26. Finn
Chapter 26
Finn
Well, fuck.
Riley Brennan…has a crush on me? And has for years? What the hell does that even mean? She’s told me plain as day she’s sworn off relationships. Besides, when Harper returns— if she returns—I’m still technically her fiancé.
I want Riley. I crave Riley. I desire Riley.
But acknowledging anything deeper than this mutual attraction and chemistry we have would be foolish. The minute I let my heart get involved, I endanger Riley’s life. Well, more than I already have.
I can’t ever fall in love with Riley. My love for Bri ultimately killed her. I won’t make the same mistake twice.
Will I live in the moment and soak up every second of every day that I have to spend with Riley, even though we have an inevitable expiration date?
Absolutely.
Keep it light, Finn. Don’t try to analyze her crush on you. Just live in the present.
I bend down, arm circling her legs.
“ Finn ?” She gasps my name as I throw her over my shoulder.
Moments later, I deposit her on my bed and anchor her to the mattress with my body. “You are so fucking sexy. I can’t believe you’ve been holding out on me. Why did you wait all this time to tell me that?”
She blushes, and I’m about to find out just how far that blush goes. “Not like I could admit I liked an enforcer, especially one way older than me.”
“Way older?” Grazing her navel with my teeth, I rip off the leggings she wore downstairs with vengeful fingers. I kiss her pussy over her panties, inhaling her scent like ambrosia. Spiced earth and lavender. “You’re going to pay for that comment.”
Tonight, she’s mine, and I have no intention of letting her go.
Vibration drags me from rest.
With difficulty, I tear my gaze from Riley’s idyllic sleeping face and rotate my head. That buzzing. My phone or?—
“Mmmm,” Riley groans, stretching like a cat against my chest. I freeze beneath her, desperate to do something about this morning wood.
It would be too easy to slip my stiff cock into her soft, supple ass. My brain spirals away into my anal wake-up call fantasy, all the blood in my body rushing south.
With a big breath, Riley rolls off me, her hand groping my bedside table until her fingers find the source of the buzzing. Eyes still closed, half asleep, she tucks the phone to her ear and answers the call.
A sound comes out of her mouth that doesn’t resemble human language, but the caller on the other end immediately begins talking. For a few seconds, Riley still appears completely unconscious as she holds her phone to her head while a rapid succession of sentences I can’t quite parse funnels into her ear.
Then her eyes fly open, and she jerks up from bed. “ Really ?”
A moment later, Riley startles, noticing for the first time that I’m staring at her. Her cheeks redden, and she settles her soft, cool hand over my face to stop me from watching her. “Wait, wait, wait. Ann, start over. Who came by?”
I kiss her palm as many times as I can before she retracts her hand and mouths to me, Cut it out!
“Henry said that?”
Unable to resist, I push her back down on my bed and climb over her, pinning her to the sheets. Before she can protest, I kiss her nose and lean our foreheads together.
“Your hair is like modern art,” I whisper.
She nails me in the back of the head with a pillow, annoyance curving her mouth.
I bite her plump lower lip, drawing her into a good morning kiss while the phone’s still pressed to her ear. Can’t remember the last time I actually thought it was a good morning.
She pushes my chin back with her fingers before I get carried away.
“Thanks for calling me. I’ll get there as soon as I can.”
Finn watches me end the call. “Who was that?”
“My landlords.” She touches my face. “Someone was outside my apartment. What if it’s Harper?”
I don’t know what I expected her to say, but definitely not that.
Does that mean Riley’s going to disappear?
Anxiety tightens my muscles. I’m not ready to lose her. We need more time.
“Let’s go see.” There’s an unfamiliar edge in her voice that puts me on high alert. “Together.”
I seal my lips over hers and kiss her savagely. When I pull away, that hazy, dizzy gleam is in her eyes, and I feel her heart racing beneath my chest.
“Okay.”
In record time, we dress, scarf down protein shakes, and climb into the car to cross the miles from the Gallagher estate to Riley’s apartment.
I was right about that edge in Riley’s voice. Whatever it is, it’s spread throughout her whole body. Sitting beside me in the passenger seat, she seems off-kilter.
Her bouncing knee distracts me.
I glance her way. “What did they say exactly?”
“They said someone was outside my apartment.”
“And?”
“The person was wearing a jacket with a hood, and they couldn’t tell who it was. I have a bad feeling.” Riley shakes her head, fingers squeezing that pendant she always wears. “If it’s Harper, why didn’t she call me?”
Riley’s uneasiness is contagious. I press down on the gas pedal, accelerating through the Manhattan streets toward Chinatown.
I turn left onto her street and dive into a metered parking space across from Blooms A to Z. Riley hops out before I get the gearshift in park, jogging across the street into the alleyway that leads to her staircase.
“Riley, wait! This could be a trap.”
She’s already gone.
Her urgency sets off alarm bells in the back of my mind. Something’s wrong, but she won’t tell me what exactly. I know she and Harper have a complicated relationship. In the months before the wedding, Harper herself mentioned that much.
Without knowing any details, I feel like I’m walking in blind when I get up to her apartment. I expect to hear Riley and Harper talking when I come through the door, but only silence greets me. I soon find Riley standing alone in her den.
If she looked nervous in the car, now she’s borderline panicked. I’m just relieved no one ambushed her.
“Riley.” I reach for her on instinct, rubbing my hands down her arms. “Talk to me.”
“Harper’s a little old-school sometimes. She leaves notes.” Riley’s worried eyes come to mine, a small bit of hope igniting in them. “I mean, when she visits someone who’s not home, she’ll put a little sticky note on the door, and?—”
“Did she leave one?”
“Not up here, but she might have left it with the Zhangs.” Riley glides out of my embrace and right back to her front door. “I’ll be right back.”
After I nod, she disappears over the threshold. I peer out her windows until she appears below, and then I turn back.
Glancing around her apartment triggers the memory of the first time I came here, the day after the wedding. How Riley patched me up, how badly I wanted her, even then?—
Boom.
A blast rocks the block.
Scorching heat. Shattering glass. A chorus of car alarms.
The force demolishes the windows and hurls me across her den. I fly through the air and crash into a desk.
Sweltering heat bakes my body. My head swims from the blow.
What the fuck was… Riley .
I yank myself up from the floor sooner than I should, my combat boots crunching on shattered glass as I race to see what happened. Outside, a humongous blaze burns in the place where I parked my car.
A car bomb. Red Hill. The De Lucas.
Riley.
I explode through her front door and take the steps two at a time.
Losing Brianne killed me. I can’t lose Riley too. It’s…unfathomable.
I pound down the alley toward the oppressive heat of the blaze. When shots ring out, I crouch behind an ashen car roasting on the curb while scanning for Riley. The blast shattered all the glass in the flower shop windows. There’s no movement inside.
Does that mean she wasn’t in there when the bomb went off?