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Chapter Twenty-Four

Carys

F inn’s hands cup my face, bringing my lips toward his. I meet his kiss, driving my fingers into his hair, pressing myself as tightly to him as I can manage with our clothes on. His tongue massages my mouth, and he skims the hem of my shirt, easing it up, circling my back. At the skin-to-skin contact, I shudder with pleasure. He grips my ass, molding me to his erection. God, I love the way he feels.

When his mouth leaves mine to seek the most sensitive places along my neck, I moan and clutch onto him, afraid my legs might give out. My adrenaline spikes. His declaration of love is a drug coursing through me. Impossible to believe someone like him could love me.

“Say it again,” I murmur.

Finn chuckles against the curve of my shoulder. “You going to make me say it all the fucking time?”

“Consider it the price of admission.” My voice is breathless, and I’m already reaching for the button on his jeans.

He sucks on my earlobe and nibbles. “I fucking love you, Carys. Just you. Always you.”

His gruff voice is like another shot of desire.

Is there anything better than hearing those words from him? I’ll never tire of being important and precious.

“Promise me.” I tug his shirt over his head. Our lips barely break apart, and he makes short work of my clothes as I strip him bare. “It’ll only be me and you. I can’t do that again.”

He grabs my hand and presses it to his heart. His lips trail a line from my jaw to my collarbone as he speaks, “What’s in here”—he drags my hand from his heart and settles it over top of the prominent bulge in his underwear—“and what’s in here are yours and yours alone.”

I circle his cock and squeeze. He groans, and his lips find mine again as he disposes of my bra.

“You think you can do that?” I say.

I’m practically panting as his hand slides into my panties, his finger gliding across my folds.

“I did it last time without you asking.”

His words are muddled by the sensations rushing through me. I’m drunk with need, with love, and his fingers slipping inside me only intensify those feelings.

“What?” I bring my hands up to cling to his shoulders, to hold myself steady.

“You heard me.” He lifts one of my breasts to his mouth and tugs on the nipple with his teeth.

I gasp.

“Then why did you—oh, God , do that again.”

His thumb grazes my clit a second time with the right amount of pressure to make every nerve ending spring to attention.

“Because…” He picks me up and carries me toward the bed. He tosses me on top, and I shriek as he follows me. “I was young and stupid. Then I was old and cynical.”

His eyes, such a pale, pale blue, examine me with such intensity my breath stalls. “I didn’t want to ruin your life a second time.”

With my finger, I trail a path from his temple to his lips. “You won’t ruin me. You’ll show me what I’ve been missing.”

His hand skims up and down my bare leg, and he seems lost in thought for a moment. Impossible to read.

“Finn?”

Both of his hands slip under my shoulder blades and he rocks against me, his underwear the only barrier between us. I arch to meet him.

“I don’t understand how a bastard like me got another chance with you.” His face sinks into my neck, and I run my fingers through his hair, my breath hitching each time he slides against me. “But I’m not letting you go this time.”

His lips work their way to my mouth, and he deepens the kiss as his hips rock against me again. “You’re mine. Just mine.”

I grip his ass, locking him tight to me. “I want to feel you. All of you.”

“Don’t worry.” He’s going down my body again. “You’ll get it all.” He kisses my inner thighs, making me squirm. “When I’m ready to give it to you.” His tongue flicks along my center. “Anticipation is half the fun.”

While his tongue and fingers bring me to the edge over and over, I dig my hands into the covers on the bed and then slide them through his hair.

“Finn,” I murmur. “Please.”

He rises off the bed and removes his boxers. His body is still riddled with bandages, but his movements are sure and fluid. “Turn over.”

I don’t need to be asked twice. I flip onto my stomach and rise onto my knees. Finn kisses my back before sliding into me. His hand comes around and rubs my clit in a circular motion. Each thrust is slow and deliberate, so slow I try to increase the rhythm, but his grip on my hips slows me every time.

I moan. My body is so rigidly strung I’m not sure what I want more. Half of me never wants the pleasure to end, and the other half is begging, straining for the release.

“Faster,” I pant. “Please.”

He picks up the pace for a few thrusts but doesn’t increase the pressure of his hand. I take one of my own and urge his fingers to rub against me.

