10. Cillian
CILLIAN
Three weeks in, I stop sleeping properly.
Every spare hour disappears into old shipping ledgers, board minutes, and contracts my father never expects anyone to read closely.
I’m not trying to bring down the whole operation.
That was never the plan. I just need one piece of leverage.
One mistake big enough to make him think twice before he comes after us.
I find it eventually, it’s buried in a string of transactions from four years ago, hidden well enough that no one would’ve looked twice.
But I do. And once I start pulling at the thread, the rest comes with it.
It’s enough. Enough to ruin his standing with the men who keep him in power.
I lock the files in my desk and, for the first time in weeks, I let myself believe I’ve found a way out. A way to protect Ciara without burning everything else to the ground.
Then my phone rings.
One of the groundskeepers. He’s out of breath before he even say my name. Ciara’s car went off the coastal road. Another car came around the bend too fast. Forced her off. There wasn’t anywhere for her to go. My heart stops.
“Is she...”
“She’s alive.”
He says it before I can finish the question. She’s already back at the house. Just a graze on her arm from hitting the door while she tried to brace herself.
Alive.
He says it again, like he knows it’s the only word I’m capable of hearing.
I don’t remember getting to her room. One second I’m running through the house. The next I’m standing in her doorway, looking at her sitting on the edge of the bed. Her sleeve is rolled up. A thin scrape cuts across her forearm. That’s all.
It should be enough to calm me down. Instead, something inside me goes ice cold. My hands won’t move for a second because all I can see is how close that scrape came to being something worse.
“I’m fine,” she says before I can ask. “Cillian, it’s just a scrape.” I don’t answer.
I drop to my knees in front of her and take her arm as carefully as if it’s made of glass, turning it toward the light. It’s barely anything. Compared to what could’ve happened on that road, it’s nothing.
“Tell me exactly what happened.”
“A car came up behind me too fast. I thought it was going to pass.” Her voice wavers. “Then it didn’t. I had to swerve or it would’ve hit me. I... I don’t know whose car it was. It never stopped.”
I know whose car it was. I don’t say it out loud. I don’t need proof. I’ve watched Connor carry out my father’s orders long enough to recognize one when I see it.
Every plan I’ve spent three weeks building drops away right there.
The document, the leverage, the careful strategy to end this quietly and walk away with everything intact.
None of it matters next to the fact that someone put her on a cliff road and tried to scare her off it. Or worse. I don’t finish that thought.
I lift her arm and press my lips against the scrape, gentle enough that she barely feels it.
“This ends today.”
Her eyes search mine. “Cillian... what are you going to do?”
“Whatever it takes.” The words leave my mouth before I can think about them, and I know I mean every one. I push myself to my feet. “I have to talk to my father.” My voice barely sounds like mine. “Now.”
“Cillian...”
“Lock the door behind me.” I press a kiss to her forehead, both hands cradling her face. “I need to end this today.”
She doesn’t argue. I think she can see it in my face, that arguing won’t do either of us any good right now.
My father’s in his study, whiskey already poured, going over papers like it’s any other evening.
“Cillian. If this is about the deadline again?—”
“Someone ran Ciara off the coastal road today.” I keep my voice flat. “She’s got a graze on her arm and could’ve gone straight over the cliff. Was that you, or was that Connor acting on his own?”
That gets his attention. He sets his pen down slow, studying me the way he studies business partners, deciding how much truth is useful to admit to.
“I didn’t order that.”
“But you knew he might.”
He doesn’t answer. That’s answer enough.
“That’s the thing about you, father. You never order anything directly.
You just let men like Connor understand what you’d prefer, and then you get to keep your hands clean when it goes wrong.
” I cross the room, done waiting for him to catch up.
“I’m not interested in whether you technically gave the order.
I’m interested in ending this before it happens again. ”
“You think you can just walk in here and end anything?”
“I know I can.”
I set the envelope on his desk and slide it across until it stops in front of him. “Open it.”
