Chapter 9
NINE
seamus
Fuck, just seeing Ava feels like a wet, slick hand wrapping tight around my cock, slowly stroking me and toying with my piercings. Even in a torn dress with the thin trickle of blood on the side of her mouth and a bruise on her cheek.
Because beneath the flare of fire in her eyes, underneath the veil of fear that shadows her expression, she’s fucking cold, in control, and something I want to dismantle into pieces to play with.
A girl like her begs to be ripped apart and laid bare.
I want to be the person who does that, and I don’t even fucking care that she’s going to lie to me about why she’s here.
For a moment, there’s a flicker of hate in her hardened gaze, but it fades away quickly to make me believe there’s actual vulnerability there. Which there isn’t. Fuck, maybe she has a future on a stage somewhere.
“I’d hoped it would be you,” she says, her voice humble, and her hand trembles in precisely the way someone faking it would make it shake.
She’s good, I’ll give her that. But not good enough to fool me.
“Oh, yeah? Because last time we saw each other, you had someone slam me in the head and knock me unconscious. You also stole my gun, which I want back.”
Her free hand closes around her black bag.
Bingo. I know exactly where my gun is.
“How…?” She stops, swallowing hard. “I saw you at the fights. Was that your brother with you?”
It suddenly strikes me she has no idea which Murphy I am, so I don’t supply her with names. I’m just interested in what she wants. And why she called.
Also why the fuck she’s bleeding and looking roughed up.
I don’t offer her a seat and I don’t sit either. I just close the door and lean against it, trapping her in the room with me.
There’s a gun at my lower back and I’m not above using it. It’d be a waste of a fantastic fuck, but I’ll kill her if she so much as tries to pull my gun on me.
Of course, I’d prefer having her naked and on her knees with my cock shoved down her throat, but hey, piss me off enough and who knows what I’ll do?
I nod at her. “What happened?”
“S-someone attacked me.”
Right. Every single injury is strategic. The blood and the bruise. She looks like someone hit her, and the torn dress is meant to say she fought someone off. But no. I don’t believe she was attacked for a single second.
“So I see. Why are you here? It’s a big thing to contact the Murphy family the way you did.
We’re extremely expensive to hire, and the price will depend on what you want us to do.
We don’t get involved in certain things, and we don’t step on toes of allies or barge into fights with certain factions.
So. What is it you want and how much are you willing to pay? ”
“Are you Callahan?”
I smile. “Call me whatever you want. And you still haven’t answered a fucking thing.”
“I need help, and I need to know I can trust you,” she says. And fuck, she’s good. I almost believe her with that.
She sounds innocent, na?ve, someone desperate to trust in a savior. But her hatred for me, for the name Murphy, is shining in her eyes. Just like the lust.
“I need to know why you put flash bombs and that other small bomb in the yard of a man whom you know. One who hasn’t killed you yet. Which, from what I know of Iosif Romanov, is highly unusual.”
I like to make jokes, act outrageously, and treat life like it’s just a grand old party. On the surface. But beneath that, I’m a fucking Murphy. I’m calm and levelheaded, and I can be brutal and cold, and while I’m not joking right now, my tone suggests I might be.
I want to keep the dark-haired beauty on her toes. I want to find out all of her deepest, darkest secrets, and I’m beginning to think she might be as slippery as I can be.
“I didn’t plant those bombs. I told you that already.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Don’t fucking lie. If you want my help, you’ll tell me the truth; otherwise, give me my gun and get the fuck out.”
Her eyes widen and it’s real surprise I see flickering in the depths. “You wouldn’t.”
“Curiosity only goes so far. I’m not interested in dying for you.”
She licks her lips and misses the blood. Or rather she leaves it. I’m glad, because I want to taste it, as feral as it sounds. There’s an element of primal play in her bones, and while blood play’s never interested me, with her, it might.
I think she wakens the primal beast inside me.
But before I play, and I will play, I want information.
“I’m not asking you to die for me,” she says, staring at me, wide-eyed and demure. “I’m asking for help.”
“Sometimes those are the same things.”
“I can’t ask Romanov for help. The offer he has is unacceptable.”
“And maybe my family’s price will be, too.”
She swallows, and her gaze steadies. “I heard you’re fair. I need… I need fair.”
There’s truth in her words, but something darker lurks. For as much as I want her, I don’t like this woman. But she does offer me more than honesty, more than likeability. She offers me intrigue.
It’s not enough.
I don’t move, but Ava steps closer, and then closer still. We’re not touching, not more than a breath apart. I can smell the night jasmine and spice, her intoxicating scent. Her heat swirls around me like it’s her superpower.
Shit, I hate to say it, but she has my dick’s full attention.
I nod at her bag. “Put it down.”
Ava hesitates but does as asked. And when she glances back at me, the fire there burns hotter. It’s fucking real.
I’m betting she’s as wet as I am hard.
We want each other.
At least there’s honesty in that.
I cross my arms, mainly to stop myself from pulling her against me. If I don’t, there won’t be anything to prevent me from getting her naked, wet, and convulsing around me.
I clear my throat. “Why the fuck would I be fair with you? Why would I help?”
“Because I do need protection. Not just from Romanov, but from other unknown parties.” She runs a hand down the front of her dress to highlight her manufactured attack.
And fuck, the urge to lick that blood’s real.
“Why?” I ask.
“Because I’m Ava Volkov. I’m the heir to the Volkov Bratva, but I can’t have it until I’m twenty-five. And if I wait, then I’ll lose it, I know it.”
I don’t speak for a beat. Then I say, “What’s the crest?”
Her eyes light up, hinting to another real emotion.
