Chapter Twenty-Three Caterina
In the days after Callum and I fell asleep in each other”s arms, I expected it to bring us closer. But something about being so emotionally vulnerable in front of me had closed him off. He’d barely mumbled more than a greeting to me this week, not to mention he’d come home after midnight every single night.
After the first night he’d come in and ignored me, I’d stopped waiting up on the couch for him. Instead, I stayed awake reading in bed until I heard his footsteps on the stairs. Then I would snap the light off and pretend to be sleeping.
I wasn’t sure why I cared that he had shut me out. It wasn’t like I entered our marriage desperately in love with him. But I knew if we were to ever consummate our marriage, I would have to feel something for him. I couldn’t just sleep with him out of duty and obligation. The sinful part of me was only too eager to find out anything and everything about sex.
This morning after waking up to an empty bed, I threw on a robe over my pajamas and headed downstairs. As usual all the Kavanaugh brothers were around the table, as well as Seamus. Although the others were talking, Callum’s attention was focused on his iPad.
I took the seat to the right of him. As I reached over to grab a piece of toast, he glanced up. “Good morning,” I said.
“Morning.”
After setting down a platter of eggs, Lorna smiled at me. “Caterina, I was thinking we could cook the corned beef for the boys tonight.”
When I opened my mouth to agree with her, Callum shook his head. “We’ll all be home late, so don’t expect us for dinner.”
I jerked my gaze from Lorna’s to stare at him. “You’re all going to be late?” It was unusual for all the brothers to be gone. While they might trickle in at different times, they were all usually around for dinner. I’d especially needed their companionship the past week with Callum’s physical and emotional absence.
Callum’s pointed look reminded me not to question him about business. When he didn’t answer me, Dare replied, “Tonight’s the opening for our new club.”
My brows shot up in surprise. “You guys own a club?”
“Yes,” Callum replied as he forcefully speared his eggs.
“What kind of club?”
“A nightclub.”
I sat a little straighter in my chair. “I’ve never been to a nightclub.”
“That doesn’t surprise me, Sister Sassy,” Dare mused with a grin.
After playfully kicking his foot under the table, I turned back to Callum, “Before I was in the order, I always wanted to go to one.”
“That’s good to know,” he replied to his iPad, rather than looking at me.
With a huff, I crossed my arms over my chest. “Why aren’t you inviting me to come with you?”
“Because you don’t need to be there,” Callum gritted out.
“But don’t most wives attend business parties?”
“They do,” Dare replied, as he shot Callum a crooked grin. Callum scowled back at him.
“Then why can’t I?”
Callum cocked a brow at me. “With your background, I didn’t think it would be something you would enjoy.”
“Now you care about my background? It certainly didn’t seem to bother you when you were kidnapping me from the Sacred Heart.”
“You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?”
“Because you kidnapped me!”
“It was a necessary detainment,” he grumbled.
“Fine. You can let me come to the club to make up for kidnapping me.”
“I won’t be guilted or bribed into letting you come, Kitten.”
“Come on, Cal. Let the girl come with us,” Dare said. After waggling his brows, he added, “Get her a hot little number to wear, and she’ll be some killer arm candy for you.”
While I blushed at his words, Callum grunted. “She’s not a piece of meat for me to parade around.”
“No, I’m your prisoner,” I replied more to my plate than him.
“Since we arrived, have I kept you under lock and key?”
“You might as well have considering you’ve only let me go shopping or for a walk under armed guard.”
“I’ve also let you volunteer everyday at St. Francis’s.”
“The operative word is let. People let prisoners do things.”
“There’s too many vices at a club for an innocent like you,” Callum replied around the mouth of his coffee cup.
“Our reception had alcohol and dancing. What’s so different about this?”
Dare snorted. “At the reception, there was no risk of people fucking out in the open or someone grabbing your tits or arse.”
At my gasp of horror, Callum slammed his hand down on the table. “Never speak that way in front of Caterina!”
With a roll of his blue eyes, Dare replied, “My apologies.”
“It’s okay,” I replied. Turning to Callum, I added, “In spite of what Dare said could happen, I still want to go.”
Callum slowly shook his head. “You’ll be the death of me, woman.”
“Let her go, Cal,” Quinn urged.
Glowering at him, Callum replied, “Not you, too. I expect as much from Dare, but you’re supposed to be the fucking voice of reason.”
“How much trouble can she possibly get into with the four of us there along with our men?”
Callum turned his red-hot stare to me. “Don’t ever underestimate this one. Remember?”
As I rolled my eyes, Quinn chuckled. “She really has been cooped up here like a prisoner. She deserves to cut loose and have some fun.”
With a beaming smile, I replied, “Thank you.” Quinn winked at me before going back to his eggs.
