Chapter 7
Ciara
Icomplete my final set of swings, my breathing steady, my focus absolute.
He stands there, a thundercloud of bruised ego and simmering rage, and I ignore him completely.
His little display was for my benefit, a primitive marking of territory.
It was loud, messy, and utterly predictable.
The man with the broken nose is long gone, no doubt scurrying away to nurse his pride.
Sean expects me to be rattled, perhaps even impressed. He is going to be disappointed.
I move to the mat and begin my cooldown stretches, holding each pose for the required thirty seconds.
The timer on my watch is my god, not the fuming man watching my every move.
He forgets I grew up in a house of brutality.
I’ve seen my father beat men to death in his office before he carries on with his breakfast. A broken nose doesn’t scare me or impress me.
When my routine is complete, to the second, I rise. I grab my towel and bottle of water, then walk directly toward him, forcing him to either move or stand his ground. He stands his ground. I stop less than a foot away, craning my neck to meet his stormy blue eyes.
“If you’re finished proving how big your dick is, I’m going for a shower.” I move to step around him, but he blocks my path.
His gaze drops to my mouth, to my breasts, before moving back up. His body is a solid wall of muscle and aggression, meant to intimidate. “We need to set some ground rules.”
“Fine.” I meet his gaze without flinching. “Rule one: you don’t touch me. Rule two: you don’t tell me what to do. Rule three: you stay out of my way.” I take a deliberate step to the side. “Your turn.”
His jaw clenches, a muscle ticking violently. His eyes blaze, only for a second. “You are going to be an O’Neill,” he says eventually. “Don’t go anywhere without protection again. If you don’t want me. We’ll find someone.”
For once in my life, I am speechless. I was expecting some big threatening speech about how I’m a bitch, and he will tame me, blah, blah, blah.
Instead, he turns on the protection mode.
The words hang in the air between us, a strange sort of peace treaty offered in the middle of a war zone.
It’s a move I didn’t anticipate. A rule rooted not in controlling me, but in preserving an asset.
His asset. I am going to be an O’Neill, and O’Neills are protected.
It’s logical. It’s practical. And it’s the first thing he’s done that isn’t entirely self-destructive.
“I protect myself,” I say.
“Not good enough,” he says, his voice losing its aggressive edge, settling into something harder. “Not when you parade around practically naked in front of half a dozen men who would stick their dick in you whether you wanted them to or not.”
And there it is. The possessive part of this charade.
The urge to roll my eyes is clawing at me, but I maintain my cool composure.
“Do you think this is the first time I’ve had males gawking at me while I work out?” I ask.
That stumps him. It’s like I’ve suddenly dropped in his lap with no past, no baggage, no prior relationships. He sees me as just his wife-to-be, and nothing more.
We stare at each other for a full ten seconds before he speaks again.
“It will be the last,” he says in a low, dark tone, but doesn’t give me a chance to counter as he turns and strides out, expecting me to follow.
I don’t.
I watch him through the glass wall, and instead of taking the elevator, he slams open the door to the stairs and disappears.
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out where he’s going, but it’s not up to his apartment.
That’s fine. It will give me some peace and quiet to shower and get some sleep before he rolls in too drunk to stand and probably owing someone else more money.
Not my problem. He is not my pet project. He is a means to an end for my father.
I walk to the elevator, my footsteps silent on the rubber floor. He can run to whatever hole he chooses to lick his wounds. I have a schedule to keep.
The elevator ride is quiet. I lean against the cool metal wall, replaying his words.
Not good enough. He thinks I’m some fragile doll that needs a brute to protect her.
He sees the dress, the heels, the designer bag, and assumes weakness.
Let him. Underestimating me will be his first and final mistake in this arrangement.
Back in the pristine silence of the penthouse guest room, I strip off my gym clothes, leaving them in a neat pile for the laundry. The air is still clean, a testament to my brief time here. The chaos he brings is a storm, but I am the eye of it—calm, contained, and in control.
I step into the en-suite shower, the hot water a welcome relief on my worked muscles.
This is my life now. A cycle of cleaning up his messes, both literal and figurative.
But I will not be his keeper. I will not be his savior.
I will be his wife, a title that will grant me access, power, and a position he cannot challenge.
He can drown in his whisky and rage. I will simply swim.
After my shower, I slip into some black silk pajamas and slide my gun under the pillow before I climb into bed.
Flicking off the lamp, I settle in on my back and stare at the ceiling for a brief moment before I turn over, my face towards the door in case he comes back aggressive and violent.
I won’t hesitate to put a bullet between his eyes if he lays a hand on me.
But deep down, I know that won’t happen. He won’t hurt me.
I close my eyes, my hand under the pillow, resting near the gun and hope he doesn’t wake me when he comes home.
My eyes fly open, what seems like moments later, but it is morning now.
The sounds of the door closing and a soft, feminine hum echoes through the apartment. I frown and sit up, checking my phone for the time. It’s 7 AM.
My hand instinctively slides under the pillow, fingers brushing the cool steel of the gun. I listen for a moment, parsing the sounds. Footsteps, the clink of a mug, the hum of someone putting things to rights. It’s a domestic sound, not a threatening one.
Slipping out of bed, I pull on a black silk robe over my pajamas, tying the sash tightly at my waist. I leave the gun where it is and move silently out of the guest suite.
In the kitchen, a woman in her late forties with kind eyes and a no-nonsense set to her mouth is wiping down the counters. She turns as I enter, her humming ceasing abruptly. Her gaze takes in my robe, my bare feet, my face.
“And you are?” she asks.
“Ciara O’Byrne,” I say slowly. “You?”
“Just call me Millie. He here?”
“I don’t think so.” I would’ve woken up if he came back, surely.
She purses her lips. “Will I be seeing you around here much?”
“I hope so. I’m marrying Sean on Monday.”
Her eyes nearly bug out of her head. Seems Connor O’Neill forgot to brief her.
“Well, isn’t that grand,” she says, her tone suggesting it’s anything but.
She recovers quickly, her expression smoothing into professional neutrality, but the shock lingers in her eyes.
She goes back to wiping the counter with a renewed, almost violent, energy. “He didn’t mention it.”
“It was a recent decision,” I offer, my voice even. I move toward the coffee machine.
“Most of his are,” she mutters, more to herself than to me. She stops wiping and turns. “Let me give you some advice, girl. Don’t try to fix him. You’ll only break yourself.”
It’s a warning. A piece of unsolicited, world-weary wisdom from the woman who knows him best when he’s at his worst. I can see she’s loyal to him, in her own way. An asset, then.
“I’m not here to fix him,” I say, pulling a mug from the cupboard. The words are true, but they sound cold. “I’m here to marry him.”
Millie just shakes her head, a small, sad movement. “Same thing, in his world.”
The conversation is over. She turns back to her work, and I focus on the coffee, the machine whirring to life in the silence. She thinks I’m a fool. Another woman destined to be collateral damage in the slow-motion car crash of Sean O’Neill’s life.
This was a statement on Sean’s behalf. I won’t see him again now until our wedding day.
Fine by me.
I did my part. I moved in here. It’s not my problem that he chose to move out.