He does, slow, deliberate. I watch his face while he reads, watch his composure crack for the first time in my entire life.
“Where did you get this?”
“Doesn’t matter. What matters is what happens to you, to this family, to everything you’ve built if this leaves the room and ends up on the wrong desk. I’ve made copies. People who know exactly what to do with them if anything happens to me, to Ciara, or to her mother.”
“You’d burn all of it down. Your own inheritance.” His voice goes quiet in a way I’ve never heard from him. “Everything I built for you.”
“You built it for yourself and called it mine because it made the story easier to tell.” I hold his gaze and don’t look away.
For the first time in my life I don’t flinch from this man.
“I’m done with that. Here’s what happens now.
Connor is finished. Not just quietly moved somewhere else.
Finished. You end him in front of every man who matters to you.
And you leave Ciara and her mother alone.
Completely. No more warnings. No more accidents on coastal roads.
No more using the people I love to force a choice you were never entitled to make for me.
Those are the terms. Take them or lose everything. ”
He’s quiet a long moment. His jaw works. The whiskey sits forgotten between us.
“And if I refuse?”
“Then it’s not just your reputation that burns. It’s the distillery. The family name. Whatever standing you still have with the men who always applaud you.” I pick the envelope back up. “Your choice. Except this time you’re not the one who controls the outcome.”
When he finally speaks, his voice comes out smaller than I’ve ever heard it.
“You’d really give it all up. The company. Everything I handed you.”
“I’ve already decided.” I straighten, done with this room, done with all those years of letting this man decide what I’m allowed to want.
“I’m not your heir anymore. Not in any way that matters to me.
I’m choosing her. All of it, the company, the name, none of it means anything next to what I’d lose if I kept it and lost her instead. ”
I don’t wait for him to answer. I walk out and leave him there, with the first decision I’ve made for myself. The years of certainty finally cracking in his hands.
I find Ciara exactly where I left her, arms wrapped around herself, still holding herself together after the fear of the afternoon. She looks up the second I walk in, searching my face for whatever I’m bringing back with me.
I don’t say anything at first. I cross the room and pull her into my arms, holding on until I feel her breath catch against my chest. The relief hits so hard my hands shake.
“It’s done,” I murmur into her hair. “Connor’s finished. Declan’s not touching either of you again.”
“How?”
“Doesn’t matter right now.” I pull back just far enough to look at her, both hands framing her face. “What matters is you’re safe. You could’ve gone off that cliff today. And I would’ve been sitting in my office thinking I still had time to fix this quietly.”
“But I didn’t.” Her voice steadies me even now. “I’m right here.”
I just hold her after that. My hand moves slow on her back. My mouth stays pressed to the top of her head. The silence between us feels full instead of empty, the kind that only comes after you’ve almost lost something you can’t live without.
I feel the warmth against my shirt before I really register what it means, a familiar spreading heat where her chest presses into me.
I know this pattern by heart now. It isn’t stress that starts it anymore.
It’s this. The closeness. My voice. The way I hold her when everything else has gone quiet.
Her body answers the tenderness before either of us says a word.
She doesn’t try to hide it. She simply leans into me a little more, already trusting that I understand.
I am the one who speaks first.
“Come here,” I murmur, pressing my mouth to her temple. “Let me take care of you.”
Her fingers curl tighter into my shirt. She exhales, long and shaky, some of the day finally draining out of her against me.
“I need to hold you a little longer,” I say, voice rough. “I need to feel you breathing against me and know you’re actually safe. Just stay here with me.”
She understands without me having to explain.
Her hands find the buttons of her shirt and work them open slowly while I watch.
When the fabric falls away I don’t rush.
I guide her down onto the bed and settle beside her instead of over her, keeping us face to face.
I start with soft kisses along her collarbone, then lower, taking my time with the soft underside of each breast before I ever reach a nipple.
Only when she’s already arching toward me do I close my mouth around her and draw her in, slow and deep.