Callum pinched the bridge of his nose. Leaning forward in my chair, I peered imploringly at him. “Please let me go. You can consider it a belated 21st birthday gift since I just celebrated it the day before you kidnapped me. Well, it was sorta the day of since it had just turned midnight.”
He turned his head to me. “I almost kidnapped you on your birthday?” When I nodded, he sighed. “Fine. You can accompany me tonight to the opening of the club.”
At my happy shriek, he merely rolled his eyes and went back to his iPad. “I’ll need to go shopping for a dress.”
“Owen can take you,” he mumbled without looking at me.
“What time do I need to be ready tonight?”
“We’ll leave at seven. There will be press and some preliminary events before we open at eight.” He then turned his attention back to his iPad and didn’t speak to me again for the rest of breakfast.
But I didn’t care anymore. Tonight I would make sure he wouldn’t be able to look at anything or anyone else but me.
After the men left for the morning, the bodyguard Callum had assigned me, Owen, accompanied me to one of the high-end boutiques. With a beefy, bodybuilder physique, Owen appeared in his mid-thirties, and he was a man of few words. He didn’t even converse with the driver. Instead, he stared out the window on high alert.
He kept the same steely reserve when we entered the boutique as if at any moment he expected an assassin to pop out from a rack of clothes. Jessica, a saleslady I’d worked with before, immediately came over to help me. “Mrs. Kavanaugh, it’s lovely seeing you again. What are you looking for today?”
“I need a dress that will give any man with a pulse a hard reaction.”
While she laughed, Owen’s face remained impassive. “I think I have several numbers that might work,” Jessica replied before leading me over to the racks. After pulling several dresses, Jessica set me up in the dressing room. I slipped on the first one–a form fitting red dress with thin spaghetti straps and a bodice encrusted in silver sparkles that barely covered my boobs.
When I came out to get a better look in front of the tri-fold mirror, Owen’s eyes bulged out of his head. “Do you like it?”
“I’m not at liberty to say, Mrs. Kavanaugh.”
“Why not?”
In a strangled voice, he replied, “Because your husband would kill me.”
Tilting my head, I replied, “From your response, I imagine you like it, but you’re too afraid to say.”
His expression became ashen. “Ma’am, please. I like my head where it belongs on my shoulders.”
My teasing expression faded. “You’re serious.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You really think my husband would kill you simply for telling me you liked my dress?”
“Mr. Kavanaugh spoke to all of us bodyguards about what respecting you entailed and what would happen if we didn’t.”
I blinked at him. I couldn’t believe Callum cared that his bodyguards might look at me. It wasn’t like we were in a real marriage. At the same time, I didn’t want Owen to suffer. “Then I’m sorry I asked you. I don’t want you to get in any trouble.”
Owen nodded. “Thank you, ma’am.”
Without another word, I slipped back into the dressing room. Taking my phone out of my purse, I dialed Callum. “Hello, Kitten,” he mumbled after he answered on the second ring.
Without even a hello, I demanded, “Did you threaten the bodyguards that you would kill them if they looked at me?”
“No.”
“Well, Owen seems to think that.”
“I threatened them if they leered at you in any way.”
“Callum, that’s insane.”
“You are my wife, and you belong to me. If they disrespect you, then they disrespect me.”
“I currently have a three-hundred-pound bodyguard practically peeing his pants because I dared to ask him if he liked my dress.”
A low growl came through the phone. “He’s close to where you are naked?”
I rolled my eyes. “I have on my underwear.”
“I don’t care.”
“He’s not right outside. He’s staying a respectful distance away.”
“Good. He’s a valuable soldier. I would hate to have to lose him.”
“Could you please be a little less psychotic?”
“Show me the dress.”
“Excuse me?”
“I want to see what you’re wearing.”
“Um, okay.” I put him on speaker phone and then quickly snapped a picture.
After texting him the picture, he snarled, “Motherfucker!”
“What’s the problem?”
“The problem, my dear wife, is you appear to be missing half your dress considering how much leg you’re showing. For fuck’s sake, if I were to see it from behind, I’d wager your arse would be hanging out.”
I scowled at the phone. “I don’t think it shows that much. I’m tall, so everything tends to be shorter on me.”
“You’ve only been out of the order a few weeks, and you’re already dressing like a fallen woman.”
With a gasp, I replied, “I know you didn’t just bring up the order.” Although there were times I swore Callum knew me far too well, there was no way he could have a grasp on the level of guilt I carried about leaving the order.
“Perhaps reminding you of it will help you make better choices.”
“You know what? Since I’m married to a fallen Irish mobster, perhaps I should dress the part,” I hissed.
“I’m done speaking to you about this. Pick another dress.”
And then he had the audacity to hang up on me. “Two can play at this game,” I muttered.
At a knock on the dressing room door, I called, “Yes?”
Jessica replied, “I was just checking to see how things were coming along.”
With a smile, I opened the door. “I’ll take this one.”