“I want you to come so hard you forget where you are.”

His lips brush my neck as he plunges even deeper. I gasp.

“And then I’ll get you to do it again.”

His fingertips circle me as he glides in and out faster and harder, and I have to put my hand back on the bed, pressing my face into the mattress to muffle my scream as my orgasm rocks through me.

With a few more thrusts, he follows me over the edge and collapses onto my back.

“I think I saw Ireland,” I mutter.

He chuckles, and my heart warms. “Fuck Ireland.” His voice is rough in my ear. “Next time, we’re aiming for the stars.”

I stuff the last few things in my purse, and I glance over at Finn who is still lying in bed, the covers snug around him. He’s drinking the coffee I made him and watching me pack. We didn’t get much sleep last night. But I saw stars. An abundance of stars.

“Intergalactic travel is hard on me.” He raises his cup to his lips and smirks.

I laugh. “You think we discovered new planets last night?”

“You realize the obvious joke is something involving Uranus, right?” He winks at me.

Another laugh escapes me. “You’ll stay here? You’re not going to appear suddenly at my breakfast meeting.”

“I’m staying here. I got plans for you when you get back.” He twists to put his coffee cup on the nightstand. “But when we land in Switzerland, we need to discuss security for you. Most of the countries and cities you visit, I can’t go without taking a massive risk. What happened yesterday isn’t fucking happening again.”

“I know. Jay will be with me. I’ll be more careful. The meeting will be fine.” I pick up the hotel notebook and consider putting it in my bag along with the pen.

“Yeah. Jay’s stellar—as a secretary. Yesterday proved he’s shit at keeping you safe. That’s unacceptable.”

“We can talk about it later.” I gather my purse and check my phone. “I don’t want them coming to the room, so I need to go.”

“You’re eating at the hotel restaurant, right? You’re not leaving the hotel.”

I sigh. “Yes. If I said no, what would you do?”

“Get dressed and tail you.”

“I’ll make sure we stay here.”

“Jay will text me if you don’t.”

I roll my eyes. “And why would he do that?”

“Because after yesterday, he knows better than to leave me out of the loop.” Finn’s gaze pins me in place. “Valeriya is dead. Charles and Eric are organizing something behind your back. We were shot at a couple days ago. The CIA is on your ass. Somehow, you’re mixed in with the PLA. If you give me a couple minutes, I can probably come up with ten other reasons you need to be fucking careful.”

At the edge of the bed, I run my hand along his face. “I’ll be careful. I promise.” He circles my neck and pulls me into a kiss. His other arm swoops around my waist, and I can guess what he’s going to do. If he gets me in the bed, I’ll never leave.

Stepping back, I give him another quick kiss, moving out of the way before he can deepen it. The weight of his words tries to rest on my shoulders. But when I open the door, I’m so happy and light they can’t settle. “I won’t leave the hotel.” When I close the door, I glimpse his face. He’s frowning into his coffee. Something is still bothering him, but I haven’t had the guts to ask. I have him. He loves me. I’m not rocking the boat. This is what happy feels like—been too long.

Jay meets me in the hall. “Your guest doing okay?” he asks as we walk.

“Same old.” I give him a sideways glance. “I hear you’re tattling on me now.”

“You didn’t see him yesterday when he found out you’d been taken, and I knew dick all. He was a man possessed. I honestly thought he would kill me before we got the CIA lead.”

“That made him feel better?” I raise my eyebrows.

“The chances of the CIA killing you weren’t high. Imprisoning you, maybe.” He rubs his temple. “He spent a hundred grand trying to track you yesterday.”

“He told me.”

“You two sharing secrets?” He opens the door to the main lobby.

“Something like that.”

“When we’re done talking to Charles and Eric, we’ll need to regroup.”

I spot them across the lobby. “Finn overheard some things in the room.”

“I wondered.” Jay tips his head at my dad and Eric in acknowledgement while he scans the lobby. “I got more info late last night too.”

“Anything I need to know right now?”

He doesn’t have time to answer because Eric comes striding over, annoyance vibrating off him.

