Chapter 9 Aran
Aran
Iknow what to do with frightened men. Angry men. Men with knives. Men with guns. Men begging. Men bleeding out on concrete.
A shaken woman at my kitchen table is a different fucking discipline.
I drag a hand over my jaw and force my head back into the problem instead of the way her face just emptied out. “Do you have a phone on you?”
She blinks. Once. Twice. “Fuck,” she snaps and fumbles around in her tunic pocket, finds it and pulls it out.
I smirk. “You forgot?”
“Excuse me for being in fear for my life.”
“Don’t call anyone,” I say. “Better yet…” I reach over and snatch it out of her hand before she can move.
She hisses. “Hey, give it back.”
“Can’t do that,” I say as she stands up and lunges for it.
Like a child, I hold it over my head.
She glares up at me, and for one second, I see her contemplate climbing me like a fucking tree.
For half a second, I contemplate letting her.
“You giant asshole,” she snaps, standing on her tiptoes and grabbing for it before she reaches for the chair and stands on it.
I simply move out of the way of the chair. “You aren’t getting it back so you can call someone, or worse, the Garda. You are in over your head, Aoife and only I can help you out of it.”
“You drag—”
“No, we’ve been through this. I saved you. You were already in this up to your neck.”
She clamps her jaw shut and folds her arms, still standing on the chair. I drop the phone and stamp on it. It’s cheap and cracks under my heavy boot. She gapes at me as I pull the SIM card out and snap it.
Her face changes so fast it nearly gives me fucking whiplash.
Not fear this time. Rage.
Pure, clean, justified rage.
“You did not just do that.”
“I did.”
“That was my phone.”
“I’m aware.”
She makes a noise low in her throat and jumps off the chair. “Do you know how long I had to save for that? Do you know what replacing it will cost me?”
“I’ll replace it.”
“That is not the fucking point.”
“No. The point is nobody tracks you through it. Nobody calls it. Nobody gets clever and uses it to find you. And you don’t get clever and call someone to tell them where you are.”
She laughs once, sharp and ugly. “You don’t get to do that and then explain it like you’re being helpful.”
“I do, actually.”
She whips her head up and glares at me. “God, you are such a prick.”
I hold her stare. “Probably. Sit down.”
“Fuck off.”
“Aoife.”
She lifts her hand, ready to slap me across the face.
I’m half tempted to let her, but my instinct snaps to life, and I grab her wrist before she can.
I glare down at her. She fumes up at me.
Stepping into her space, I walk her slowly back to the counter and box her in, one hand on her wrist, one on the counter.
I lean down, trying to get eye-level with her. “If you’re going to slap me, Aoife, you have to be quicker than that. Don’t hesitate.”
“I didn’t.”
“You did,” I say, releasing her wrist, placing my hand on the counter so she is completely caged.
“Let’s get one thing straight, Aoife. Without me, you are dead.
I’ve tried to sugarcoat it, but I’m done because you aren’t taking any of this seriously.
” My tone is low, neutral, but fear flashes in her eyes.
“So you are going to listen because if I have to repeat myself, I’ll set you loose, and you can deal with it on your own. ”
She lifts her chin defiantly, but she stays mercifully silent.
“Sean Granville is the name of the man you saw escaping. He is deadly. You do not want to get on the wrong side of him. Trust me on that. The people who arranged this swap took a woman my uncle wants around—who apparently looks like you, except has a penchant for nail guns—so they had leverage to get Granville. Both of these dangerous criminals are now on the street. The people who wanted Granville, don’t have him.
The people who wanted Granville enough to lay an ambush, don’t have him.
I don’t have Granville or the woman. Who is the easiest person to coerce into talking, and who saw all parties, out of all of those people? Hmm, Aoife?”
She looks down. “Me,” she croaks.
“Precisely. Now will you listen to me and stop being so fucking feisty?”
Her bottom lip wobbles. “How exactly can you help me?”
“I can keep you safe. If you are with me. I won’t let anyone get near you.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t let innocents die if I can stop it.”
“My phone has no credit, and I have no one to call anyway,” she whispers.
“Emergency numbers don’t need credit,” I point out. “The Garda are not your friends in this instance, Aoife.”
“And you are?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t see anything,” she whispers. “I can’t tell anyone anything I don’t know.”
“Doesn’t matter. You saw enough for them to think you might know more.”
“Are you saying I can never go back to my life?”
“Never is a long time, Aoife. I’ll fix this as quickly as possible and get you back to your life.”
She looks oddly disappointed by that. I file it away.
“What about my job?” she mutters. “I can’t just not show up.”
“To scrub toilets? I’m sure you’ll live.”
“Not when I’m fired, I won’t.”
I take a moment to evaluate this woman’s life.
She hates her job but goes anyway because without it, she’d be broke.
It has been a long time since I associated with anyone normal, it’s something I tend to forget.
I have no financial hardships. Never had.
Never will. I’m not a lavish man, but I’m not short of cash either. If I need something, I buy it.
Aoife doesn’t have that luxury, and asking her to cut off her one source of income is unfair.
But also necessary.
