I should stay away. She deserves to forget last night. But I don't, not straight away. I head home and focus on my work, the kind that requires putting my fist through things that deserve it. I make calls, pull strings, and track down every lead I can on those two bastards from the alley.
By evening, I've got names. Dead ends, both of them—low-level muscle, the kind you hire when you want something done quietly and don't care much if it gets done right. No family connections. No known affiliations. Just two arseholes who took a job and picked the wrong fucking alley.
Which means whoever hired them was careful enough to keep themselves clean.
I stare at the wall, my jaw tight. Nameless men don't move on their own. Somebody pointed them at her specifically—somebody who knew where she'd be and when, somebody who wanted her and didn't want to be traced back to it.
The question gnaws at me. Why her? She doesn't fit the profile of a random grab. Too visible. Too… everything.
I don't have an answer. I don't like not having an answer.
All the more reason to keep an eye on her.
I get a box of takeaway for dinner, then shovel it down without tasting it. I train until my knuckles are raw and bleeding. I have another fight that night and sweep the floor with the bastard, an easy feat when I imagine the two faces of those fuckers from last night in front of me. Every punch lands harder than it should. Every hit is for her, even if she'll never know it.
And on the way home…
I drive instead of walking and find myself sitting outside her house at midnight.
Bianca'shouse.
Just once more. Just to make sure she's safe. Just to make sure they never come back.
Chapter Three
Nine months later…
Ashland
Bianca'snineteen years old today.Nineteen.
I’mthirteen yearsolder than she is.
And I'll never touch the lass. I can admire her from a distance and not… touch her. I couldnever. It would be like marring a flawless diamond, dulling something precious and pure.
I've taken on the role of her distant protector though.
She's majoring in history, because of course she is. Reads Arthurian legend like it’s gospel. Drinks coffee with an obscene amount of cream and sugar. Leaves her door unlocked when she's home alone.
That last one keeps me up at night.
If she were mine, I'd change that right quick. She isn’t though. She can’t ever be.
My phone buzzes with an alert, and I quickly glance at the screen.
Bianca's home.
I breathe a sigh of relief. The lass decided it would be an excellent idea to walk alone in the moors after dark, said something to her rosy-cheeked classmate about it being “melancholy and romantic,” and off she went.
Fuck.
“Ashland, you ready, brother?” Cavin waits at the entrance to the ring, frowning at me as he cracks his neck from side to side.
“Aye.”
We're practicing together. Seamus would fucking kill us if he knew, because we're not allowed to fight each other. McCarthy versus McCarthy means broken bones or worse.
But Cavin and I know how to keep each other intact.
