Illicit Temptation (Astoria Royals #3)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Trace

I see it happening before anyone else. And damn, I have to stop it. I cross the room and shove Shea behind me, catching the hand of Archer before he pulls her into a stairwell.

“Get your hands off me, you low-born psycho,” Archer sneers.

“Low born?” I chuckle menacingly. “Doesn’t matter who or what I am, you’re not getting anywhere near my client.”

“Shea, please.” The man I beat up in August sounds ready to grovel. “I need to speak to you.”

“Step back or I’ll give you a shiner to match that suit, too.”

“Oh, you were the masked man who attacked me at my store?” The lying bastard looks around snapping his fingers. “Care to confess that under oath to one of the judges here?”

Shea rests her head against my back, her breathing ragged. “Oh God, oh God.”

I wisely believe a man like this has the power to implicate me. My power lies in the ability to scare the fuck out of him.

“Stay away from my client, mate,” I ground out. “Those security videos are still on my phone and her deadly brothers who will pound you to dust are in that ballroom.”

Archer is out of his element here in Astoria, and looking around, I don’t see his brothers, which means either they’re not in his corner in his brutal pursuit of a mob princess, or he hasn’t told them what he’s been up to. Namely, cheating on his wife .

“One text and five O’Rourkes will be right here. Do you want to face them?”

Archer grunts and stalks down a back corridor. I doubt he even stepped foot in the ballroom or Lachlan would have shot him on site.

“I still feel so stupid.” Shea leans into my chest when I turn toward her.

“I doubt people respect a man who cheats on his wife and lied to his girlfriend.” I brush her cheek. “And if it ever comes up, I suggest that’s your story.”

“It just wasn’t meant to be, was it? Like...us,” she says, low and controlled.

I go still. “Us?”

“We’re not meant to me, are we?” She sniffs.

“I...”

“Then I think about how complicated the world is, and we ended up in Las Vegas at the exact same time.”

My heart leaps in my chest. “That and I never lied to you, love. I never strung you along. I never cheated on you.”

“I still can’t believe that. I mean, I believe you,” she snorts and looks up at me. Her green eyes have that glassy shine like emeralds.

My princess interrupted.

“Shea?” A voice I don’t recognize, and without a lilt, brings my head up.

“Dr. O’Rourke,” I say and pry Shea from me.

“Darragh?” Shea addresses her brother.

He looks from me to her. “What’s wrong?”

Her breathing goes ragged, and the woman who has an answer for everything, can’t speak.

“An unhappy client had the nerve to bark her displeasure,” I speak for her. “Here in public. I put a stop to it.”

“Thank goodness.” Darragh squeezes my shoulder. “ Who’s the client, I’ll get Lachlan—”

“No,” Shea says, smoothing her dress. “Trace handled it. I handled it. It did wipe me out, though. Can you send my apologies to Kieran? I’m going to skip dinner and go home.”

That means I’m leaving, too.

“Of course.” Darragh, my buddy Cormac’s twin, another blond O’Rourke doctor leans in and hugs her.

He’s younger than she is, but so tall she disappears in his arms. “I hear you’re coming to Dunbar with us.”

“I am.” She perks up. “Can you call me in more Ambien? I’m running low.”

“Sure.” He lays one more kiss on her forehead. “How are you getting home?”

“I’ll take care of it,” I say, even though we took the helicopter here and the pilot is expecting a few more hours off. “I’ll take care of her.”

My voice raises an eyebrow, maybe giving me away.

“I’ll be fine,” Shea says, tugging his arm. “Kiss Sophie and JP for me when you get home.”

“Will do.” He gives me a nod and struts away in a white suit jacket and black pants that remind me of Frank Sinatra.

When we’re alone, Shea exhales. “Shoot, how are we getting home? Maybe I should just sleep at Divona. You deserve a night off. Go home to your apartment. Where in the city is it?”

“I can tell you that. But then I’ll have to kill you,” I joke.

“Right. I have guards and gates. You don’t.”

