Chapter 17 The Red Crescendo #2
“Say my name,” he growls between licks. “Say it like you said it when you chose me.”
“Cillian—” My voice breaks as heat coils tight inside me. “I’m— I’m so close—”
His grip tightens. His tongue moves faster.
And I fall. Hard. Sharp. Crying out his name as the world splinters into firelight and pleasure.
He moans against me as I come, holding me through it like he’s trying to memorize each shiver.
When I go limp onto the rug, panting, he rises over me, mouth swollen, eyes blazing.
“Look at you,” he murmurs, brushing his thumb across my cheek. “My duchess. My siren.” He presses his forehead to mine. “My forever.”
I wrap my legs around him and pull him in until our bodies align, heat to heat. “Then take me,” I whisper. “Claim me.”
He growls — low, possessive, reverent — and pushes inside me in one slow, perfect thrust. I gasp his name. He shudders.
“Jesus Christ, Siobhán—” he rasps, voice breaking as he buries himself in me. “You’re heaven. You’re hell. You’re everythin’ I ever bled for.”
He moves — slow at first, like he’s savoring every inch, every sound I make — then faster, deeper, losing himself in the rhythm of us.
I cling to him, nails dragging down his back. “Harder,” I breathe. “I want to feel you tomorrow.”
He laughs breathlessly, kissing me like he’ll die if he stops. “A ghrá,” he whispers against my lips, thrusts deepening. “I’ll make sure you feel me for a lifetime.”
“Good,” I moan, tightening around him. “Then give it to me. All of it.”
He curses in Irish — filthy, sacred, beautiful — and slams into me harder, pace breaking into something desperate, emotional, starved. “Tell me you’re mine,” he growls.
“I’m yours.”
“Tell me you’ll stay.”
“I’ll stay.”
“Tell me you love me.”
I frame his face with both hands, pulling him down until our noses brush. “I love you, Cillian O’Dwyer.”
He comes undone with a sound that’s part groan, part prayer, part broken boy finally healed. His body trembles through the climax, face pressed to my neck, breath shattered. My own orgasm hits as he shudders, my body vibrating with pleasure.
I hold him. I kiss him. I whisper his name like a vow. When he finally collapses beside me, pulling me into his chest, the fire crackles quietly. For a long moment, there’s only breathing. Touch. Warmth.
Then he says it. Quiet. Terrified. Hopeful. “I have a choice for you, dove. Stay and rule beside me… or walk away forever.”
My breath stops. His arm tightens around me.
“Choose,” he whispers.
And I realize, I don’t know my answer. The fire crackles softly beside us, the only sound in the whole quiet house. Our breaths still tangled. Our bodies still humming. His arms warm and trembling around me.
But my heart… My heart is chaos. Cillian’s fingers trace slow shapes along my spine, grounding me even as my thoughts spiral in a hundred different directions.
“Siobhán,” he murmurs, voice low and raw, “tell me.”
I stare at the ceiling for a long moment. The shadows dance. The room feels both too big and too small.
“I…” My voice cracks. “I don’t know, Cillian.”
He goes still. Not angry. Not surprised. Just… still. Then he nods once, slow and steady, pressing a soft kiss to my forehead.
“I hear you.”
I swallow hard. “It’s not that I don’t love you. I do. More than I should. More than is safe. It’s just—” My voice trembles. “Everything is too much.”
He closes his eyes, resting his forehead against my temple. “I’ll wait,” he whispers. “If waiting is what you need.”
The kindness in that nearly breaks me. I touch his cheek, thumb brushing where tears once ran on a different night. “I’m tired,” I breathe.
“So am I.”
He pulls a blanket over us, wrapping me into his chest like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he loosens his grip even an inch.
“Sleep, my dove,” he murmurs. “We’ll sort the rest in the morning.”
I close my eyes. For the first time all night, my heartbeat slows. Cillian’s breath warms the back of my neck. And even though I don’t have an answer for him… I let him hold me anyway.
Morning comes soft and golden. The fire burned low sometime in the night, leaving only embers and the faint smell of smoke. I blink awake to a warm, heavy arm across my waist and Cillian’s breath against the back of my shoulder.
We fell asleep on the rug. Together. Wrapped in the same blanket, in the same mess of limbs, in the same tangle of feelings I still haven’t sorted. Outside, faint bells are ringing—distant church chimes signaling Christmas morning.
I shift slightly. Cillian stirs with a quiet groan, tightening his hold like he’s trying to pull me back into his dreams.
“Morning,” I whisper.
He presses a soft kiss to the curve of my neck. “Merry Christmas, mo chol.”
The words do something to me— a little ache, a little warmth, a little wish for a world simpler than ours. We sit up slowly, the blanket slipping from our shoulders. The living room is cold, but cozy in that winter-morning way, the kind that makes everything feel a little more precious.
