Conal shoved Ronan aside and sat down opposite me with a serious expression on his ridiculously handsome face.Fuck my life. Why couldn't my best friend's brothers be ugly? It would have saved me a lot of teenage angst.
"We came to bring you home because your father's no longer in prison."
Conal's words sank in and hit me harder than Anton's fist ever had. The bottle of water slipped from my hand and fell to the floor. Water spilled, soaking into the beige carpet. Nobody bothered to pick it up.
"Why…how?" As far as I knew, the authorities had locked him up for life. So why was he out?
My body switched into fight-or-flight mode. Adrenaline flooded my system in waves. I tried to suck in oxygen, but my lungs refused to work. Conal's next words barely registered above the pounding of my heart. My throat closed as I froze, gripped with panic at the idea of my father coming after me.
Memories of the attic where I'd spent my formative years blasted through my head, the endless days of nothingness until my sister's men rescued us. A long period of bright sunshine and happiness with my new family followed until the realization that something had broken in my head pulled me back into the abyss.
Tears trickled down my cheeks. I tasted salt. Then a large hand found mine, grounding me, calming the chaos swirling around me like a mini tornado.
"It's OK,mo mhuirnin," Ronan murmured in a soothing voice. "I got you."
"Wewillalwayskeep you safe," Conal added.
The Kelly estate seemed larger than ever. The Kelly family patriarch, Seamus Kelly, spent most of his time in Dubai these days, soaking up the sun and hitting on the social media influencers who swarmed out there, eager to tap the wallets of rich men.
Only yesterday, Saoirse had sent me a screenshot of some blonde in a bikini draped over her father, Seamus, on a yacht. She'd ranted, and I'd nearly lost my breakfast. The man still had his looks, but seriously? He was way too old to be leering at a 20-something.Gross.
Thank God Declan wasn't like his father. At least he dated age-appropriate females. The few women I'd seen him with over the years were always gorgeous, long-legged goddesses with pert asses and dainty breasts.
Yeah…he definitely had a type. The exact opposite of me, which rankled, although I didn't care to examinewhyit bothered me.
Like my crush on the twins, my attraction to Declan had crept up on me in my late teens. Wildly inappropriate and something I preferred to shove into a locked box in my head.
Declan behaved like a big brother. A calm presence in my life. Someone to go to for advice.
He was not a man who would ever look at me with desire in his amber eyes.
Our SUV pulled through the gates, past two armed guards. Saoirse came running out the minute our car halted outside the main door.
"Ver! I couldn't believe it when I came home and Dec said the twins had gone to collect you!" She sucked in a sharp breath when she saw my bruised cheek. "Oh, hun, who did that to you? Was it that fucker you've been dating? Please tell me my brothers beat the shit out of him."
I nodded, letting her pull me in for a hug. We clung to each other, neither of us willing to discuss the elephant squatting in the room. Namely, that I'd willfully hidden the extent of Anton's fuckery for weeks. I knew at some point she'd want to know why I didn't confide in her about how bad things had got, but I wasn't strong enough to deal with her outrage right now.
My head still hurt, and I needed some space.
Space to get my head around the news that someone had let my father back out into the world.
"Let's get you inside." Saoirse curled her hand in mine and tugged me indoors. This place had been my safe space as a teenager, and even though I now had many reasons to avoid it, part of me still thought of it as a home.
We passed the family room. I caught a glimpse of the sea in the distance, glittering in the early morning sun. It reminded me of why I'd not been back here in three years.
Even if I was safer here than in Italy, I knew I couldn't stay.
It held too many memories.
Not all of them happy.
6
Declan
Conal strolled into my office and dropped onto the worn Chesterfield sofa. He rubbed his eyes and yawned, clearly exhausted after his impromptu trip to Europe and back. Not that I gave a fuck.
"Any problems I need to be aware of?"
