Chapter 19 Katie
KATIE
I haven’t seen Aiden in four days, which is highly unusual given the fact that I haven’t been away from him this long in weeks.
It’s a much-needed break, or at least that’s what I keep telling myself every fifteen minutes to ease the growing anxiety that I’ve done something wrong.
I had six book covers to create and four tours to organise; all were done in a day of non-stop work.
Thank God for hyper-fixation. I can move mountains when there is a tight deadline, but heaven forbid that I take a moment to relax and recharge.
Not that I’d be recharging much with Ciara currently burning a hole through my floors with her pacing. “You need to dump him,” she says to a picture of our late nanny, but I’m sure that one was directed at me.
I stuff a handful of fizzy cola bottles into my mouth, taking my time to think of an answer other than “go fuck yourself.” I love my sister to bits, I do. I wouldn’t trade her for anything in the world. But she is pushing her luck by offering unsolicited advice that I clearly don’t need or want.
“How about, no.” I finally respond, making a point of chewing as loud as possible just to irk her.
“He had something to do with those guys going missing; we both know it!” Her dark brown hair falls in loose waves around her face as she steps closer.
“We don’t know anything. We cannot remember a damn thing. We were spiked, remember?”
“He did something, Katie!” she insists. “What are the odds that it was his club it happened in? That it was his house we woke up in. That he has inserted himself into your life since it happened.” Her fingers tangle in her hair as she scrapes it away from her face.
“He watches you like a hawk. He’s now your boyfriend? How the hell did that even happen?”
I don’t know if I should be insulted right now. “Are you insinuating that Aiden’s too good for me?”
She scoffs. “No, that’s not what I meant. I just find it all too coincidental, don’t you think?”
Stuffing another handful of cola bottles in my mouth, I mull over her words.
I know there is something that he’s not telling me.
I know he’s dangerous in, at least, some aspects; the gun gave that away.
I know he has something to do with the missing arseholes from that night, but I can’t quite piece it all together. Not yet.
Still, call me lovesick, blind, or just plain stupid, but I refuse to believe that the man who has shown me more kindness and understanding than anyone else I’ve ever known could be involved in something sinister.
“Ok,” I say slowly, swallowing the jellies.
“Let’s say you’re right. Let’s say you’re on to something.
Let’s say that Aiden, for whatever reason, has something to do with those two arseholes disappearing.
” I get to my feet, grab the empty sweet bag, and toss it into the fireplace.
“That means that he saved us that night.” I turn to my sister, righteous indignation burning in my eyes.
“We were drugged, Ciara. Those men could have done anything to us. Best case scenario, we were going to be assaulted. Worst case, we were dead.” I pause for a moment, letting the weight of my words sink in.
“If Aiden was involved, he saved our arses that night.”
Ciara swallows hard, her eyes welling up with tears. “And if they’re dead?”
“Good riddance,” she flinches at my blunt response.
“If they’re dead, I hope that whoever killed them made it fucking hurt.
” Aiden’s hoodie hangs loosely around my shoulders, a constant reminder of the night that changed everything.
He never took it back from me, even though I offered to return it countless times.
He never took his bank card back, either.
After two days of trying to hand it back to him and him not budging on the matter, I spent eight hundred euros on Shein, then ratted myself out, and all Aiden did was laugh.
Apparently, his tie clip costs more than my entire new wardrobe.
Let’s see how much he’ll be laughing when he sees the price of my new windows and doors. In my defence, he keeps insulting them; I’m in desperate need of new ones, and he left me unsupervised with his bank card.
The dopamine hit was what I imagine addicts feel like shooting up with black tar heroin.
“So let me get this straight.” Ciara follows me into the kitchen. “Drugs and alcohol are a hard no for you, but murder and your boyfriend breaking into your house are fine?”
I shrug, reaching for two cups from the cabinet. “You saw what we grew up with,” I say, pouring hot water over the teabags in the cups. “I’d take getting fingered by Edward Scissorhands over reliving that shit.”
“He admitted to breaking in!”
“With a butter knife,” I turn to get milk from the fridge. “He wasn’t wrong when he said my doors are a piece of shit, plus,” I reach into Aiden’s hoodie for my purse, slam the bank card on the counter, then continue making tea.
Ciara’s brows jump so high behind her fringe that I lose sight of them for a second before they decline as she reads his name on the card. “He gave you his bank card?”
I nod, adding sugar to the tea. “Yeah. I just dropped twelve grand on new windows and doors.” As soon as the words leave my mouth, my phone buzzes.
I glance at the screen and see a text from Aiden. “How much money do I have to spend to piss him off?”
“Wait,” Ciara reaches for her tea while I put the milk back into the fridge. “He’s not bothered that you dropped twelve grand from his account?”
I close the fridge door a little too hard, hearing the contents rattle inside.
“No, it’s infuriating.” We turn back to the sitting room, and I hear my phone buzz again.
I grab it and see a text from Maria with a link to an article titled “Body found in a house in Killinarden Heights. Gardaí appealing for information.”
“What the fuck?” Is it someone we know? I immediately text Maria back, asking if she has any more details, then scroll down the article, seeing a name I sort of recognise, before my blood freezes.
Keane McCarthy is listed as a person of interest. “Did you see this?” I shove the phone at Ciara and watch her face contort.
“Keane McCarthy? That’s the guy who used to live up the road from us?”
I never told Ciara what happened or what he did to me. I never told anyone but Maria and… Aiden! I was just talking to him about this on Sunday at his mam’s. Surely it must be a coincidence.
Something gnaws at my gut as I try to make sense of the situation. “What…” I force my nails away from my mouth and look at Ciara. “What day was that?”