“It’s meant to prove ownership, but possession of it isn’t in my father’s will. I… need…” She stops, and her shoulders lift. “Protection.”
No, she wants something else. That’s in the fucking air. But I keep playing her like a fiddle, and I can actually play the fucking fiddle, thanks to Mam and lessons and my natural talent.
“I can help with that. We have connections through St. Jane’s church. If you want protection, then a passage out of New York. A new life is your best bet.”
Her beautiful face transforms, her expression changing from hope to dark thunder, and finally to a careful mask of manufactured fear once more.
I continue. “Because if you want to battle for a bratva you don’t have control over, then you’re out of luck. We don’t fight battles that aren’t our own.”
She takes a closer step, right into the danger zone, because from here, it’d take no more than an outstretched finger to touch her.
“But,” Ava says, “you fought Iosif’s battle.”
“Not a battle. We were security for a party. That’s it. Anything else that came of that night, like the bombing, or something else that rises up between Romanov and Assisi, isn’t our problem.”
Ava frowns. “But you want to know about the crest and the other bomber.”
“Consider it personal curiosity that stops short of a death wish. And for the record, sweet thing, I think you planted those bombs. So that whole shit show is connected to you, not Romanov. Of course, you mentioned you need protection from Romanov so I have to wonder—”
“It has nothing to do with that night,” she rushes to say.
I smile. “Now I think that makes you a dirty liar.”
She shuts her eyes a moment as she sucks in a breath. “It’s not what you think.”
“Then explain it to me. Will he stop you from running? Try to kill you?”
“I’m not running. I saw your brother, Seamus,” she says, my name like a drop of poison on her tongue, “at that church. I thought maybe I could run away a year ago, but… I can’t now. And Romanov isn’t a ‘kill me’ kind of threat. At least I don’t think he is.”
“You saw Seamus at church? You sure about that? He isn’t much of a churchgoer. Take it from me. I know.” And I wink at her.
She glares. “Yes, I’m sure. And I can’t run away, even if I wanted to abandon my birthright. There’s something Romanov has, something I can’t leave behind.”
There’s truth in her words, but she doesn’t elaborate.
I let my arms fall to my sides but pause just enough to touch her, a hand whispering up to her cheek, to brush against the bruise on her jaw. It’s not makeup. Apart from mascara, eyeliner, and lipstick, I don’t think she’s wearing any.
“What is it?”
“Not your concern.” She shakes her head. “That’s not why I’m here.”
“Why are you?” I murmur, sliding my hand under the heavy silk of her hair.
“I need a husband.”
Okay, now she has my attention. I look around and then back at her. “Sorry, I don’t see any lying around.”
She swallows. “Callahan… I… you must have someone who can help me.”
“I never said I’m Cal.”
“Whichever brother. You’re not married, you’re not wearing a ring,” she snaps.
“Be still my beating fucking heart. What a romantic proposal.”
My sarcasm hits a brick wall.
“In exchange for my protection and my securing the bratva, you’d get a share in it,” she says.
“Volkov isn’t big, but the smuggling routes we have are coveted.
They’re protected and we only work with select clientele.
It’s money, and for a family like yours, it’s something that’ll enhance your power. ”
I shrug. “Marriage for a piece of a pie isn’t a good deal.”
“It’d only be for twelve months.” She’s practically pushing the reluctant words out. “And you’d be ruling with me.”
Bullshit. I can read that subtext. She means I’d be in charge, and now my interest spikes up even further. And I saw the interest stir in Cal when he mentioned the name Volkov to me.
“So without even knowing me, you’d want me as your husband.” I lift an eyebrow.
Ava lets out a breath, and I almost laugh. Reluctant? Fuck, her words are forced out over hostile air. “In name only.”
“Oh, sweet thing, I don’t think so.” My gaze moves slowly over Ava. “I’d want proper compensation.”
“You mean to sleep with me?”
This time I smile. “Already have, but I’d want the marriage to be real enough that I get half.”
“Fine,” Ava says after a moment. “Whatever.”
She’s going to try and double-cross us, double-cross me. But I don’t need to speak to Cal to know he’d want this. A coveted smuggling route under our belt to add to others. Shit, just having that and a piece of the pie would be enough. But I think I could get half.
Maybe all of it if she pisses me off enough.
It’s just too good, and she wants it too much.
But I’m not done with her.
I pull her close and she moves against my thickening cock.
“This might fall into the Murphy line of interest,” I say.
“So… you’ll do it? Marry me?”
I turn, press her against the wall, and cup her face. Now I give in to that urge to taste her blood, taking my time to lick it off her skin. A low moan rumbles in her throat, and the sound strokes over me. I could do terrible things just to hear her make that sound. And then I kiss her. Hard.
Ava doesn’t fight me, she never does. She’s already there, mouth opening and kissing me back like she can’t stop herself.
Like she needs me to breathe. I can’t seem to stop myself, either.
She’s a vicious and delicious enigma, a thing I don’t like and yet covet at the same time.
And she’s wrapped herself up in an offer a man like me would be an idiot to refuse.
Her hands slide up my chest, one resting against my shoulder as the kiss deepens and changes into a higher level of intensity, one that rocks me down to my toes and makes my cock the hardest I think it’s ever been.
She bites my lip, sucking it through her teeth. I bite hers in response, and it whips up the ferocity of the kiss. Our tongues clash and fight and meld. Like we’re fucking each other with our mouths.
Ava makes that bone-shattering moan again, gripping me tighter.
If I don’t stop, I’m going to fuck her. Here. Now.
Fuck. I pull my mouth from hers.
When I release her, I don’t step back. I look down into those purple-black eyes and whisper one word.
“No.”