7. Silas
7
SILAS
I worked hard not to fucking jump out of the fucking car as soon as Maverick came to a stop in the middle of fucking nowhere.
We had been silent the entire ride here, and for once, it wasn’t because we were all trying to keep from exploding.
The opposite.
The three of us got out of the car at the same time, Maverick taking in his surroundings. We found Gareth and Sean right away, leaning against the hood of the car. They straightened when we approached.
“Are you sure?” I asked by way of greeting.
Sean nodded. “Yes, sir. Gareth saw her at the drugstore, and I followed her here when she got on the bus. She’s staying in room 107.”
He pointed to the motel and in the general direction of the room.
Fuck me.
I didn’t want to believe it until I laid my eyes on her, but…
Fuck me.
I worked hard not to show any reaction to his words. Everyone already knew the Tiernan brothers took Daniel Hayes’ daughter. And now that there were words out there that she meant something to us—she meant everything— it had put a target on her back. These might be our men, our soldiers, but it didn’t fucking mean I would give them access to my thoughts and feelings.
“And she’s safe?” Killian asked.
“Yes. We’ve been here the entire time. No one came to her door, and she hasn’t made any move to leave the room since.”
Maverick nodded. “You did good. You can go now.”
“Yes, sir,” they both said before getting in the car and driving off, leaving just the three of us and a fucking motel door that separated us from something so infinitely precious.
How familiar this fucking setting was. Only there hadn’t been so much on the line that first time we went looking for her.
We didn’t say anything to each other as we took in the door. I didn’t know what my brothers were feeling or thinking. I couldn’t bring myself to care because we finally fucking found her.
I could fucking weep with joy. I wouldn’t because I was a fucking Tiernan, but hell.
“What are we waiting for?” I asked. Now that I had my emotions under control, I was getting impatient to see my girl. I couldn’t fucking wait to hold her tightly in my arms and ensure she would never leave. After I give her a stern talking to about running away, and fuck, maybe redden her pale ass for the shit she put us through.
I couldn’t fucking wait.
Maverick placed his hand on my chest to stop me from going to her. “Wait. We can’t just show up. She’ll freak out.”
“So?” I asked. I didn’t see the fucking problem. Of course, she would freak out. There was no way around it. But she could freak out all she wanted. There would be no escape this time. Not now. I wasn’t a man who made the same mistake twice.
Maverick shook his head, shooting me a look he hadn’t shot me since I was five and didn’t understand the dynamic of our family yet.
I wasn’t fucking five anymore.
“Do you really think that’s a good idea?” he asked.
I didn’t answer because that sounded like a trick question. I narrowed my eyes at him.
He let out a small sigh. “I assume you want to keep her, no?”
I scoffed. “And you don’t?”
Because this past week had been hell. And I knew I wasn’t the only one going through it. As much as Maverick and Killian didn’t say shit, I could see it all over their faces. Her leaving had affected us, and that was the truth, whether or not they wanted to admit to it.
“You know that’s not what I meant,” he said, speaking slowly.
“No, we’re not doing this again. You can act indifferent all you want, and”—I pointed at Killian—“you can act cold if you want, but you both can’t fucking hide the truth from me.”
Killian, for his part, had been quiet the entire time. I didn’t want to delve into the fucker’s moodiness. I wasn’t in the mood .
I made a move to head toward the motel room when Killian spoke, stopping me in my tracks. “I want her.”
I turned around and took him in.
He rolled his eyes. “I’m not just fucking saying it, so stop looking at me like that, or I’m going to start throwing hands.”
My eyebrows rose at that.
He smiled a little. “Must have been going easy on you, else you wouldn’t be walking around so fucking cocky.”
I didn’t respond to that, and Killian looked off to the side. It wasn’t an easy feat trying to make any of my brothers uneasy, but Killian almost looked it.
“I want her, okay, Silas. You fucking won.”
“This isn’t about winning or losing.”
“Yeah, well, you still fucking did. You were right. She… is different. And I want her. And I want to keep her.”
“And you’ll fucking lay Lilliana to rest?”
I meant that in more than just the physical sense. I had wanted to get my hands on the bitch and make sure she stopped breathing. I didn’t lay my hands on women. Didn’t need to. On the rare occasion when we did deal with women who had betrayed us or were a danger to us, we usually gave them an easy death. A bullet to the head and it was done with.
But Lilliana was personal, and had Killian given me the go-ahead, I would have gone off hunting the bitch.
