Saoirse
“Saoirse.”
His eyes are wide. I can see the simmering blue.
This is the first good look I’ve had of him in over a decade.
The glimpse I’d caught of him in the airport was so fleeting. I’d seen the blond hair, the impressive height, the width of his shoulders.
But I’d missed so much, too.
He’s more muscular now. And he carries himself even more proudly. But there are new lines around his eyes and mouth. They don’t make him look older so much as experienced. Weathered.
His hair still has the same golden tinge, but he wears it shorter. It suits him, of course. All of it does.
I push myself up to my feet and ignore the flares of pain that rage up my body.
“Cillian,” I whisper as I step closer to the bars.
There are only inches between us, but the heat coming off him is palpable.
I realize how desperately I’ve craved it all these years.
His heat.
His scent.
The tangible, undeniable presence of him.
For thirteen years, he’s been nothing but a dream. A fantasy. A memory.
Now, here he is. Standing before me. Flesh and blood and so completely concrete. Taking up space and everything.
It’s mind-boggling.
“Saoirse,” he says again.
A nasally voice intrudes. “Cillian!”
I look to the side as a man approaches down the hall. He’s tall and skinny, with the sharpest nose I’ve ever seen.
I can’t tell if I like his face or not. His eyes are shrouded in shadow, and that makes it harder to make up my mind.
“What are you doing?” he says urgently. “We’ve got to go.”
“No.”
That’s something else that’s changed about Cillian, too.
The natural authority. The commanding tone. The complete lack of fear.
His voice alone fills in some of the gaps for me. It reminds me that he’s lived a full life in the time we’ve been a part.
I understand the lines on his face better now. The toughness that’s been drilled into him.
“No?” the man gapes. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Cillian ignores him. “Why are you in a cage?” he demands of me.