Keira
Saint watches me in silence.
Firelight kisses one half of his furrowed brow, catching on the curve of his cheekbone and carving shadow beneath the dark sweep of his lashes.
Without another word, he pushes himself up from the chair.
“You’ve had a busy day,” he says. “Time for bed.”
Before I can decide whether to stand or scoot backward, his hands find me. One slides around my shoulders, broad palm spanning almost the width of my back, the other beneath my knees, forearm flexing as he lifts.
My hands come up to hold on to the solid muscle of his neck. Heat radiates through the cotton of his shirt.
His pulse beats steady and strong beneath my fingers, and I find myself melting against him.
“I’m not tired—”
“Yeah, ya are.” His voice vibrates through his chest and into mine. “You nearly drowned out there today.”
He carries me along the hallway and kicks the bedroom door open, not breaking stride. When we’re inside, he moves to the bed and lowers me onto the mattress, his hands lingering at my waist before he straightens.
From this angle, looking up at him, he seems larger somehow. Broader. Breathtaking.
The fading firelight from the hall moves around his shoulders, the powerful column of his throat, and the shadowed strength in his jaw.
“We’re drawing a line in the sand now,” he says. “This is dangerous, Keira. So, let’s not get to the point when I can’t fucking stop. This will all be over soon and ya can go home.”
The word home shouldn’t sting. It’s where I’m supposed to belong. Where my family lives. But the way he says it makes something inside me recoil.
Go home.
As if this mistake will correct itself.
I push up onto my elbows and stare at the whites of his eyes glowing in the darkness of his room, at the restraint tightening his features, at the way his hands curl by his thighs.
“Yeah… I get it,” I say it like I’m agreeing.
Like I’m a reasonable woman. But there’s an ugly twist happening in my chest at the thought of pretending we didn’t get close.
He forces a step back, throat working, muscles tense like distance is something he has to wrestle into place. “I won’t hand ya over to my brothers just because I lost control.”
I nod, understanding that he’s protecting me from his family, and maybe from himself.
He turns and walks out, shutting the door behind him.
I sit and stare at the door, then let myself fall back into the duvet. My heart pumps louder in my chest as I lie in the bed he sleeps in, breathing in the faint scent of fire smoke and clean laundry and him. And that only makes it worse.
My skin still burns where his hands had been, like the imprint of his touch is something my body refuses to forget.
“How did this happen?” I whisper to myself.
Rather than get under the duvet, I grab a pillow and hug it close to my chest, burying my face.
There’s so much to process, so many emotions running riot inside of me. They crash and recoil and collide, leaving me breathless in the aftermath.
Saint was wrong to kidnap me and make up lies about where I’d gone. He used me to get my father’s attention. Men like him don’t change or become the good guy overnight. He’s focused on his family’s legacy.
He was raised in it. Shaped by it. The Tallon family carved loyalty into his bones long before I was born.
Despite all that, my father knows where I am…
And I’m still into Saint. More than any man I’ve ever met.
The truth of it tightens in my throat.
I know exactly what he is.
And somehow, that only makes it harder to stop wanting him.
After a minute that feels like ten, I sit upright. The pillow falls off the mattress when my bare feet hit the floorboards.
I open the bedroom door and walk toward the orange glow.
Saint lies stretched along the couch in nothing but his boxers, one arm tucked behind his head, the other resting loose at his side. The blazing fire paints his body, inked muscles carved across his chest and stomach.
His thighs are thick, powerful. Even asleep, he looks like a weapon at rest.
I stand there for a beat, heart racing, pulse thudding in my throat until his eyes open.
“I can feel ya watching me.” His voice is rough with sleep. “You got a fork in your hand, princess?”
The corners of my mouth hitch to a small smile. “I had a nightmare.”
He stretches himself and scratches the rough edge of his jawline. “Oh yeah? What happened?”
“I fell into a river.” I fold my arms across my chest. “And Saint Tallon saved me.”
A flicker of remembrance moves over his expression, and he offers me a crooked half smile.
“A Harrington princess saved by a Tallon. Now that is a nightmare,” he says in a low rumble.
I pad across the room before I can talk myself out of it and lower myself beside him, close enough that my bare skin brushes his.
“He made me take off my clothes,” I whisper.
“What a bad bastard,” he says next to my ear, his voice hoarse.
His mouth lingers there for a second, close enough that the warmth of his breath traces the shell of my ear and drifts down the side of my neck.