“I’ll take care of you,” I say before I’ve even realized what I’ve said.
Her gaze shoots to mine, heavy with unshed tears. “Don’t be absurd,” she sniffs. “I’m not yours to look after.”
And what a damn shame that is. The visceral need to protect her is clogging up my normally focused thoughts. I stay where I am, caging her in, taking in every millimeter of her face, her hair, her lips. My cock hardens as I think of that mouth wrapped around it.
“Aran,” she says quietly.
“What?”
“Can you move? I’m feeling stifled.”
Her gaze locks on mine. I don’t move a muscle. Her breath hitches, but it’s not panic; it’s something much hotter, something that I want to explore. Slowly, I straighten up and take a step back.
She breathes out. She rubs at her wrist where I had gripped her, but I know I didn’t hurt her. “Thank you.”
“Do you need anything?”
She shakes her head.
“Are you sure?”
“What exactly are you offering?”
I look at her for a beat too long.
She knows it, too.
Her eyes don’t leave mine. Green. Tired. Angry. Braver than is good for her. She’s standing in my kitchen in a hotel uniform with split knuckles and whiskey in her system, asking me what I’m offering like this is a negotiation she can still control.
“Tea,” I say eventually. “Whiskey. A shower. Food. A bed.”
“All of the above,” she replies. “What am I meant to do about clothes?”
“We’ll order some. You’ll have to make do for now.”
“Make do,” she mutters and strides off to the kitchen door. “Shower?”
I jerk my chin toward the hall. “Upstairs. First door on the left. Fresh towels in the cupboard.”
She disappears into the hall without a word.
I stand in the kitchen for a second after she’s gone, staring at the doorway like a fucking idiot. Then I move. I rinse the whiskey glasses, wipe down the counter she didn’t even dirty, and put the ruined phone in the bin under the sink. My own sits heavy in my pocket.
Connor needs an update. I’m not in the mood.
I call him anyway.
He answers on the second ring. “Is she useful, or do we need to clean her?”
I head into the sitting room and look out the front window through the slats.
The street’s quiet. The neighbor across the road is bringing shopping inside.
Nothing off. “We are not cleaning her, Connor. She’s an innocent bystander.
She saw Granville’s face. She also saw the woman.
Blonde. Black jeans. Leather jacket. Heading toward the elevator before it all kicked off. ”
That gets his attention. “Is she certain?”
“She’s certain enough.”
“And Granville?”
“In the wind.”
“I want the woman,” he grits out.
“Then you’d better start talking because, without a name, known habits, address, fake or otherwise, I’m flying blind. Even more so as she doesn’t want to be found. Aoife said she walked out of there under her own steam.”
“Aoife,” he growls.
“That’s her name,” I growl back. “Try to keep up.”
He goes quiet for a second, which means he’s irritated enough to be choosing his words, or he’s planning to murder me. Either way, not good. “You’re sounding invested.”
“I’m sounding like a man cleaning up a mess that should have come with better fucking information.”
“She’s a witness.”
“She’s a hotel cleaner who got caught in the middle.”
“She saw Granville.”
“Yes.”
“She saw the woman.”
“Yes.”
“Then she is not just a random bystander anymore.”
I clench my jaw and stare through the blinds at fuck all. He’s not wrong. That’s what makes him such a pain in the ass. “She stays with me.”
“For now,” he says.
I hear it. The conditional. The little hook buried in the sentence.
“For however long this takes,” I reply.
“Don’t let this woman become a liability. Find out everything she knows. Whatever it takes.”
“Give me the information I need to fix this almighty fuck up,” I say, instead of acknowledging his order.
Connor exhales down the line. “You’ll get what you need when I decide you need it.”
“Fuck that,” I say. “You sent me into a swap with a description that was vaguer than you expected, with an ambush waiting to happen. Granville walked. Your woman walked. I came out of there with the wrong woman and a fucking headache. Start talking.”
He waits a beat, but then must realize I’m not fucking around.
“Her name is Nessa Doyle.”
“Age?”
“Thirty-six.”
“Who is she?”
A simmering pause. Then, “I can’t tell you.”
“Connor. This blew past need to know, well into you’d better fucking tell me now, territory about two hours ago.”
“Liam and Sean… they can’t know,” he says quietly. “Not yet.”
My blood turns to ice as I scrub my hand over my face. “Fuck’s sake, Connor. Daughter?”
“Yes.”
“That’s why you sent me.”
“I sent you because you had the best odds of keeping Granville in check. Clearly, I overestimated you.”
“Oh, do not,” I grit out. “I had him fully in check until I was ambushed.”
“I did warn you it might be a trap.”
“Trap? No. This was a full-on attack. The other party had no fucking idea someone else was gunning for Granville.”
“That means someone else knew what was going down and when. But that is secondary. Find Nessa, Aran.”
“Connor…”
“What?”
“Aoife said she saw her in the corridor walking towards the elevator. No hurry, no urgency. She either escaped captivity or she was let go. Does she know about you?”
“No. You are the only one who knows. Fix this.” He hangs up just as I hear a shriek come from upstairs.