“I won’t let what happened with Lilliana affect what will happen between Mila and me.”
That wasn’t a fucking answer. At least, not the one I wanted anyway. One look at Maverick, and I knew he felt the same.
“But Maverick is right. We can’t just barge in and demand she come home with us,” Killian said.
“Who said anything about demanding her to come home?” I asked.
Maverick shook his head. “We can’t just go in and do what we’d done back in New Orleans.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Why? It worked so well the first time.”
I didn’t fucking care how we did it; I just fucking needed her in my arms.
“She’ll hate us for it,” Maverick said, making me pull up short. “And if you want to keep her, she needs to decide to be with us on her own.”
I gritted my teeth and looked away from my brothers. I knew what they said made sense, but doing things their way would mean waiting. And I didn’t fucking want to wait any longer.
Maverick came up to me and placed his hand on my shoulder. “You’ve always been so hotheaded. And stubborn. We both know it, even when you try to appear laid-back. It makes you forget all the things I’ve taught you.”
I wanted to shrug off his touch and deny his words. But hell, I knew he was telling the truth. I was getting impatient, and I forgot all about the things that make for a successful hunt.
“Be patient. She’s ours, and she’s not going anywhere. I promise,” Maverick said softly.
I let out a small sigh. My brothers relaxed, knowing they got me right where they wanted me.
“Fine. Then what are we doing?”
“Well, right now, I’d say we go see if Mila has any neighbors.”
I smiled, seeing where he was going with this.
Whether or not she had anyone in the rooms next to her didn’t matter. Because by the end of the night, she would be surrounded on both sides by us.
Protected by us.
Killian and I shared one room to the left of Mila, and Maverick took the one on the right.
I looked around the run-down place, feeling my lips pulling back in a sneer from disgust.
“What, is this not to your taste, princess?” Killian asked from where he sat on his bed, already getting settled in. “Might I remind you we’ve stayed in places worse than this?”
Fuck, I didn’t need a reminder. I might have been younger than my brothers back then when we were forced to flee Chicago, but I remembered everything. All those restless nights, all the crappy places we had to stay at until we could find a way into Las Vegas, and even then, our uncle wasn’t an easy man to reach.
Fionn Tiernan was one of the most feared men in Las Vegas in his prime. He had taken over the Las Vegas scene by storm, and it was mostly because the paranoid bastard was as ruthless as he was careful.
He didn’t trust anyone, not even his wife, who was nothing more than a trophy in his arms until he decided she’d gotten too old, and he killed her and married a newer, younger version of her. But there was no one he mistrusted more than his older brother, Declan Tiernan, our dad. Not that I blamed the fucker.
If Fionn was considered paranoid and ruthless, then our dad was downright fucking psychotic and probably played a huge role in why our uncle was the way he was.
Us, being Declan Tiernan’s children didn’t help one bit. It wasn’t like we were welcomed to Las Vegas with open arms.
I shook away the memory.
“I don’t fucking care about the state of this shitty motel room. I can fucking sleep under a bridge. But I’m pretty sure Mila’s room is the exact replica of this room and is probably just as fucking shitty.”
That shut Killian up.
Jesus, but this motel was probably worse than the one she stayed in back in New Orleans.
My fists clenched as I took in the room once more, resisting the urge to fucking break everything in it. Mila should be treated like a princess. She deserved nothing less than the best things money could buy, and once I got her back in my arms, that would always be the fucking case for her.
The only thing stopping me was knowing Mila might hear, and either she’d try to investigate the noise, or it would scare her for the rest of the night, and she might leave the place.
Not that she would be able to escape me now that I’ve found her, but that was more an inconvenience that I didn’t want.
I pushed away from the wall I had been leaning on.
“I’m gonna catch a quick shower,” I muttered. I closed the door behind me, not waiting for his reply. I turned on the shower and, while waiting for it to warm, took in myself in the mirror.
I cupped my jaw, feeling the beard that had grown out from the week and my tired eyes. I hadn’t fucking slept much since she left. There had been times in the business that required us to stay up for days, hell, weeks on end, only getting a few hours of shut-eye here and there, and I hadn’t felt this drained.
What would Mila think once she got a look at me? I shut my eyes. It wasn’t like I had paid any attention to my looks, but for the first time, I wondered if I looked too… much. Too savage, too unhuman .
Fuck me, but her leaving really fucked me up.
Without another thought, I threw off my clothes and hopped into the shower, shutting out the world, even for a little while.