I’d accepted that I’d marry her back then, but I hadn’twantedto. And I’m having a very hard time reconciling the girl I met tonight, in the tight jeans and dark makeup and biker boots, the girl who squirmed in my lap and let me finger her to an orgasm in an elevator, with the Saoirse I remember from Boston.
“And here I thought I was coming up to your room to give you the night of your young life.” I narrow my eyes at her. “Instead, it was—what do they call it? A honey trap?”
“You’ll watch how you speak about my daughter, lad,” Graham says sharply, taking a step closer. “She’s already been disgraced by one man. I’ll not have another talking about her like she’s some common whore.”
I can’t help but snort at that, glancing between the old man and his daughter. “So you weren’t lying about that, then? That you’re not a virgin?” I move closer to her, and to her credit, she doesn’t flinch back despite the taut anger I know she can see in my face. “Was it my brother who took it or some other unlucky lad?”
“What did I just say?” Graham’s voice rises, gruff and as angry as I feel. “You’ll not speak about her in that way. She’s untouched—by your brother or any other man.”
Oh, I touched her, alright.It’s on the tip of my tongue to say it, regardless of what trouble it might get her in with her father. I’m seething with anger at both her and myself—her for putting on the seductress act to get me up here and me for falling for it. I’m no green boy to let my dick lead me into places it shouldn’t, yet here we are.
But Saoirse doesn’t give me a chance. She’s already pushing herself up out of the chair as her father defends her honor, her features tightening. “I’ll thank you to stop talking about my virginity like that, in front of me no less, as if I’m not even here.” Her voice is snappish and arrogant, and I smirk at her.
“Ah yes, there’s the Saoirse I remember. Prissy and uptight as ever. So which was it? A lie, or not?” I let my gaze rake over her, blatantly taking in every inch of her figure without caring if her father notices. “You certainly didn’t act like a virgin tonight when—”
Her face pales a little, which pleases me. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” she hisses, her eyes narrowing. “But you’re not going to find out. Not tonight, anyway.”
I take a step closer to her, anger surging in me again. “I don’t appreciate being manipulated,” I growl, looking down at her. I could swear I see her breath hitch in her throat as if she’s turned on by my forcefulness, and I feel my dick twitch uncomfortably in my jeans.
“Enough!” Graham says sharply from my left. “We have business to talk about, lad. We can discuss your relations with my daughter later—which will factor into it, certainly.”
“Factor into what?” My attention turns back to Graham. “What is this all about, anyway?”
“It’s about the state of the Kings back in Boston,” he says grimly. “And what your brother’s done.”
Ah, Christ.I haven’t looked into what’s happened in Boston since I left, not wanting to draw attention from anywhere to the fact that I’m still alive—and truthfully, not wanting to know. It had been my father’s plots with his bastard that drove me away. Though I can’t say I haven’t wondered what came of it and what happened to my family, I’ve purposely avoided finding out.
The temptation has been there, usually on dark nights alone with no good company and too much to drink, but I’ve successfully fended it off. I’d put that life behind me and focused on making a new one.
Now, though, it seems that Graham is determined to fill me in, whether I want to know or not.
“My brother?” I raise an eyebrow, careful not to show too much emotion one way or another. I know very well how cunning Graham can be—I wouldn’t doubt he’s fully behind Saoirse’s manipulations tonight—and I don’t want to give him anything to latch onto. “You’re telling me that the McGregor black sheep, the family changeling, has had something to do with the Kings? That my father gave him some responsibility, and he fucked it up?” I smirk. “Unsurprising, really.”
Graham’s face remains impassive. “You can pretend not to care, Connor,” he says evenly. “But I know very well what your feelings are for your brother. You were always kind to him when your father was not. And as for your father himself—” He pauses, his gaze meeting mine, and to my surprise, I see something of regret in it, as if he doesn’t want to say the next words.
“Your father is dead, Connor,” he says carefully. “I’d wondered if you knew.”
I can’t stop the emotion that flickers over my face before I can school my features back into careful blankness. “I didn’t know,” I say quietly. “I can’t say that I’m surprised, though. He was overreaching, even before I left. In fact—” I pause, not wanting to give away too much. Graham knows almost everything anyway, I’m sure. Still, the details of that final fight between my father and me are personal. “What was the cause of death?”
“Execution.” Graham’s keen eyes never leave mine. I can feel Saoirse’s gaze on me too, and it makes me uncomfortable to feel as if I’m under a microscope. “Viktor Andreyev carried it out.”
“The Bratva head?” Thatdoessurprise me a little, though not too much since the dealings between the Manhattan Bratva and the Boston Kings were none too friendly when I left. “As I recall, my father wanted to work with him, to double-cross the Rossi family. That was his use for his bastard. You’re telling me that went wrong?”
“Very,” Graham says dryly. “Your father didn’t just set out to change alliances, to switch to supporting the Russians and double-cross the Italians. He decided that he and Franco would double-cross them both, take down the Italians with Viktor Andreyev’s help and then turn the tables on them as well, taking the territory of both families for the Kings.”
I stare at him. I’d been shocked enough by my father’s hubris in wanting to betray Vito Rossi, angered at his desire to raise up his bastard son over my true-born brother, and disgusted at the lies he was willing to spin in order to do so. Still, I hadn’t imagined that my father would have fancied himself a man who could take down two of the largest families in the Northeast in one fell swoop.
“He must have been insane,” I mutter.
“The other Kings certainly would have agreed with you. Thus, Viktor’s request for his death was granted as a condition of peace.”
My jaw clenches. I had left Boston on bad terms with my father, disappearing in such a way that he didn’t know if I was alive or dead. It’s what I’d wanted—and I hadn’t known if I’d ever want to reconcile with him. But deep down, I’ve always known there was a part of me that assumed I’d have time if I wanted to. Time to speak with him again, to come to terms with how we parted.
Now, all chance of that is gone. My father is dead. And my brother—
“You allowed this all to happen?” I pin Graham with a steely glare. “You were his right hand! You allowed him to spin this—this ridiculous notion, to involve others in it, and you didn’t put an end to it?”
Graham doesn’t flinch. “Your father was unwilling to listen to—alternate points of view about his plans. I tried to steer him in a better direction. Ultimately I failed,” he admits. “But had I pushed back too hard, your father would simply have removed me. I thought I could do more from within the circle than without—”