Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
ANDIE
If you knew about the awful shit I’ve done, you’d think otherwise.
I force his gaze to mine, needing to see his eyes. The truth always shows in the eyes. The way someone looks up or whether or not the pupils dilate. Watching someone’s eyes is as good as hooking them up to a lie detector.
“No, I wouldn’t.”
His mouth shuts, the muscle in his jaw distending.
I lock my ankles around him just in case he tries to get up and leave. His face hardens, and creases appear between his brow.
“Christ, Andie. The night we spent together in Geneva, I’d tortured and killed a man in a back storage closet of the club right before I approached you on the dance floor.”
“Why?” I know it’s morally fucked up to not feel horrified by that. But I also know Liam, and he wouldn’t have done it unless he had good reason. Again, fucked up to think that way, but that’s the world he and I live in. Blurred lines and blood. There is no black and white. Not in the mob.
“He had been following you. Rossi sent him.”
I had always thought Max had eyes on me while I was in Switzerland, even though, to find out, he also planted a tracker on me.
Needing to get through to him, I say, “We’ve all done things we regret. Things we had to do to survive.” I lift my hands between us, spreading my fingers, then curling them into fists. “We’ve all got blood on our hands.”
I’ve racked up my own body count in the last week, and that number will continue to grow once I wipe Alejandro and Julio off the face of the earth.
Like he did before, Liam grips my hands and kisses each finger. “Some of us more so than others.”
I twine my fingers with his until we’re holding hands. “Tell me.”
It takes a few minutes, and I wait patiently for him to find the words.
“Her name was Sophia—Sophie. We were engaged to be married.”
Jealousy at this unknown woman digs sharp barbs into my heart. Did he love her? He must have if he proposed.
“She was Cillian’s sister’s oldest daughter. His niece.”
“My cousin, Cillian?” I ask.
Cillian is a McCarthy from my mother’s side of the family. He’s the one I reached out to after Kellan’s funeral. Keane and Jax had asked me where I learned how to fight. The simple answer is Cillian.
“Aye.”
“What happened? Did you call off the engagement?”
He takes a slow breath and exhales it. “No. I killed her. She betrayed me. Betrayed the family. She was feeding information to one of our rivals, the McMurphys. A lot of our men had died because of her. Come to find out, she was also fucking their eldest son.” Liam’s eyes glaze over as he gets lost in the memory.
Am I shocked by his confession? A little. But overriding that is the compulsion to comfort him.
“Liam,” I whisper, kissing him chastely. “I’m so sorry. Do we need to worry about the McMurphys or Cillian?” Are they the enemies he was referring to? I could reach out to Cillian. See if there’s a way we could cancel any blood debt owed.
He shakes his head. “Cillian was the one who ordered her death. The McMurphy son, Niall, didn’t give a shit about Sophie. Why go to war over a woman who meant nothing other than a few good fucks?”
His question slaps me in the face. Sophie was like me. A woman in a male-dominated world, whose only value was found between her legs.
Not wanting to know the answer, but asking anyway, I inquire as casually as I can, “Did you love Sophie?”
He doesn’t even hesitate. “Not like I should have, considering she was to be my wife. I guess Rafael and I have that in common. Being forced to marry someone for the good of the family business.”
I couldn’t stand the thought of Rafe marrying Rita—good fucking riddance to that duplicitous bitch. And Liam is right. Their situations are eerily comparable.
“I don’t deserve your love, bella . Not after the things I’ve done. How could you want to be with someone who murdered his own fiancée?”
He makes a valid point, except it’s one I disagree with wholeheartedly. I’m already in too deep with these four men.
“I gave you my love, Liam. You can’t give it back. The return policy expired the night you fucked me in Geneva.”
Liam discharges a huff and buries his face in my chest.
“I have one more question,” I say.
He grazes a knuckle over my nipple, making it peak into a hard nub beneath my top. He switches to the other breast, and sparks light me up from inside, making me hungry for more.
“Does it feel like I’m cheating on you?”
