Page 19

19

Thea

T he ocean stretched away into infinity as I stood on the small beach below the house, a seething mass of angry granite-gray water. Towering waves crashed over the pebbles, sending foam flying into the wind. Gulls wheeled overhead, screeching to be heard above the roaring wind.

Salty air stung my eyes while the bitter wind whipped my hair across my face. Every step took me further away from the stone path carved out of the cliff, but I needed some space. Space away from the suffocating atmosphere inside the house, where everyone treated me like damaged goods.

It felt like I was spinning out of control, yet I had no clue why. This wasn’t the first bad thing to have happened to me. It didn’t even feature on my Top 10 List of All-Time Traumatic Experiences. So why was I losing my shit?

Maybe because I’d let my guard down.

Let them breech my walls.

Allowed myself to feel again.

Wandering away from the house alone was probably stupid, but this was a private cove, only accessible from the steep path carved into the cliff at the back of the house.

It was highly unlikely my father would find me here. He had no clue Declan Kelly had become my, albeit temporary, ally. As far as he was concerned, the Kellys were small fry compared to his own operations and those of the Russians.

However, even though Kyril assured me we were safe here, my brain and body remained in fight-or-flight mode. Every time a door banged, I jumped, expecting armed men to rush into the house. Violent dreams punctuated my sleep, and as my memories of the week I’d spent incarcerated in the dungeon returned, I grew increasingly murderous.

My father didn’t deserve to live. He was beyond redemption. I had no nice memories of our life with that man. Not one. My mother was the only parent who’d treated me with love, and poor Verity had not even had that. All my sister had ever known was a half-life living in a shitty attic, hidden away from society, treated as an outcast.

Neither one of us deserved the life we’d endured, but until that man lay six feet under, we would never be free.

Thoughts of revenge consumed me as I walked along the single beach, oblivious to the howling wind. The further I walked, the colder it got. Mrs. O’Malley, the housekeeper who visited daily with food and booze, had mentioned at breakfast that snow was on the way. She’d told Verity and my sister had been chattering non-stop about it all day, full of excitement at the prospect.

We’d waved goodbye to Eden this morning. A car had arrived to take her to her family’s estate near Dublin. She and her cousins were spending Christmas there. I was sad to see her go, but it wasn’t fair to expect her to keep me company indefinitely.

Her presence had provided a useful buffer between me and the guys, however.

Kyril acted like his usual self, overprotective and possessive, although he’d not made any attempt to get into my pants since our arrival, which surprised and frustrated me in equal measure. I was determined to put distance between us, but at the same time, I wanted him. A lot . It seemed like my libido hadn’t got the message the man was an asshole.

Even though he’d rescued me from a life of servitude and misery, it was ridiculous to pretend we had a future together. His father would recall him home soon, and before long, he’d be taking over the mantle of bratva Pakhan . There was no room in his life for me, a fugitive Italian mafia princess with a psychotic father.

Landon continued to mope around like a kicked puppy. He’d tried talking to me a few times, but I shut him down. Again, what was the point? His life and mine were worlds apart. We had no common ground, even if he’d harbored delusions about a long-term relationship with me.

Sure, he was hot.

Very hot .

But hot didn’t mean we were compatible in other areas. I doubted his parents would ever accept me, not with my naked boobs and ass plastered all over the internet. Model daughter-in-law, I was not.

Milo spent most of his time glued to a computer screen, trying to track my father down. The only times I saw him were at night when I woke up and he was there, in my bed, like a stalker. We hadn’t talked much, but I found his presence comforting. Unlike the other assholes, he didn’t push for anything, and I appreciated that.

And as for Dario, well, he’d become Verity’s new best friend. My sister loved him. He spent hours with her, introducing her to new TV shows, playing board games, and talking to her. He’d even let her paint his nails a vile shade of pink, much to Eden’s amusement.

The only time he left her was when I was there. It felt like we’d negotiated a shared custody arrangement - without the expensive lawyers.