“There’s a thirty-minute wait for a table here.” He glances at his watch. “Your father and I fly out in a few hours. We don’t have time for a lineup.” When he looks up, his eyes narrow. “You look tired.”

I shrug. “Hours of interrogation will do that.” The hours of orgasms didn’t help with the tiredness. Intergalactic travel is so fucking amazing I’d never complain. A wisp of a smile rises at the memory.

Eric’s eyes are slits, and he opens his mouth to speak when Jay says, “Place across the street seems decent.”

“Done,” I say. “We’ll slip over there, have a quick chat over a coffee, and come back here.”

Jay raises his eyebrows as he gets his phone out of his pocket. I cover his hands as he types something.

He scowls at me. “You weren’t there. My head and my shoulders enjoy being attached to each other. Nobody likes a headless Jay.”

Eric’s gaze shifts between the two of us, and I drop it. Stopping him isn’t worth alerting Eric or my father to who’s upstairs and why my body is so deliciously sore.

My father strides toward us, agitated. He and Eric are far too similar sometimes. Why did I ever believe Eric could make me happy? “Did you decide, Carys? You were the holdout for staying in the hotel.”

My sweet smile strains my facial muscles. “We’ll go across the street. Not nearly as busy.”

“Probably shitty food,” my father grumbles.

“Remind me again why you and Eric are here?” I lead the way toward the hotel exit. Jay picks up his pace to leave ahead of me. I may not have seen Finn raging yesterday, but the evidence is written across Jay like a billboard.

“You’re my daughter. You were missing. Where else would I be?”

Several places spring to mind without me trying hard, and none of them is a second-rate hotel in Ireland. There are few times I can remember my father putting his wants, his needs, after mine.

“And you?” I glance at Eric.

He scoffs and shakes his head. “We were engaged once. Those feelings don’t just turn off.”

“Well, I suppose that was the problem with our engagement. You couldn’t turn off those feelings for anyone.”

Beside me, Jay snorts and then covers it up with his fist and a cough. When we get to the pub across the street advertising an Irish breakfast, Jay enters first, and the three of us stand outside the door for a minute.

“This is the new protocol?” My father puts his hands on his hips. “He sweeps the place before you ever enter? Seems to be an overreaction to a CIA meeting.”

I sigh and purse my lips. Impossible to win. “How about me almost being shot? How about Valeriya being murdered? How about the PLA doing business with my company behind my back? Any of that seem worth extra precautions?”

Eric’s hand settles on my hip, and I step away from him. Jay pops his head out the door and nods to me. We file in and find a booth in the rear.

Jay orders our food from the bar and then slides in beside me. “The PLA.” He stares at my father and Eric. “My intel says one of you is behind at least a few of those deals.”

My father shrugs. “I never had a problem working with people who could pay. The politics is none of my concern.”

My temper simmers below the surface. “The last time you interfered, I told you to say out of the business or to be all in. You’ve completely fucked me. The CIA has a file which makes me appear solely responsible for those deals.”

“You didn’t let me finish.” My father holds up his hand. “I stopped dealing with them when you told me to step away. However irrational and ill-informed your wishes might have been, I respected them.”

I turn to Jay. Was my father being truthful?

“The last deal happened a week ago. And the products they bought came from our warehouse theft.” He picks up his phone and finds the email before handing it to me.

I sigh and scan the information. “He’s right. The product numbers match.”

Eric sips his coffee and remains silent. Finn said Eric had something to do with Valeriya’s death, and Valeriya was coming to meet with the PLA.

“You met Valeriya a few times, didn’t you, Eric?” I cock my head at him as the waitress delivers our food.

He clears his throat and takes another sip of his drink. “Possibly.” He sets cup onto the table before picking up his knife and fork. “Not everyone is memorable.”

He’s a fucking liar. Not that I’m surprised. The smoothness of the lies as they tumble out—that’s what astounds me. Was he always like this?

My father’s phone rings, and he takes it out of his pocket before silencing it. When our gazes connect, he sighs. “Your mother. She’s having a late-in-life crisis. I’m giving her space to deal with it.”

