Page 132 of Carnal Urges

“Let you go. Today, if that’s what you want.”

She exhales a hard little breath, full of disappointment. “See, I knew I shouldn’t have told you that story.”

“I’m not saying that because of the story. Ah, fuck, maybe I am. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I want you to know you always have a choice with me. A choice in everything. I haven’t demonstrated that so far. I don’t want to be like all the other men in your life. Taking. Hurting you. Letting you down.”

“No one’s hurt me in a long time,” she says quietly, her breath warm against my chest.

But you could.

She doesn’t say it, but I hear it all the same. She’s already told me as much. I’m caught again between wanting to do the right thing and wanting to do the selfish thing, which is keeping her by my side forever, no matter what she has to say about it.

I wish that last tiny shred of humanity inside me would just fucking die already. Things would be so much easier.

But I meant what I said. She has a choice. I’m a soulless Neanderthal, but for her, I’ll make an exception.

“I’ll take you back to New York if—”

“Say another word and lose your testicles.”

The anger’s back. I hear it in her voice, feel it in the new tension in her body. I like my balls where they are, so I only kiss her temple again and remain silent.

She does box breathing for a while. Eventually, the tension drains from her limbs. We lie together silently until I think she’s about to drift off to sleep.

Then my cell rings. It’s on the bathroom counter.

Sloane lifts her head and looks at me with big eyes. “Is that him?”

“I doubt Kazimir would call this soon. Stay here.”

I roll out of bed and cross to the bathroom. When I pick up the phone and look at the readout, it’s Kieran’s number I see.

I poke my head out the bathroom door, look at Sloane sitting up in bed, her eyes worried, and shake my head.

She collapses back against the mattress, releasing a big gust of air.

I answer Kieran’s call, then listen to him absently as I take a piss. He’s got logistics to go over. Plans that have to be made. A hundred different decisions await me, and it isn’t even seven a.m. yet.

Wanting to get back to bed as quickly as possible, I give him ten minutes of my time. I hang up, splash water on my face, brush my teeth, then head back into the bedroom, stopping short when I see the empty bed.

Sloane’s gone.

THIRTY-FIVE

SLOANE

I have no idea how long Declan will be on the phone. I can’t tell what he’s saying, either, because it’s all in Gaelic. So I decide I need some fresh air and get dressed.

When I walk out the bedroom door, he’s still in the bathroom, talking.

Ignoring my rumbling stomach as I pass through the kitchen, I pull open the glass door of the breakfast room and step outside. The air is brisk and fresh. Cold on my face, but not cold enough to send me back in. Wrapping my arms around myself, I walk over the patio and across the wide expanse of lawn until it gives way to sand.

At the end of the yard by the tall hedge of privets, Spider stands sentry.

Our eyes meet.

I raise a hand in greeting, then look away.

I haven’t spoken to him since the incident in the kitchen. I haven’t spoken to any of the men who prowl the grounds, not even when Declan was gone. I’ve stayed inside, locked out of sight, feelingfoolish and angry with myself for what happened. That I risked their jobs and their pinkies like that. That I made them disobey orders because I was bored.