Not that I was complaining. While Verity had settled in wonderfully, having so much freedom was new to her. For a 12-year-old, she was very na?ve and fearless. Someone needed to keep a close eye on her, and for now, my head was way too messed up to be there for her.

As much as I hated to admit it, the way he cared for Verity had gone a long way toward healing some of my emotional wounds. We weren’t friends. Not even close. But I no longer wanted to murder him.

Cassian remained AWOL. I’d deliberately avoided looking online, but Eden had told me the tabloids were still tearing me apart, calling me everything from a whore to a home wrecker, and offering ridiculous sums of money to anyone with information on who I was.

Camilla, Cassian’s ex-fiancée, had apparently appeared on several chat shows, denouncing Cassian and cementing her status as the poor victim of a horrible betrayal. I would have been more sympathetic if I hadn’t known the engagement was a sham.

Still, she seemed determined to milk that shit for all it was worth. And the press were loving every minute of it.

I tried not to think about Cassian, but inevitably he crept into my thoughts. Did he hate me still? I assumed so. None of the guys had mentioned him, however. Milo and he still communicated, but Milo didn’t discuss him with me and I didn’t ask.

Rain sluiced down, soaking through the coat Eden left for me. My cheeks stung with every gust of icy wind, but it felt good to be outdoors. Not ready to go back to the house yet, I trudged on, heading for a pile of rocks in the distance.

When I reached the end of the beach and could walk no further, I moved back under the shelter of the cliff and leaned against a boulder, glad to be out of the bitter wind.

I stood for a while, watching the waves crash over the rocks. The water was almost as chaotic as the thoughts in my head. I needed a plan, but nothing sprang to mind.

Traveling on my current passport would see me captured almost immediately. If I wanted to travel back to Europe, I needed a new ID. Dad was probably scrambling to figure out who attacked the estate. It wouldn’t take him long to figure things out.

He had to know about Kyril. Torrance would have revealed we knew each other after the botched attempt to pull Roberto Pesci in for questioning. Whether he was aware Kyril and I were lovers was a whole other question.

Or rather, were lovers.

Not anymore.

Sleeping with him - or any of them - was too confusing. And then there was the niggling worry I might be pregnant. If I was pregnant, Kyril couldn’t find out. He’d go all caveman and demand I kept it. After all, any baby he fathered would potentially become a future Russian mafia heir. Sure, we weren’t officially a couple, and his father probably had a future bride lined up for him, but illegitimate kids still counted in the line of succession.

It had always been the way. The first male heir, regardless of legitimacy, could claim the crown. And as I knew all too well, female children were equally valuable.

There was no way I’d willingly hand over a child to become a mafia prince or princess. Not after the life I’d endured. So if I was pregnant, my only option was to seek a termination. And given we were stuck in rural Ireland where reproductive rights were stuck in the 1950s, that would be tricky.

But since it was almost the Christmas holidays, I decided to do what I did best: ignore the problem in the hope it went away.

By the time I turned to walk back toward the house, I was so cold I could barely feel my face. I trudged along, almost bent double against the howling wind, lost in thought. It was only when I stumbled over a piece of weathered driftwood that I realized someone was heading toward me.

Kyril.

“You’re freezing, kotenok,” he grumbled when he reached me. “Why are you out here in this fucking awful weather?”

“I wanted some peace,” I muttered, but a sharp gust stole the words away. Not that Kyril cared about what I thought.

He picked me up and threw me over his shoulder.

“Put me down!” I beat my fists against his back, but he barely reacted.

“No. I’m taking you back to the house.”

“Fucking asshole!” I yelled into the wind while he climbed back up the path toward the house. The stone steps were steep and treacherous in places, but for a big guy, he was as surefooted as a mountain goat. And just as obstinate.

Milo looked up from the kitchen table when we entered, his fingers pausing over the keys. The heat from the fireplace hit me hard after being outdoors for ages. My frozen extremities prickled painfully as the blood flow returned to my fingers, nose, and ears.

