Page 2 of Sweet Deception (Irish Kings #4)

Chapter Two

One hundred and one. One hundred. Ninety-nine.

Counting the flicks of my lighter backward keeps me focused, calm, and my impatience in check.

In another hour, I can bounce.

Sixty minutes of watching two of my best friends dance with their significant others while raucous relatives stuff their faces and guzzle free booze.

Weddings are no fun.

All that time spent sitting in a church, listening to couples recite vows that over half of them won’t keep.

The crying. Way too many posed photos beforehand, followed by cheesy dancing afterward.

No fireworks. No surprises. No explosions or C4 or pyrotechnics of any kind to liven things up.

Boring music. The same old toasts and well wishes. Kill me now.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m happy for the grooms. But did we really have to fly all the way to Vegas for this? Fancy hotels are a dime a dozen back home in New York.

I still don’t understand why we couldn’t just roll down to the courthouse, watch them sign some papers, pop a few bottles of champagne, and call it a day.

Instead, we’re fattening up all the Kings and their trusted associates on overpriced gourmet food and debasing an orchestra with drunken renditions of the Electric Slide. How’d they get these classical musicians to play that cheesy-ass song in the first place?

Seventy-five. Seventy-four. Seventy-three.

Watching the mayhem unfolding around me only further sours my mood, so I return my attention to my lighter’s small spark and think about happier things.

Like the recent execution of traitor Thomas Brennan. Or should I say, the late father of the brides . That happened a few weeks ago, but I’m still raring to blow something up in celebration.

Brennan was sentenced to the family goodbye, which means every King had the opportunity to torture him before Shane Gallagher, my uncle and head of the clan, did the final honor of lighting him on fire. He burned that man’s sick, twisted, treacherous body to a fucking crisp. My kind of punishment.

Something about that level of violence inspires my own destructive creativity.

Eighty-three. Eighty-two. Eighty?—

My internal counting stutters to a halt when I spot her.

At first, I assume I’m seeing things. The woman in the sexy black dress can’t be the same server I locked eyes with some twenty minutes ago.

But as my eyes track her through the ballroom, I realize she is. Her grace gives her away.

My father—Donal Gallagher—materializes in front of me, blocking my view. “You planning to set something on fire at your cousin’s wedding?”

I lean to the left to peer around him, but the woman has disappeared in the crowd. “Only if things get too boring.”

“So, I would be wise to take that as a yes ?”

He settles beside me, the caring father routine on full display as his gray eyes fix on mine.

A lot of people claim we look alike, but I personally can’t see the resemblance.

We’re not even related by blood. My birth father died in a car crash when I was a few months old, and Donal raised me as his own.

The rest of the Gallaghers claimed me too, including Shane, who’s always insisted I call him uncle.

Donal’s the only father I’ve ever known, and while I may love him, I’m not blind. He’s a snake masquerading as a gentleman. A viper hiding behind a ten-thousand-dollar suit, a well-groomed beard, and a silver tongue.

He’s also a total dog. Any time an attractive woman under fifty struts by, even when we’re in the middle of a conversation, he’s lost to her.

We both know the reason he goes through women like underwear.

No one will ever measure up to my mother, the wife he drove away with all the violence.

I don’t think he ever cheated on her, but I sometimes wonder if his roving eye is why she never changed my last name to Gallagher.

And those tiny lingering seeds of doubt are what prevented me from requesting the name change myself.

Sometimes, I wonder if he uses womanizing as a means of banishing her from his memory. I wouldn’t blame him if he ever did, despite my disdain for sentimentality.

She’s a tough woman to forget.

His voice interrupts my little detour into the past. “Son, it’s a wedding, not a funeral.”

“That’s a matter of perspective.”

“Would it kill you to show your cousin a little support?” He nods at Finn, who’s laughing with his bride near the center of the room.

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

My father opens his mouth, but a signal from Shane cuts his reply short. Not that I blame him for that. No one with half a brain would force the head of the Irish Kings to wait…not even his first cousin and closest confidant.

“Excuse me.”

I grunt and watch him stalk away.

I take it back. Despite the lack of shared blood, my father and I are exactly the same where it counts.

Duty before family.

Always.

The woman in the black dress reappears. My slouched spine straightens, and I absorb more details.

The material of the sexy, elegant cocktail dress skims her lithe body and subtle curves, and the flared skirt swishes when she walks to reveal a pair of deliciously toned calves and thighs.

Loose waves I want to knot my fingers in have replaced the low bun.

The red stains now accentuating those lush lips entice me, urging me to shove her to her knees and transfer that color all over my dick.

Those magnetic gray eyes land on me and stick.

While waiting for her to inevitably avert her gaze, I drink in the rest of her. Her long swan neck. Her plump lower lip. The curve of her shoulders and the elegance of her collarbones.

She’s still staring. No stranger has ever held my gaze like this… Yet this woman regards me like we’re ex-lovers with unfinished business.

Hold up. Now she’s gliding toward me.

Anticipation builds inside me like a slow-burning fuse.

It takes a lot of balls for a woman to crash the mobster wedding she’s hired to work.

Obviously, she’s a gold digger, headed my way for some attention and a payday. I should probably kick her out or even redirect her to my father, but I already know I’m not going to do either.

I can’t remember the last time I let myself play with a woman, and cutting loose—just for tonight—could be fun.

Besides, I love a good mind game.

As long as I win.