I shovel a mouthful of egg into my mouth to keep my rant from spilling out. My father has never been supportive of emotional outbursts. Any time I wanted his attention, I had to make damn sure I was stoic, controlled, no hint of emotion. Dealing with my brother’s illness and death were a million times worse because of my father’s unspoken rule.

“Why’s she upset?” I ask.

“The past. Always the past. The thing she doesn’t understand is you can’t go back. Once a choice is made, you might as well forget you had a choice. It’s that simple.”

I frown and take another forkful of food, chewing while I think. “Is this something you did or something she did causing the regret?”

“Something she did—but she’s upset because she says I asked her to do it—no, demanded it. Which is ridiculous. I’d never do that. Her memory is faulty.”

Whenever he becomes the blustering old man, he’s covering a lie. A weird tell, but that’s his. He goes too far with his denial.

“All these years she never talked about it—like it didn’t happen,” he says. “I don’t understand what’s gotten into her.”

“Are you going to tell me why she’s upset or just talk in half-truths?”

He glances up at me as though he’s realized what he’s saying. “I can’t tell you. Her shame, not mine.”

I scratch the nape of my neck and decide I’ll never get to the bottom of their issues. My mother and I aren’t close—not anymore. When I broke my engagement to Eric, a switch flipped in her. Every time I went to see her, she asked about him. When would I forgive him? When would I take him back? He was, after all, such a nice man.

“When are you returning to Chicago? Regular work needs to resume,” Eric says as he polishes off the last of his breakfast.

An image of Finn, surrounded by plush white covers pops into my head, and I have to suppress a smile. “Technically I’m still working right now. I came to identify Valeriya, my employee. Prior to that I was in Russia trying to track our stolen goods.”

“And before that you were in Switzerland harboring a fugitive.” Eric’s gaze is stony when it meets mine.

The urge to tell him I’ve been harboring Finn all over the place is almost irresistible. “My personal life is mine.”

“When it interferes with business—”

“My father”—I gesture toward my dad—“can give me a hard time about mixing my personal life and my job. He’s my father. He used to run and own everything. I’ll take that. From you? Not one more word. If you can’t remember your place in my life and in this company, you’ll find yourself on your ass hunting for a job.”

Eric raises his hands. “All right. All right. Settle down, Carys.”

My father glances at his watch. “We need to catch our plane.” He rises from his seat and tosses his napkin beside his plate. “You’ll take care of the bill, Carys?”

“Of course,” I say. “We’ll be heading back to Switzerland later today. You can call me at the house if there is anything urgent. I’ll be trying to sort out a few things while I’m there.”

Such as what Finn will do for a job or how I’m going to get his money. He hates being too dependent on me.

My father gives a curt nod, but Eric’s face is stormy as he stands. “You won’t keep him there forever.”

I tilt my head at him. “He’s safe there. Whether he stays there forever is up to him and me.”

His gaze searches mine for a moment. “He’s a murdering fugitive. There’s no forever with a guy like him.”

“Not your concern who I spend forever with, Eric.”

His eyes narrow and then his face clears, and he smirks. His fingertips trace the side of my face, and I stare him down, cool, defiant. He kisses my cheek. My father waits impatiently at the door. He tips his head toward the outside. With one last lingering look, Eric follows my father out.

“What was that about?” Jay drains the last of his coffee.

I sit back in my chair. “I don’t know. Did he always treat me like that?”

“He did.”

“Huh.” Silence fills the space between us for a beat. “Finn knows we’re here?”

“He does.”

“I’m in trouble.”

Jay’s lips twist in amusement. “You’re probably in for a tongue lashing.”

A burst of laughter is out before I can catch it. I dig money out of my purse and drop it onto the table. I give him a sly smile. “I do enjoy the way his tongue lashes.”

“I heard.” He grins. “My room is right next to yours, and those walls aren’t as thick as you’d think. Then my wife heard the two of you through the phone, and I got an actual tongue lashing on how I don’t do enough for her anymore.” He chuckles. “Might have to get pro-tips from Finn. Calm my wife the fuck down.”

I shake my head and hold my hand over my eyes as I laugh. My cheeks are hot, but I am also impossibly, absurdly happy.

“It looks good on you.” Jay opens the door and steps into the street ahead of me.

“What does?”

“Happiness.”