“I don’t need a guard. No one’s getting near me who’s not supposed to be.” I take out my phone and after a few clicks, I get a confirmation text. “Our ride home will be here in three minutes.”

“Uber Black, I assume. Impressive. Let me know how much— ”

I stop her with my lips resting on hers like I can’t help it. The lush, warmth of her mouth zings me with memories from our night in Vegas. Making my heart happy. And something else a few feet lower.

“I got the ride home. And how about for the rest of the night, you’re not my client?”

She swallows. “Then...who am I?”

“A woman I’m dying to fuck.”

BUT WE’RE NOT IN A limo where I can raise a partition and lower my pants. In the GMC SUV, Shea keeps her head on my shoulder. At my request, the driver keeps on a soft jazz station.

“Oh, Darragh called in the script for me already.” Shea checks her phone. “Can we stop at the pharmacy?”

“We can, but I’ll get out and grab it for you.” This isn’t an Uber Black, this is Rian Quinlan driving, my cousins’ half-brother, and he’s more armed than me.

We stop at Shea’s neighborhood pharmacy where I give a nod to Rian, signaling to protect her. The tension releases in my shoulders while picking up her meds.

The sparse clouds in the dark blue sky let dapples of moonlight shine on the ocean across the street.

At the house, we get inside, and after a drawn-out gaze between us, the exhaustion in Shea’s eyes tempers my desire. I want her awake and on fire.

“I was committing adultery by sleeping with Archer these last three years, wasn’t I?” Her voice is small.

“That’s a technicality, I guess. If I didn’t have to fly back to Dublin to deal with a disaster and then get sent off on a three-year-long assignment, I’d have made sure no man went near you. Including him. You never would have committed that adultery.”

She looks up at me. “You wanted our wedding to...last? ”

I don’t want to give away how I didn’t think of it as something flighty and ill-conceived like she does. Even if I knew it wasn’t a real marriage. It meant she belonged to me. Even if for a little while.

“I admit, we were goofing around.” I lean in. “Then I fucked you. Consummated that sketchy wedding and it turned very real for me.”

“Is that why you like calling me your wife?”

“That and your eyes fill with fire when I say it.”

“But you’re agreeing to the divorce.” She folds her arms.

She’s got me there, only I vaguely agreed to that last August before Ares Zervas met with Griffin on New Year’s Day. Now, I’ll have the position and power to keep her as my wife. I just need her father on my side.

“We’ll get the divorce you want,” I lie. “ When we get home from Dunbar.”

Another lie, since I plan to come home with her father’s blessing. I challenge any one of his sons to tell me they have more of a say over Shea than her bleedin’ father . I might have a black eye, a few broken ribs, and a crushed skull doing it. But Shea-Lynne is worth that pain.

The Ireland trip also buys me time. I don’t have to worry she’ll drug me or sneak off to Vegas on her own to terminate this marriage. Pay someone to pretend to be me.

Sadness takes over her features and it breaks my heart. “Um. Okay.”

With her yawn, I give up on the idea of touching her tonight. She can’t properly consent. I beat back my morally gray side that stains my soul thinking of how I’d make sure she consented. With my tongue on her clit and my finger in her ass.

Shea ambles to bed, the bag from the pharmacy clutched in her hand.

I complete my evening walkthrough of the house like I do every night before settling into bed. There’s not a hint of trouble lurking around Shea here in East Hampton. She’s a smart woman and would know what to look for given how she grew up. It’s got to be the reason her brothers let her live out here all alone. That was before Crest decided eight years wasn’t enough time with Shea.

Not anymore. She’ll never be alone again.

I check the cameras in the control room and there’s not a soul for miles.

I sit in one of the living room chairs and log into one of my stupid video games on my phone to calm my brain. I tire myself out after an hour and close my eyes. I shake awake, shocked it’s close to three a.m.

A sound in the kitchen me has the hair on the back of my neck standing up. Slipping my gun from my ankle strap, I step soundlessly through the living room and into the kitchen.

My body hardens and my brain spazzes out. Shea is standing in the kitchen.

Wearing a thong.

And fucking nothing else.