Page 47 of Irish Vice

I slap her bare bottom. “Isn’t that what you wanted? When you came into my office dressed like a slag?”

She shakes her head like a woman in a dream. “I wanted you. You’re the one. The only one. It’s you, only you, always, always you.”

The shade rustles again, shifted by the breeze. She tries to look over her shoulder. I spank her again, and she groans.

I lean close and whisper in her ear. “Look at you. Bent over the table. Dripping for me. Arse red from my hand.”

I smooth my fingers over that hot, flushed skin. Her whole body starts to shake. She flattens her hands on the felt. She grits her teeth as her knees begin to buckle.

And I sink into her from behind—my entire cock, all my weight. She screams my name as she shatters all around me. I keep her on her feet, digging my fingers into her hips, and then I’m as wet as she is, as hot as she is. She’s milking me and I’m filling her and neither one of us is fully human as we come and come and come together.

My throat aches when I finally let her go. The April night swirls behind me, cold fingers swiping down my sweaty spine, smacking my bare arse.

Her teeth start to chatter, and I pull her into my heat. We cross the room and collapse onto the bed. I find the duvet and pull it up to our chins, and I wrap her in my arms and legs.

I want to carry her back to the house. I have arnica gel there and a store of the chocolate she loves. I could feed her the dinner Fairfax prepared, make up for the meal we both missed. I could put her in my bed and keep her there forever.

She’d protest. I know she would. She won’t sleep in the big house until I atone for Birte.

I could order her to my bedroom. Use my Captain’s voice. Take away her choice.

But I want her todecideto come back.

So I press her close to my body. I kiss the spiderweb of scars at her temple. I wipe the tears from her cheeks and I stroke her hair and I tell her that she’s mypiscín,that she’s magnificent, that I’ve never known anyone like her in my entire life.

“Mo chailín maith,” I breathe, so softly I’m not sure she hears. She sighs, though, relaxing against me. Another breeze steals through the ruined door, and I pull the covers close to keep her warm, holding her close as she drifts off to sleep.

18

BRAIDEN

Four days later, the last note of the national anthem carries over Fenway Park. Half the men in the Diamond Ring head back inside our luxury suite. The wind is predictably fierce in Boston on this April Saturday, the first home game for the World Series Champion Red Sox.

But when Prince stays outside, I do too. He takes a long pull from his beer as the first pitch crosses the plate for a strike. The cheering crowd is loud enough to shake the old stadium. I wait for the New York batter to strike out before I start my own sort of pitch.

“Another month, another Diamond Ring event,” I say, keeping one eye on the game below.

“Maybe we’ll get through this one without a special clean-up.”

Without my leaving a body on the ground, he means. “Any complications from that?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “Best does good work.”

We both glance inside, where Sawyer Best is deep in conversation with Cole Wolf. Military dark ops and underworld computers. What could possibly go wrong?

The crowd around us cheers another out. I take a sip of whiskey. “About that waiter…” I start.

Prince grunts.

“I assume he wasn’t freeport staff.”

“Never saw the motherfucker before.”

“But he got past freeport security.”

Prince eyes me steadily. “What’s on your mind, Kelly?”

“I’m not sure you can keep my wife safe.”