Sophie was sleeping with another man. One that was his enemy. I can’t blame Liam for being angry with me that I’m doing something similar, regardless of the fact that I’ve been completely honest with each of them on where I stand. I won’t be made to choose.
“I guess it should. But the honest answer would be no.”
My confusion must show.
“Sophie didn’t go through the horrific things you’ve had to endure, bella . Her life was easy. The shit you’ve lived through… the fact that you trust me, trust them, with this?—”
He lays a fingertip to my breastbone where my heart beats, then slides his hand over my shoulder, down my arm, and across my stomach.
“—Is a fucking miracle. And I’ll protect and love any part of you that you’ll give me.”
“I do love you.” These men may be broken. Damaged. Their pieces jagged and sharp. But that’s what makes them perfect.
He smiles as he kisses me, and my stomach flutters with what feels like intense happiness, an emotion that is still so foreign to me.
“Then that’s all I need.”
I look down at the large ring I’m now wearing on my right hand, glimmering in the overhead lights of the gym. Declan’s family crest. My family.
“I’m sorry if you thought I was excluding you earlier. There were some things that needed explaining to Rafe.”
Another sigh. “I’m sorry for overreacting.”
I pull his lower lip with my teeth and then soothe the bite with several tiny flicks of my tongue. “You’re forgiven.”
He tugs my hair, wanting more, and that little bite turns into a frantic kiss laced with need. He holds me to him, a comforting embrace that I appreciate more than he’ll ever know.
“Baby, I’m so fecking sorry about everything,” he says, his accent thick with emotion.
He stands up with me still wrapped around him. The amount of strength that must take… damn . Gripping my ass, he walks with me to the back of the room where the lights are dimmer.
“I’m going to take great pleasure in ripping Alejandro apart with my bare hands. I swear to you, bella , I won’t fail you again.”
“You’ve never failed me,” I assure him, bracing his shoulders as he carries me.
With determined eyes full of love and the promise of the vengeance he plans to reap on our enemies, he rasps against my lips, “Before we head back, I need to fuck you first.”
My pussy flutters in response, craving the feel of his Jacob’s ladder inside her.
“Do you have your phone on you?”
Stopping, he pulls it out of the side pocket of his sweats, unlocks it, and hands it to me.
“Thank you.”
I type out a quick text.
Me: Hey, GirlDownLow. I’m on Liam’s phone. Can you shut off the cameras in the gym please?
Tessa: Seriously? Damn you and your golden vagina. I’d be crazy jealous if I didn’t love you so much.
When I burst out laughing, Liam gives me a questioning look.
Me: Just do it.
Tessa: Done. You owe me.
Me: Thank you. Tell the guys I’ll be back in a few minutes.
Tessa: On it.
Seeing what I typed, Liam remarks, “A few minutes?” He takes his phone back and tosses it onto the floor.
“Yep.”
“I think I can make you come at least five times by then.”
“I sure as fuck hope so,” I tell him as my back impacts with the wall, and Liam crushes his body to mine.
He pulls the edge of my halter down and immediately attacks my nipple with his talented tongue. I expect him to dive right in and pound me into the wall, but when he doesn’t, I meet his steadfast, slate-gray gaze.
He runs a thumb across my clavicle, tracing the curved bone there. “I never did answer you.”
My brows knit together. He answered the two questions I’d asked. He opened up to me and shared a fragile part of himself. The guilt about how he sees himself as too damaged and not good enough for me, and the insecurities he has that I want Keane, Jax, and Rafe more than him.
“Thank you for trusting me enough to tell me about Sophia.”
“Not what I’m referring to, bella .”
I’m at a loss, then. I don’t remember asking him anything else.
“You told me that you loved me.”
“I do,” I immediately reply.
Those three words don’t come easily for me. Not after everything I’ve lived through. But I will make damn sure the guys hear them often.
“I love you, too,” he quietly declares, setting me down and dropping to his knees. “You might want to hold on to something. I promised you five orgasms.”