Page 5

FIVE

KEIRA

Secrets - Omit, Ordell, Rock Jansen

A ll eyes swing in Harkin’s direction. His face looks ashen with disbelief as he sits there in silence. I grab both our plates and set them on the side table before his ends up on the floor.

“You still want to bet that life savings he was kidnapped?” he asks James, breaking the stilted silence.

“Everything might not be as it seems. Domenico has connections. Plus, when did you start listening to the news and believing the shit they spew?”

Harkin nods, jumping to his feet and walking toward the exit. Before he can make it, he turns back to the group. “Are you guys staying here tonight?”

“Just tonight. I rented us a place down the street, but I figured the girls would want some time together,” James says, as if said girls aren’t in the same room and can speak for themselves.

“There’s plenty of space. I’ll be in the office. I have some work to do.” Then he’s gone, and James quickly follows behind.

“Well, that was intense,” Stace says, confusion written all over her face.

“Story of my life for the last few months.”

Intense doesn’t even begin to touch the tip of the iceberg of the shit she still doesn’t know. Or at least I don’t think she does. James doesn’t seem the type to go telling other people’s business, even if that other person is my extremely determined, annoying best friend. She did get him to bring her here, after all.

“How long are you guys planning on staying in the area? Don’t you need to work?

She looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “I haven’t worked since you left. You know I only worked there because of you. I don’t need to with my brand deals. Not to mention that trust fund I try not to bring up.”

It’s so easy to forget Stacey is a trust-fund baby. Besides her fantastic apartment in Manhattan and extensive high-end wardrobe, nothing else screams New York’s elite, but she is. She did the European boarding schools, the highly outdated cotillion ceremony, and even modeled for a few years. Yet, at the end of the day, we still somehow clicked.

“But what about you? What are you going to do when all of this is over? Hate to break it to you, babe, but it’s not like they’ve saved your position at the airline.”

“Honestly, I have no fucking clue. How do you go back to working a nine-to-five after being kidnapped, finding out your dad is the Don of a mafia family right here in New York, you’ve been shot at and drugged? Oh yeah, and the twin sister you thought was dead is still very much alive and wants the man you love.”

“Oh my god!” Stace squeaks.

“Shit! I didn’t mean to tell you all that. It’s a lot.”

“No, not all that craziness. Which we will get back to in a moment. You’re in love with Harkin!” she screams.

I slap my hand over her mouth, eyes bulging in stern warning. “Are you going to calm down?”

Stace nods, her smile drawn wide under my hand. I can tell by how her flushed cheeks bulge. Her shoulders do a little dance of excitement.

“You haven’t told him?” she asks incredulously. “You guys spent months together, alone, in the woods. What the hell were you doing up there?”

I think back over the last couple of months of our seclusion, getting to know every inch of each other, in and out of the bedroom. It was easy to forget the madness our lives had become when it was just us two. We’d spend our days training, with him pushing me to get stronger in the gym while I taught him everything I knew about the sizable armory James had stashed away there. Our nights were filled with him teaching me the basics of computer warfare and the delicious rewards by the fire when I’d retain the crazy instructions he gave me.

Occasionally, I’d dwelled on the fact that I’d dragged him into this mess with my family. But he never let me forget that if we’d never met on the curb in front of his apartment, it would have been in my father’s office regardless, with his connection to Alina.

Stace’s hand shakes my knee. “Hello, earth to Keira.”

“No, I haven’t told him yet. But he knows.”

“Oh? How do you figure? He’s a man, after all. They typically need a hand-drawn map to find something in the fridge, and you think he knows your feelings without you telling him directly.”

“It’s just—” I think about how Harkin and I are together. The way he anticipates my needs, first and always. It was there before we left for Colorado, budding in the middle of all the chaos erupting around us in New York. Being alone together allowed it to blossom, and we didn’t need the words spoken to know they were true. Or that’s what I kept telling myself. Because deep down, I knew the people you love always die.

“It’s not the time yet, with everything going on.”

Stacey scoffs at my brush off. “It’s exactly the right time, if you ask me. So, if my vote counts, which I one hundred percent think it should, I say you should tell him sooner than later. You never know what could happen tomorrow.”

And that right there lies the problem.

“You know what I really think?” she asks, as if she held her opinion back in the first place.

“Do I want to know?” I laugh, knowing anything could come out of her mouth.

“We need wine,” she states.

“Uhm, too bad there isn’t any here. Also, I haven’t had a drink in months.”

“Well then, what an even better reason to have one. We’re celebrating that you’re back, sort of.” She pops off the couch and runs for the hall. Disappearing for a few minutes, she comes back with two glasses of red in her hands. “I came prepared.”

“God, I fucking missed you.”

I enjoy the wine as Stacey fills me in on everything she’s been up to over the last couple of months. She told me she gave me a month without a word, then started showing up at Harkin’s until she ran into James. She recognized him as my driver and bugged him every day for another month until he finally broke and sat down to have a conversation with her. By the time she’s done regaling me, I’ve finished my second glass to her bottle and a half and we’re both ready for bed.

Walking her up to the spare room, I get her situated. I contemplate joining her in bed like we used to because, knowing Harkin, he’ll be up all night working on whatever he and James are trying to crack. But in the end, I trudge over to the main bedroom. Cinder lays curled up in a ball on the end of the bed. Her spot since she was a puppy, as much as Harkin hates it.

After months of not drinking, the two glasses of wine swirl through my blood, clouding my thoughts. Moving through the bedroom, I strip down, leaving pieces of clothing in my wake. The oversized clawfoot tub under the frosted arched window calls to me.

I flip on the hot water, dousing the bottom of the tub in the bubble bath and oils provided by the rental company. Slowly, I dip my body into the steaming water, relaxing quickly against the padded headrest. The scent of vanilla and peppermint fills the bathroom, and I wish I had thought of dimming the lights and turning on some music.

Left alone with my thoughts is never a great place to be. My anxiety quickly builds, regardless of the calm state I’m in. It never matters how much Harkin assures me we’ll figure this out together. My self-reliance from years of being alone has systematically engrained a need to figure shit out immediately.

I could go to my father, keep Harkin out of it, and finally figure out what the hell his end game is. But all that will do is cause mass chaos for my man. He’ll never let me go now. I’d have to drug him, tie him down, and become a ghost to disappear from him again. And if I’m honest with myself, that’s the last thing I want.

Harkin is it. He’s the one I’ll always want. It doesn’t matter if he has a daughter with my sister. It doesn’t matter if my father has other intentions for me. None of it matters because I would rather take my last breath than separate from him.

I draw in a deep breath, sliding beneath the calm edge of glassy water. The weightlessness washes away my mind’s need to piece everything together. When I break through the surface and settle back, a hand slips against my skin, pushing a strand of hair out of my face.

“There you are.” Harkin’s warm tone surrounds me.

I purr like a cat raised from a nap in the sun. “Join me?”

He doesn’t answer. Instead, his hand swishes through the cooling water. “How about we take this to bed instead?” he asks, extending his hand to me for a safe exit.

I take it, and he pulls my body from the warm depths. Water cascades down my relaxed muscles. He wraps me in a soft towel before drawing me into his arms. I nuzzle into his neck, inhaling his familiar scent that I could pick out of a blind lineup.

This is the side of Harkin that makes me stay. Not the way he handles situations with a firm hand, not the money or the tech genius. It’s the man who takes care of me when no one else has since my mom died. I feel the sting of her loss every day, but he lessens it. Hour by hour, day by day, I’ve learned to love again.

Stacey’s shock about me not sharing that little tidbit of information plays back through my head. She might be right. Maybe it’s time to let the final brick crumble.