CHAPTER TWO
FERGUS
The sun has barely begun its descent behind the skyline, casting a warm golden hue through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the luxury hotel room I’m more or less hiding in. No one except my head of security knows I left Houston and made the four hour trek north to Frisco solo, and I’d like to keep it that way for a few more minutes.
The city below buzzes with life, a sense of urgency that is intoxicating in a way that would be strange to most. In the life I live, I’m very much used to this feeling and my body feeds off of it. One can’t have my job, leading as many people as I do, being responsible for everyone in that periphery, without a bit of chaotic energy coursing through their veins. It can be a bit exhausting at times, but don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t trade being the leader of my family for anything.
But for what is about to happen, I need it. Not one to ever chicken out of something once I make a decision, I need to harness all the energy.
Nola Taylor. Hearing her voice this morning, it broke and healed something inside of me all at the same time. When she winked at me, and joked with me about flirting with her, it was the final straw that broke the camel’s back. I needed to see her like I needed my next breath, and not just through my sister-in-law’s phone screen.
Pretending I had an emergency pop up, I rushed out of my brother’s house like my ass was on fire. I had somewhere else I needed to be.
So here I am, about two hundred and fifty miles from home, anxiously waiting for Nola to appear.
Standing by the window, as I watch the tiny people dart between their cars and the various stores and restaurants below us in the district, everyone’s life rushing by while mine is hanging in the balance waiting for time to determine if this trip was a mistake or the best decision I’ve ever made.
I hear the main door to the suite open with a click and everything outside fades into irrelevance. There could be an asteroid barreling its way to Earth and I wouldn’t be able to care less. My focus remains locked solely on the woman who just stepped into the bedroom.
She freezes as soon as she sees me. “Fergus?”
God damn is she stunning. Even looking a little worn out from hours on her feet, the exhaustion I see in her eyes takes nothing away from her beauty.
“Nola.” I finally step away from my perch by the window and make my way to her. “Did you have fun today?”
She nods in response and takes a step toward me, but then stops again and looks around the room like she’s just realizing where she is. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you.” I tell her like it isn’t obvious. To me it is, but I don’t think she does . . . but she will.
“Me?”
“There’s no one else in your bedroom, Nola.”
I circle behind her to close the door, but it’s quickly pushed back at me and Remi comes to a screeching halt when she sees me.
“What the fuck?”
“Hey Remi.” I smile down at my tiny sprite of a sister-in-law. If I didn’t love her so much, I would tell her to fuck off and just shut the door in her face.
But I don’t do that. I never would. Remi is Nola’s best friend, so that means unless I want this night to end with both women kicking me out and followed by my brother shooting me with one of his high powered rifles, I need to be nice to the woman shooting lasers at me from her eyeballs.
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to see Nola.” That’s the short and sweet version of why I’m in this room, but it’s all she needs to know for now. “Are you all packed and ready to head home? Declan and Shane will take you.”
Hands on her hips, she keeps firing questions. “And what about Nola? How is she getting home? Why are you really here? Does Tadhg know you came? Did he put you up to this?”
“No, Tadhg doesn’t know I’m here, but I’m sure you’ll tell him all about it on your ride home.” Resting my hands on her shoulders, I steer Remi backward out of the room a few steps. Lowering my voice so only she can hear me, I give her only the answers she needs. “Remi, you know I love you, but you need to let this go for right now. This is something I’ve put off for too long, so can you trust that I know what I’m doing and everything will be okay?”
And just like that, the light bulb goes off above her head. With a tiny hop and a squeal pinched between her lips, Remi wraps me in a tight, quick hug then steps back, but not before poking me surprisingly hard in the chest. “Don’t break her heart, Fergus. I’m trusting you.”
“That’s the last thing on my mind,” I place my right hand over my heart and tell her the God’s honest truth.
And with a short nod, she’s gone.
Now my work really begins.
Shutting the door with no interruptions this time, I find Nola seated on the plush couch on the far side of the room, her fingers nervously twisting a few of the frayed strings hanging from the bottom of her shorts. While I’ve seen her in similar outfits before, maybe even this same one, everything about this moment is different than ever before.
This moment—the reason that we’re alone for the first time ever—it’s lifechanging.
If what I hope is about to happen tonight happens, our friendship will take a leap into another stratosphere, morphing into something more electric, more overwhelming . . . more everything. The air between us charges with palpable tension, a current that crackles as our eyes lock—those deep pools give me a whole new meaning of home.
