He makes a sound that’s almost painful to hear when he touches my slick, aroused flesh. “Christ,” he swears, his accent thickening as he grinds against my thigh. His other hand goes to his belt, and I stiffen under his touch, starting to pull away.
“No, lass,” Niall gasps. “I won’t—I’m not going to—” He groans against my mouth, fumbling with his zipper. “I just need—” He can’t seem to finish a sentence, his fingers slipping between my folds and sliding up to my clit, and I lose my ability to speak too as he strokes me, moaning with near-painful need as he slides his cock out with his other hand.
He switches hands abruptly then, gripping his cock with his right hand that’s coated in my arousal. The thought of it makes me whimper against his mouth, a fresh wave of it hitting me as he starts to stroke himself. He presses two fingers of his left hand against my entrance, and I start to tell him to stop, but I can’t. I’m aching, the heat of his cock pressed against my inner thigh, his kisses so hungry and searing that I can’t say no. I need more of this feeling—feeling desired, wanted, and as his fingers slip inside of me and his thumb finds my clit, I bite back a high-pitched moan of pleasure as his lips claim mine again.
“Saoirse—fuck, you feel so fucking good, lass—” Niall murmurs against my mouth, his voice thick with need, his hand rhythmically stroking his cock as he rubs the swollen head against my inner thigh. I can feel his pre-cum on my skin, the throbbing of his length as he thrusts into his hand, his fingers working inside me. My own pleasure is rising sharply, and I gasp aloud as I buck upwards, nipping at his lower lip as he grinds against me. I know he’s kissing me partially to keep me silent, to keep me from moaning too loudly or saying the words that could push us both too far, words on the tip of my tongue. I can feel him pressed to my thigh, hot and wanting, and I want him fucking me instead of his fist. I want to see what his face looks like when he feels himself slip inside of me, the pure adoration that I know I would see there, the unabashed lust and desire without complications or manipulation. I want it, and I know I might beg for it if I could, and he does too.
“I’ll stop,” he gasps. “I’ll stop before—” He’s fucking his hand now, in sharp, hard thrusts that rub his swollen cockhead against my thigh each time. I can feel myself flooding with arousal, drenching his hand as he fingers me with the same rhythm, his mouth on my lips, my jaw, my throat. “I’ll—oh fuck.”
My pussy clenches around his fingers, the first spasm of my oncoming orgasm, my hips thrusting down onto his hand, and Niall crushes his mouth against my shoulder as his body jerks. “I can’t—oh fuck, fuck, I’m coming, lass, I can’t stop it,Christ—” He curses aloud as I feel his entire body shudder, my orgasm fleeing with the cold realization that his cum is spurting onto my thigh, too close to my pussy for comfort, drenching my leg and the duvet as he shudders and bucks, moaning with his teeth pressed to my shoulder as the pleasure overcomes him entirely.
I pull away from him, squirming away as I grab for a blanket and wipe at my thigh, and Niall leans back on his knees, his eyes faintly dazed as he pulls his hand away from his softening cock.
“Fuck,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, lass, I didn’t mean to—I thought I could stop—”
A mixture of sadness and frustration wells up in me, hot and thick, with him, with myself, with how close I was to my own pleasure, only to be shocked out of it. “This is what I meant,” I snap exasperatedly, harsher than I meant to. “We need to stay away from each other until I’ve fulfilled my part of my bargain with Connor. Look what happened today. We’re only going to keep pushing boundaries—”
“I told you I wouldn’t fuck you, lass, and I didn’t.” Niall looks as frustrated as I feel. “You’re putting me off. It feels like you’re stringing me along—”
“I’m not!”
“You’re making excuses. Sayin’ one thing and feelin’ another.” His accent thickens, roughens, and he straightens his clothes, his face tightening as his blue eyes fix on mine. “Be honest with me, Saoirse. We didn’t fuck up that bad. It’s not as if I came in you!” He lets out a breath. “What does it matter? You wanted it too. But you keep fighting me and then coming back.”
“You pulled me in here,” I point out sharply.