Cillian stands and offers me his hand with a crooked smile. “Stay here.”
He disappears for a moment, returning with a small wrapped box—dark green paper, tied with a thin velvet ribbon.
“For you,” he says softly.
My chest squeezes. It’s so small it can’t be extravagant. Which makes it infinitely more terrifying. I take it carefully and undo the ribbon. Inside, nestled in black velvet, is a charm a tiny gold treble clef, delicate and warm in my palm, the back engraved with a single phrase: Mo stor.
My breath catches. “Cillian…”
He kneels in front of me, fingers brushing mine. “It’s not a promise you haven’t chosen yet,” he murmurs. “It’s just a truth. You’ve always been my treasure.”
Tears prick my eyes before I can stop them. I take a shaky breath and stand. “It’s your turn.”
His brows rise as I cross the room to my suitcase. I pull out the small envelope tucked into the side pocket. Cream paper. Sealed with wax from a hotel I stayed in during a Paris tour.
“And no,” I say, handing it to him, “it’s nothing explosive. Lower your blood pressure.”
He smirks, tearing it open. Inside is a single photograph. A candid taken years ago— me and him sitting on the old stable roof as teenagers, legs dangling, him mid-laugh, me mid-eye-roll, the sunset behind us turning everything copper and gold.
On the back, I wrote: For when you forget who you really are. For when you forget who you’ve always been to me.
His jaw flexes. His eyes soften. Then go glassy.
“Jesus Christ, Siobhán,” he whispers.
I shrug, pretending my heart isn’t unraveling. “Merry Christmas.”
He cups the back of my neck, pulling me into a kiss that’s slow and warm and unbearably tender. When he pulls back, the moment settles between us—quiet and fragile and too full.
Second-to-last performance. Christmas Day. And I still haven’t chosen him.
We dress in silence. We move around each other like we’ve done it for a lifetime.
Getting ready feels surreal. Like I’ve stepped into some other girl’s life — a girl who isn’t grieving, or torn in half, or standing on the edge of a choice that could change everything. A girl who can just… slip into beauty.
But Rouge shoved a garment bag at me the moment he arrived and said, “Dress up, Dove. Dublin expects a Christmas miracle,” so here we are.
I unzip the bag in the bedroom and just stare.
It’s breathtaking. A grand Christmas ball gown — deep crimson velvet that catches the light like embers, a sweetheart neckline, fitted bodice, full skirt that swishes around my legs like a romantic movie dream sequence.
There’s delicate gold embroidery at the waist, tiny glints of starlight woven in thread.
The kind of gown symphonies are written for. The kind of gown you wear in front of kings. Or devils.
Cillian dresses behind me, the quiet rustle of his tux brushing the air. When I turn — Christ. He’s… devastating. A tailored black tuxedo with a subtle sheen, a deep wine-colored tie that matches my dress perfectly, hair tamed back, jaw freshly shaved, eyes softened and fierce at the same time.
I swallow. He notices.
“You’re staring, dove,” he murmurs.
“How could I not?”
He steps closer, taking my waist with careful hands that still feel like last night — warm, claiming, reverent. I smooth his lapel. “You clean up disgustingly well.”
He smirks. “So do you.”
Then there’s a knock. Rouge opens the door without waiting for permission, naturally, and leans in with a dramatic whistle.
“Well, damn,” he says. “Look at Dublin’s royal couple.”
I roll my eyes. Cillian glares. Rouge beams. He’s in a tux too — sharp navy with a black satin lapel — hair tied back, looking like a man who could attend a gala or stab someone in the coatroom and do both gracefully.
“Told you two to dress up,” he says. “Didn’t expect you to look like a magazine cover.”
“Shut up, Rouge,” Cillian mutters, grabbing our coats.
“Love you too, Captain.”
Outside, instead of his usual SUV, Rouge’s pulled up in a luxury car so sleek and polished it looks like it was made out of midnight. A Bentley. Black. Quiet. Sinful.
He gestures grandly. “Your carriage, my liege and lady.”
Cillian gives him a deadpan stare. “If you call me that again, I’ll shoot your tires.”
“Hot,” Rouge says, opening the back door for me. “Get in.”
I laugh despite myself, gathering my gown and ducking into the plush interior. Cillian slides in beside me, taking my hand immediately, thumb brushing across my knuckles. Rouge pulls away from the stable-house, snow drifting softly over the windshield, Dublin awakening in Christmas light.
We move toward the National Concert Hall — toward the stage, toward music, toward a future I’m still afraid to choose. But as Cillian lifts my hand and presses a kiss to the inside of my wrist,
something warm blooms in my chest.
A crescendo. A warning. A promise.