Chapter 18 Green at the Gates of Home #2
Siobhán snorts as she brings plates over—roast goose, champ, roasted carrots with honey, brown bread stuffing, gravy thick and rich. A proper Irish Christmas, the kind neither of us has had since we were kids.
She sets the last dish down. “Sit. Both of you. Before the food goes cold.”
“Yes, a stór,” I say, leaning down to kiss her cheek. She blushes, which I savor like a prize.
Rouge makes kissy noises. I threaten to throw him out into the frost. We eat until we’re full—Rouge going back for seconds, then thirds—while Siobhán tells stories about her mother burning the pudding every year, and I tell them how Ma used to make me stir the Christmas cake for luck.
Rouge claims he’s the only one here with actual skill since he can make toast without setting off alarms. There’s laughter.
Real laughter. The kind that fills a room and warms the bones.
After dinner, she brings out dessert—Baileys chocolate mousse with shaved dark chocolate—and me and Rouge actually shut up for a good ten seconds just to appreciate it.
Then Rouge points his spoon at her hand. “So. When’s the wedding?”
Siobhán nearly chokes on a berry. “Rouge!”
“What?” He shrugs. “Man puts a boulder on your finger the size of a small planet, I’m allowed to ask questions.”
I glance at her. She glances back. And for a moment—just a moment—the entire future flashes between us. A church. A piano. Snow. Her last name becoming mine. My chest tightens with something I’ve never had before—hope that doesn’t terrify me.
“We’ll figure it out,” she says softly.
Rouge nods, satisfied. “Good. ‘Cause I better have a place in this family. Preferably one where I don’t have to babysit either of you.”
“You’re stuck with us,” she says, smiling over her glass. “Forever.”
I wrap my arm around her shoulders, tug her close. “You’re family, Rouge. Always have been.”
He looks down like maybe he’s about to get emotional, then ruins it immediately. “Yeah well, if I walk in on you two on the damn kitchen counter again, I’m revoking my membership.”
Siobhán groans and covers her face. I throw a napkin at his head. And God—God—if this isn’t the closest thing to home I’ve ever felt, I don’t know what is.
We clean up dinner slowly, like none of us are quite ready for this night to end.
Siobhán hums under her breath—some half-remembered carol—while I dry the dishes she hands me.
Rouge leans against the counter with a glass of whiskey, pretending he’s supervising when really he’s swaying like a man twice his age.
“Don’t judge me,” he mutters when Siobhán raises a brow. “Near-death experiences and holiday emotions are exhausting.”
“You ate three helpings,” she says.
“That too.”
I snort, handing him another splash of whiskey.
He takes it like I’ve just given him medicine for his soul.
We sit with him for a while—talking wedding nonsense, futures, colors she pretends she hasn’t already picked, the way her eyes lit up when she talked about children’s concerts and charity shows.
Rouge teases us. We tease him. It’s warm.
Easy. The kind of night you don’t realize you’re going to remember until you’re right in the middle of it.
Eventually Rouge’s head starts to dip. Then dip again. Then drop fully onto his chest. Siobhán presses her lips together, trying not to laugh, but she fails spectacularly. A bright, soft sound that fills the whole house.
“Alright, soldier,” I murmur, standing. “Bed.”
He grumbles something that might be English or might be a prayer, but he lets us haul him up. We guide him to the couch—he insisted he didn’t need a guest room, said couches were the superior napping furniture—and he flops down like a corpse.
I grab the throw blanket from the armchair and spread it over him. Siobhán tucks it around his shoulders with all the care of someone tending a child. Rouge, half-asleep, slaps my hand away and mumbles, “Touch me again, Captain, and I’ll haunt you.”
Siobhán bites her lip, shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter. I stare at them—my soldier, my siren—and something in my chest goes soft in a way I don’t have language for.
“Goodnight, Rouge,” she whispers.
“‘Night… Duchess,” he mumbles without opening his eyes.
We turn off the lights, leaving only the glow from the fireplace and the tree. I take her hand. She squeezes back. And we head toward the bedroom. Her hair is down, wild from the night, curls brushing her collarbones. The ring I put on her hand glints with every breath she takes.