She gasps, fingers sliding into my hair.
I stay on that side longer than usual, drinking in long pulls while my free hand simply rests over her heart, feeling it beat.
When I finally switch I do it the same way, unhurried, almost reverent.
Every pull feels like proof she’s real, warm, alive, mine.
The fear from this afternoon finally starts to loosen with every second I spend at her skin.
“You’re safe,” I murmur against her. “You’re here with me.”
She lets out a soft breath, one hand cupping the back of my head to hold me closer. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“There’s not going to be another day like today. I’m not gonna let them hurt you again.” I press a kiss to the curve of her breast, then the other, savoring instead of just needing. “I mean that. Whatever it takes.”
“Cillian.” Her voice breaks softly. “I know.”
“Good” I don’t stop. “Stay with me a little longer.”
She lets me have it. Her hands move slow through my hair while she murmurs quiet reassurance. I drink from her again and again, nothing like the urgency of the barrel room or the balcony. Just need and relief tangled so tight I can’t separate them anymore.
By the time I lift my head she’s soft and spent against the pillows. I gather her into my chest and hold her there, both of us breathing hard.
“I love you,” I murmur into her hair. “I don’t think I’ve said it enough.”
“I love you too.” Soft and certain, nothing held back. “I’ve loved you longer than I probably should admit.”
The knot in my chest finally lets go. The first full breath I’ve taken since the phone call.
We don’t sleep that night. We lie tangled together instead, talking about nothing and everything, and somewhere before dawn we both know neither of us wants to spend another night under Declan’s roof.
We pack light. A few bags, only what we actually need, and walk down together as the sky turns pale gold. The Atlantic stretches out gray and endless beside the path.
Ciara laughs once, quiet, watching the water. “We’re really doing this.”
“Looks that way.”
“Good.” She squeezes my hand. “I don’t want to be anywhere else.”
The old distillery sits at the far edge of the property, stone walls soft with ivy, the building my grandfather used before the new facility replaced it.
Nobody’s lived here in years. Close enough that I can still call this coast home.
Far enough that Declan’s roof is no longer over either of our heads.
Ciara stops in the doorway, looking back the way we came, then forward at the building waiting for us.
“This is really happening,” she says softly.
“It is.” I take her hand. “This is ours now. Whatever we make of it.”
She laughs, something light and unburdened in the sound. “It’s going to need a lot of work.”
“We’ve got time.”
I lead her inside, past dust and old barrels, until we reach the far room where morning light spills gold across the stone floor. I stop there, still holding her hand. Something settles in my chest, quiet and sure.
“Ciara.”
“Yeah?”
I get down on one knee before I can overthink it, pulling the ring box from my pocket, the one I’ve carried for three days without telling her.
Her hand flies to her mouth. “Cillian.”
“I’ve spent my whole life having everything decided for me.
My name. My future. Every choice that ever mattered.
” I open the box. “This is the first thing I’ve ever chosen completely for myself, and I’m not waiting one more day to make it official.
Marry me. Not for the company. Not for the name.
Not for anything Declan ever wanted from either of us.
Just because I want you. All of you. For the rest of my life. ”
She’s crying now, nodding before she finds the words. “Yes. God, yes.”
I slide the ring onto her finger and stand. She’s already reaching for me, arms around my neck as I lift her off her feet.
“I love you,” I say again, because I don’t think I’ll ever say it enough. “You’re the choice I keep making. Every single day.”
“I love you too.” She presses her forehead to mine. “Whatever we build here, I don’t want it with anyone else.”
“MacCarthy Distillery still stands,” I say against her hair, half a laugh in it. “Just a smaller version. Ours.”
“Perfect.” She smiles against my mouth. “I like it small. Starting from scratch with you feels like freedom.”
Outside, the sea keeps doing what it’s always done. For the first time in longer than I can remember, none of that noise reaches me. Just this room, this woman, this ring on her finger, and the quiet certainty that whatever comes next, we’re building it together. Starting now.