife. You’ve preordered so much, I’ll have to put an addition on the house to expand your library for all the books you’re about to get,” Tadhg says as I pull the door shut behind us and head for the elevator.
“I didn’t order that many,” she tries to lie to her husband as she tugs her currently empty, but not for long, rolling cart that matches mine alongside.
“Yea, okay. Whatever you have to tell yourself.” I insert myself into their silly conversation with an eye roll.
“Excuse me?” Remi pushes the button for floor two as we step into the elevator. “Pot meet kettle. I saw your spreadsheet. You ordered the entire backlist of books from how many authors? It was six at my last count.”
“No comment.” I mime zipping my lips.
“Do I need to send a moving truck to haul both of your loot back?” Tadhg asks, making us both snicker.
“No,” we say in unison. We reach our destination and when the elevator doors slide open, the volume of voices is jarring for a second.
“But I wouldn’t say no to a few cardboard boxes so we can pack them for a safe journey home.” Remi taps a few buttons ending the video chat, switching to a call and putting the phone to her ear. “But nothing super big. Books are heavy as heck. Too big and we won’t be able to lift the dang things.”
As she wraps up her call, I lead us to the end of the registration line. We’re probably thirty or so people back, so getting checked in goes fairly quick. After we tuck our phones in our back pockets, we loop our VIP badge lanyards around our necks, and wait for the doors to open.