“Cillian…” she whispers, and it’s not a question. It’s an unraveling.
I cup her jaw with one hand, thumb sweeping over her cheekbone. “Come to bed, a rún,” I murmur. My secret. My beloved.
Her breath hitches. But when I guide her toward the hallway, she tugs on my shirt—soft, unsure, wanting. I stop.
Her fingers curl in the fabric. “Not bed,” she whispers, cheeks flushed. “Not yet.”
Oh. Oh, I’m done for.
I slide my hands to her waist, pulling her slowly against me. “Where, then?”
She rises on her toes, lips brushing my ear. “Wherever you want me.”
Every cell in my body detonates. I kiss her—slow, deep, savoring the taste of her, the warmth of her mouth, the way she goes pliant and desperate in the same breath. She fists my hair, pulling me closer, and I groan into her lips.
“Jesus, Siobhán,” I breathe against her mouth. “Tá mé ar mire leat. 3I’m mad with you.”
“I know,” she whispers, nails dragging down my chest. “Show me.”
I lift her—gentle, effortless—and press her back against the hallway wall, her gown spilling around my hands. She gasps, wrapping her legs around my waist as I kiss down her throat, slow and reverent, tasting her skin like it’s something sacred.
Because it is. It always has been.
“You’re shaking,” I murmur against her collarbone.
“You do that to me,” she whispers back, breathless.
God help me. I slide my hands up her thighs, pushing the fabric higher, baring inch after inch of her until the cool air hits the warm heat between her legs. She trembles, head falling back against the wall with a soft thud.
“Cillian…”
“I’ve got you,” I say, voice low, raw. “Always.”
My fingers trace the inside of her thigh—just barely—and she shivers like I’ve struck a match along her spine. When I reach the softest part of her, wet and wanting, she bites a sound into her lip.
“Look at me, dove.”
Her eyes lift—green and glassy and full of hunger.
“Good girl,” I breathe.
Her whole body tightens around the words. I stroke her slowly, reverently, watching her fall apart, watching her cling to my shoulders like she’ll lift off the earth if she lets go. She whispers my name between breaths, soft little pleas that undo me more than any scream ever could.
When she’s trembling, ready to break, I kiss her—deep, consuming—and guide myself to her, pushing in slowly, inch by inch, watching her lips part in a silent cry.
“Fucking Christ,” I groan into her neck. “You feel like heaven.”
Her fingers dig into my back. “More,” she whispers. “Please.”
I thrust deeper, slow and steady, savoring the way she melts into me, the way her breath catches each time I bottom out. She clings to me, forehead against mine, lips parting with every movement.
“Mo chroí,” I whisper. My heart.
She gasps. “Say it again.”
I thrust into her harder, hand cradling the back of her head. “Mo chroí. Mo ghrá. Mo shaol. My heart, my love, my life.”
She whimpers—a soft, broken sound—and kisses me like she’s drowning.
I kiss her back like she’s oxygen. We move together—slow, sensual, every bit of us tangled in devotion and hunger.
Her gown slips from one shoulder; I kiss the skin revealed there.
Her ring brushes my cheek as she holds my face.
And when she breaks—crying out softly into my mouth—I hold her tightly, whispering Irish against her skin, guiding her through it.
“Tá tú slán. Tá tú sábháilte.4 I’ve got you.”
She shudders, still trembling around me, and I follow—thrusting deep, burying my face in her neck as I spill into the woman I’ve loved since I was a boy. For a moment, neither of us breathe.
Then she cups my face, thumb brushing my lips, and whispers, “I love you, Cillian O’Dwyer.”
Christ, I’ll die from it. I kiss her—slow and reverent this time—and carry her to bed, curling around her under the blankets, her breath soft against my chest.
Safe. Home. Mine. And I fall asleep with her hand over my heart.
1. I am yours forever, my love
2. And I am yours forever, my dove
3. I’m crazy about you
4. You are safe, you are safe.