Every nerve in my body wakes up, hoping he would kiss me there.
He exhales a slow breath. “What else did he do?”
“He kissed me.”
“I bet ya hated that…”
“Yeah…I think he hated it, too.”
He rolls himself onto his side and positions me in front of him, my spine snug to his chest, his body a wall of warmth at my back.
His arm slides back around my middle and his hand splays over my belly, stealing a breath from me.
My spine arches a fraction, and my ass settles against him, and he’s hard.
His thumb moves along the underside of my breast. Once. Then it stops, and his hand stays exactly where it is. I lie there aching and wide awake with him pressed against me, neither of us willing to be the one who moves.
“Don’t worry: nightmares fade eventually.” The warmth of his breath caresses my nape.
He drags a blanket over me, and neither of us says anything more.
And for the first time since this began, my heart doesn’t thrum like it’s fighting itself. It just beats, slow and steady, and in time with his.
“Ciarán Tallon, what the hell do ya think you’re doin’?”
My eyes snap open, and I take a second to remember that I fell asleep on Saint’s couch, in his arms. And now, his sister is glaring over the top of us.
For one disorienting second, I feel caught as if she’s interrupted something private and dragged me into the light.
Saint moves behind me, pulling himself up to sitting while fixing the blanket over me.
“Get the fuck out of here,” he warns. “The spare key was for emergencies only, Sera.”
“This is an emergency,” she grits. “I knew the Harrington girl fancied you, but I didn’t think you two would be in here playing house. What the hell is wrong with ya, Saint?”
Saint’s on his feet in a blur and towering over her. He’s pure muscle and fury now, all warmth replaced with stern features.
“What I do behind that door is none of your fucking business.”
She laughs and prods his inked chest. “Really? This is a whole new level of asshole, even for you.”
I sit up and wrap the blanket around me, not sure where to go.
“Oh yeah? Because I like the girl? Because she’s nothing like her old man?”
My heart beats faster because he just admitted that out loud.
“No, Saint!” Sera bites back. “Because you’re making moves on her when you know how this ends.”
Her gaze cuts to me then, and for a split second the anger thins into something that looks dangerously close to caution.
“The plan was to hold her in the yard until Alasdair signs, then throw her back. Not welcome her into the family with your dick and a warm blanket.”
Heat crawls up my throat and I hug the blanket tighter, the fluffiness still warm from our combined body heat. Now it feels less like comfort and more like evidence.
Because his sister isn’t wrong. He did both. Though I wasn’t dragged into it kicking and screaming. I walked toward him knowing exactly who he is.
Saint goes stiff and his fists clench tighter. His jaw ticks once before he answers.
“She knows the way things are. I’m not doing anything she’s not into, and I sure as hell haven’t promised her anything.”
And he hasn’t. Although he has protected me, saved me, fed me, kissed me like I mattered and—
She shakes her head and glances down at me for a beat before her withering gaze cuts back to Saint.
“Then she’s in for a fucking ride when this blows up.” Sera plasters a smile on her face. “Does Ma know you’re fooling around with her?”
“Are you gonna run to her and shout your mouth off?” Saint steps into her. “Are you, Sera? Because you know what that would make ya.”
Sera props her hands on her hips and doesn’t back down. “You’re a pig, Saint. That girl’s gonna hate you more than her da does once you dump her back where she belongs.”
She angles herself around to face me. “I told you already: he won’t pick you over blood. What happens now is on you. But don’t let our ma see whatever the fuck this is… or she’ll remind Saint exactly what family he belongs to.”
His jaw tightens at the mention of their mother.
“She can remind me all she likes,” he says. “I haven’t forgotten.”
Then his gaze settles on me.
“Keira’s an adult. If she’d rather spend her nights in here than in the yard, that’s her choice. What I do is up to me. Not Ma. Not you. Not anyone. Next time you come to my house, knock first.”
Sera exhales through her nose and folds her arms. “I brought the clothes for her like ya asked…and I won’t say a word, but she’s gonna work today. There’s plenty to be done in the yard, and you’re needed at the racetrack with Dane.”
My stomach drops.
Saint won’t be around.
I clutch the blanket to my chest and stand.
“Fine,” I say, almost shrugging. “I can work.”
“Good.” Sera turns away. “You two have spent enough time together already. I’ll work ya so hard you’ll be too tired to even think about touching my brother again.”