“Aye, and I would’ve let you leave if you’d asked. You didn’t want to stop any more than I did, until it got far enough for me to get some relief out of it.” Niall runs a hand through his hair, closing his eyes briefly. “Maybe I’m not bein’ fair to you, lass. I don’t mean to hurt your feelings. But it feels to me as if you’re falling for Connor and using me to make up for the fact that he won’t love you back.” He looks at me flatly. “There’s the truth of it. It’s what’s been eating me up for days while you were out of the country.”
“Niall—it’s not that—”
“I’m not usingyoufor anything, lass,” he plows forward, his jaw tight as he grinds out the words as if it hurts him to say them. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph, lass, I—Christ, I love you.”
My eyes go wide, but he reaches out, kneeling next to me on the bed as he takes my hands in his, pulling me closer to him. My skirt falls back around my knees, and his hands slide down to my waist, his blue eyes hot and searching my face. “I love you so fucking much that I don’t know if I can do this some days,” he whispers. “I don’t know if I can be your secret, Saoirse, your side piece, a lover you ignore until no one else will see. That day after the fire, you walked by me, and it near killed me not to be able to reach for you. I thought I was going to die that day, lass, and you were the only thing on my mind. The only one I wanted to talk to before the fire took me, if it did.”
He laces his fingers through mine, and I close my eyes, fighting back a swelling tide of emotion. I can hear the truth in his words, in all of them, and I know at the same time that it’s too much. It’s too much for what this is, for what I can give him, but I don’t know how to give him up entirely. Not when he makes me feel alive every time Connor rips out my heart.
“I want all of you, lass,” he whispers, his hands tightening on mine. “Just you, and I always have. I’m just finally findin’ the nerve to tell you, now. I wish I had before. Maybe things would be different, then—”
“They wouldn’t be.” I pull away, sliding off of the bed, breaking the grasp of his hands on mine. “Niall, if that’s how you feel, if you can’t stand to share me or see me and not be able to have me, if you need this to be out in the open, then we can’t—we can’t do this.” I suck in a breath as I see the hurt on his face, but I keep going anyway because I have to be honest with him. I have to make sure he understands, so it doesn’t destroy us both.
“I have a responsibility to my family, Niall. To the family I was born into and the family I’ll make with Connor. I have a commitment, a duty that I’ve promised to uphold. This –thisthingbetween us, it could be love. It could—but I’m never going to love anyone else so much that it gets in the way of what I’ve promised to do. There are rules about this—this thing, and I’ve already broken them as far as I can. I’m not going to break them all the way. This is supposed to be about pleasure at the core of it, not love. If love comes about because of it, that’s one thing—but I can’t be your one and only, Niall. I never could have been.” I look at him sadly. “I can’t give you all of me. I just can’t.”
The last words come out as a whisper, and I see the pain on his face, the way his mouth tightens as if he’s forcing back words he knows he can’t say.
“You’re loyal to a man who doesn’t give a shite about you,” he bites out. “Who wants you for power and nothing more—who’s said flat out he can’t or won’t love you, Saoirse. What are you doing? You’re wasting so much—”
“I’m doing what I’ve promised,” I say stiffly. “It’s too late for all this, Niall. I’m married. I’m trying to have a baby. I’ve committed—”
“I’d give you everything, Saoirse. Everything that matters—”
“It’s too late!” My voice rises, and I bite it back, feeling my chest ache with painful emotion. “Niall, I told you—”
There’s a sudden noise from outside, a cry, and something that sounds like a crash and a heavy thud, and I whirl, scrambling to make sure all of my clothing is in place as I dart towards the door. I hear Niall behind me, but I don’t look back. A sick foreboding feeling in my stomach as I rush out into the hall and towards the foyer where it seems like the sound came from.
I turn the corner, and my heart sinks, plummeting to my toes at the sight in front of me.
Ana is on the marble, a broken vase next to her, her blonde hair tangled around her face. Liam and the staff are huddled around her, saying her name, but all I can see is her ghostly pale face and something else that makes my breath catch in my throat,
Around her hips and thighs, puddling on the marble, is a slowly growing pool of blood.