Her medium brown hair falls over her shoulders, with a few flashes of pink strands mix in the longer strands, framing a face that is both familiar and mesmerizingly new like I’m seeing it again for the first time.
Deep within me, the yearning that I could no longer ignore pulls me to her.
“Fergus?” Her voice is soft, almost a whisper, but it slices through the silence like a knife. “What’s going on?”
“Don’t you get it?” I reply, trying not to sound like a bumbling idiot. “After hearing your voice this morning, I needed to see you. I couldn’t not to be with you.”
“But why?”
My heart races as I sit down beside her, our knees brushing against each other’s. The heat radiating from her skin sears through the wool fabric of my Brioni suit pants, igniting a shiver that spreads throughout my entire body. Touching her skin to skin for the first time, I place my hands on top of her still fidgeting fingers and pull them free, then intertwine them with mine. Feeling the softness of her skin against mine, it ignites a fire in my stomach, a yearning I could no longer contain.
“Oh, Nola. Did I wait too long to do this? Too long to try and make you mine?”
“Yours?” she says with a small gasp, like she never imagined my words as possible.
“Yes.” I nod. “Mine.”
Nola’s eyes drop and she watches my thumbs rub along the back of her hands for a few seconds. When she finally looks back up at me, there is a sparkle in her eyes I’ve seen several times before. It’s her happy smile. The one she gives with no guards or restraint. “How long have you felt like this? And why now?”
“When you sassed me about maybe flirting with you this morning, I felt like maybe you were giving me the green light. It was like you were opening the door to something different and I had to step through it to see if I was right.” I lift one of her hands, bringing her skin to my lips for the first time. “Was I right?”
Her lips curl into an even bigger smile, and I watch the last sliver of underlying nervousness disappear from her gaze. “Am I crazy for saying that I felt something different too?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Will this change us?”
“Everything will be different. But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing.”
We sit in silence, eyes locked as a moment that feels as heavy as the velvet curtains framing the window passes. Finally, she breaks the stillness. “This may make me sound like a teenage girl, but I’ve had a crush on you since the day we met,” she confesses, with a small chuckle.
“Me too.” The admission slips from my lips before I can stop it. I see the surprise glow in her eyes, followed by something deeper—a flicker of hope, perhaps. I take a deep breath, summoning my courage. “I’ve had feelings for you, deeper than friendship, from day one but I was too afraid to say anything and pop the bubble.”
The weight of my confession hangs in the air, electrifying the space between us, until that bubble burst and she starts laughing so hard. “I thought I was the only one who felt that way,” she admits before pulling one of her hands free of mine to wipe away the tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Why didn’t we say anything sooner?” I ask, letting my heart soak in all the joy and laughter we’re now both sharing. I don’t laugh often, but coming from Nola, it’s infectious. “I’ve wanted to tell you for so long.”
“I was scared.” We both lean in slightly, the magnetic pull between us undeniable as our foreheads meet. “Scared of ruining what we had, of losing you. Of losing my friendship with Remi.”
Her honesty bounces around within me, striking a chord because I felt the same way for two years. “I felt the same way, but . . . but now I think we could have something more. Something beautiful and just for us without having to worry about anyone or anything else interfering.”
“You know Remi is going to try and butt in every chance she can get?” Nola whispers with a cheeky smile. “She will want to know everything.”
“I have no doubt.” I reply with a small smile of my own.
“What if we don’t work?”
“How about this?” I ask, my voice low, trying to keep my tone steady in the face of the hurricane of emotions swirling inside. “Will you let us try? Now that we’ve both admitted to having feelings for each other, there’s no going back anyway. We have to try.”
Her eyes glisten as she nods, a single tear escaping down her cheek. “I want to try.”
“Thank fucking God.” Once the words pass my lips, there is no more holding back. I attack Nola and kiss her with every fiber of my being. I cradle her face in my palms and devour her softness, her sweetness. I take everything she gives, and then even more.
I feel Nola’s hand find its way to my neck, her fingers curling gently, urging me closer as her fingernails scrape up into my hair. There is no holding back the growl I groan against her lips as she tugs the longer strands on the top.
“Nola.”
“I need you, Fergus,” she pants breaths against my lips between my kisses. “Please.”
“Since you asked so nicely.”