“Everything OK?” he asked curiously as Kyril dropped me onto the mat by the fire.

“No, everything is not OK!” I hissed before unzipping my jacket and hanging it over a chair to drip-dry.

“She’s not looking after herself,” Kyril grumbled. “It’s colder than fucking Siberia out there and she’s been out there for hours!”

“Um, I think that’s her decision to make?” Milo hedged warily.

“Exactly!” I yanked my boots off and threw them at Kyril. They bounced off his stupidly wide chest, narrowly avoiding the hearth. “I’m an adult! If I want to get cold and wet, that’s my choice!”

“The tide is coming in! Did you even consider the fact the tide could have trapped you down there? No, of course you didn’t!”

The angry retort I was about to fire back at him died in my throat. “Tide?”

“Yes, Thea! The tide! Were you not listening the other day when Eden warned us not to get stuck on the beach at high tide?”

“Um... No?”

Milo sat back in his chair and frowned. “It’s important to pay attention to the tides, Thea. The water rises quickly and if you’re not close enough to the cliff path, it’s easy to get stuck on the rocks. On a day like this, you’d drown if that happened.”

“I’m an excellent swimmer,” I huffed, not happy about being lectured on something so basic. Had she really warned us about the tide? My brain said not, but also, I hadn’t exactly been paying attention to much of anything since we arrived, too caught up in my head.

“Not even Michael Phelps would last five minutes in the water - if the waves didn’t smash you into bits on the rocks, the rip tides would suck you out to sea.”

“Sounds awesome,” I muttered.

Kyril’s mutinous expression softened. “You need to take better care of yourself,” he implored.

“I can take care of myself just fine.” I didn’t need him or anyone.

He watched as I pulled off my saturated socks and threw them and my wet sweater in the laundry room. Despite the heat from the fire, a deep chill had sunk into my bones. Maybe soaking in a hot bath would help.

Neither Kyril nor Milo stopped me as I stomped off upstairs to my attic bedroom.

The steaming hot water turned my ice-cold skin bright red as I submerged my body. Eden had left me a selection of scented bath products, all from a high-end brand. I’d chosen a lavender-scented one that promised to ‘relax’ me. It seemed a big ask, given how fucked up my head was, but at least it smelled nice.

After a few moments, I lay back in the water and stared up at the skylight. High above, the gray sky darkened as night fell. Rain splattered on the glass, but here, it felt cozy and safe.

My hands rested on my belly as I tried not to imagine how it would feel to be pregnant. I was still a kid when Mama was pregnant with Verity, but I had a few faint memories of her swollen belly and how tired she was in the later stages.

Being pregnant would put me in immense danger. It would leave me defenseless, unable to protect myself from an attacker. Torrance would have no problem hauling me back to my father, and once he knew I was pregnant, he’d take my baby and do fuck knows what with it.

There was no way I could let that happen.

A cool waft of air alerted me to the bathroom door opening.

“Ever heard of boundaries, Kyril?” I sank deeper into the water. “Go away.”

“Nope.” The irritating fucker shut the bathroom door and strode over to the tub, pulling his tee over his head and shucking off the sweatpants he wore.

I tried not to ogle his body but failed miserably. It had been a while, and I was only human. I definitely wasn’t looking at the thick, hard cock that pointed in my direction like a heat-seeking missile.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I spluttered as he lifted me so he could sit behind me.

“I’ve come to help you relax, kotenok .” Heat coiled in my belly. Heat that had nothing to do with the lavender-infused water.

“I don’t need help to relax . I’m perfectly capable of relaxing myself.” Neither of us was talking about mindfulness or meditation. I wasn’t dumb. The insistent pressure of his rock-hard cock against my lower back told me exactly why he was here.

Like I said, it had been a while, and clearly, he’d had enough of waiting for me to come to him.