“The gardaí think Sunday night or early Monday morning,” she says matter-of-factly. “Why?”
“No reason.” It couldn’t have been Aiden. There is no way. He was at work, and then he was with me.
Ciara lifts her gaze from the phone, “are you alright?”
“Yeah, just,” I take the phone back, trying to act nonchalant. “Mad to think that something like that happened so close to home.” My phone starts buzzing, which almost makes me jump out of my skin. Aiden.
“Hey.”
“Bug.” I can practically see the frown on his face. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, just talking to Ciara.”
“Do you need me to come over? You sound…triggered,” he proffers. There is no way this man is involved in whatever happened. There’s just not.
“No, I’m fine, honestly. Just a little tired,” I assure him. “But you may need to come down here and take your bank card back before I make another impulse buy.”
He chuckles lowly. “I told you to buy whatever you want.”
“You don’t want me to do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’ll probably clear off my mortgage if you leave me alone with your bank card,” my shoulders start to relax and I sink back against the cushions.
“How much is left on your mortgage?” Aiden asks, I hear him rooting through some papers on his end.
“Around €61,000, not including interest; that’s probably another ten-grand penalty for early repayment.”
He pauses briefly, most likely planning on rallying his gorgeous arse down here to take back his card. “That it?”
Ciara almost chokes on her tea; spittle flies in every direction; my piggies are not happy. They both flee into their respective hiding spots. Oreo chatters his teeth, clearly annoyed with the fright she gave him.
“You’re not serious.” Are the only words I can think of to say.
“You should know I never joke about money.”
“There’s no way I could let you—”
Ciara kicks me in the shins.
I can imagine him leaning on the desk, smirking into the phone. “Why?”
“Let him pay for it!” Ciara growls lowly.
Getting to my feet, I leave my sister on the couch and scramble upstairs for some privacy. “Aiden, you’re not—”
“I wasn’t asking permission, bug,” he interrupts. “I was informing you of my decision.”
“No.”
“No?”
Why does it sound like the bastard is enjoying this?
“No! This is my house. I got it on my own. I’m responsible for paying for it.”
Why is he laughing at me right now?
“Bank of Ireland. Ten-year fixed-rate mortgage. Low interest. Account number…”
Blood swims in my ears as he rattles off my bank account information. I don’t even know if that is my account number, but he seems pretty sure of himself. “Aiden James Quinn.” How the hell did he get my information?
“I told you before, Katie,” he growls, a low, sexy sound. “You’re my woman. I’m not going to ask your permission to treat you like the queen you are.”
“It’s too much!”
He scoffs. “Not enough.”
“Aiden!”
“Katie,” he does not raise his voice; instead, he drops it to a dangerous, commanding whisper. “The deeds will be with you in two days. I’ve already sent the payment.”
“I’ll pay you back.”
“You will not!”
“Aiden!”
I hear his fist bang on his desk.
Oh, now I’ve pissed him off. Good. He’s pissed me off.
I hear him breathing heavily, most likely counting to ten in an attempt to calm himself down. “Bug…”
“I’m not talking to you now; you’re an arsehole.”
“But I’m your arsehole.” From his tone, I guess that he’s smiling.
I roll my eyes, unable to resist a small grin. “Yeah, unfortunately, you are.”
“And you love me.”
He’s never going to let me live that down, is he? I haven’t said it since, more so from mortification than anything else. Plus, he hasn’t made a move to say it back so I’m clearly the only one of us two who feel that way. “Not right now, I don’t.”
“Still do.”
“Shut your mouth.”
He barks a laugh, cocky prick that he is. “I’ll see you later tonight.”
My stomach flutters—treacherous bastard. “I thought you had to work?”
“And deprive you of seeing my handsome face before bed?”
I lean against the wall in my bedroom, throwing my eyes to the heavens. “Don’t think too highly of yourself, do you?”
“Bug,” that growl again. The one that makes my knees weak and my stomach flip. “The only thing I’ve thought about since Sunday night is just how fucking beautiful you look when you’re soaking wet and begging me to take you.”
I bite my lip, heat rushing to my cheeks. I did do that, didn’t I? I begged him to take me. I was damn near feral.
And what he gave me was beyond anything I could have imagined. I wasn’t numb to his touch. I felt everything from the moment he pushed inside me until the very last second. Every thrust, every caress, I felt… and that’s something I struggled to do before him.
I don’t even know what to say to him. It was the best sex of my life, the closest to normal I’ve ever felt, and if he were here right now, I’d want him to do it again.
“You shouldn’t be thinking about me like that when you’re working.”
The noise he makes is not quite a growl, not quite a whisper, but a low, husky sound that sends shivers down my spine. “I shouldn’t be at work at all.” I hear his chair scrape the floor in his office. “I should be in your bed right now, worshipping at your altar.”
The thought of his lips on my skin and his hands exploring every inch of my body makes it hard to focus on anything else.
“I should be on my fucking knees with your hands tangled in my hair and your juices dripping down my chin.”
I tug the collar of his hoodie away from my neck and take a deep breath, trying to ignore the image that is playing in my mind.
Pressing my thighs together, I try to relieve the ache between my legs, but it only intensifies the longing.
I hear a door shut on his end, followed by the soft chatter of voices in the background. “You have ninety minutes.”
“For what?” I ask, my voice barely above a whisper.
“To get rid of your sister before I get there,” I hear the jingle of keys and his engine roar to life.
My mouth feels dry—too dry to swallow. “Aiden?”
“Ninety minutes, bug,” He hangs up, and I’m left staring at my phone.