Page 205 of Sins of Arrogance

We’ve got a sub­base­ment I’ve never been in, but I’m as­sum­ing that’s where the hold­ing cells are.

The sol­dier grabs Dier­dre by the up­per arm, but she screams and kicks him. Then he tosses her over his shoul­der fire­man style and car­ries her from the room, her cat­er­waul­ing all the way.

“Isn’t that a lit­tle con­spic­u­ous?” I ask.

“He’s one of my men.”

As op­posed to one of my fa­ther’s men who Mick does not trust as much. His lieu­tenants and their crews know stuff even Bro­gan doesn’t. But I know it all.

Now.

Mick grabs me, picks me up the same way and starts jog­ging.

Only I’m laugh­ing and his hand is squeez­ing my thigh sug­ges­tively as he jogs up the grand stair­case.

“Where are you tak­ing me?” I smooth my hands over his toned back­side.

What’s a girl to do? It’s right there.

“We need to have an­other dis­cus­sion about how very not sweet I am.”

Chap­ter 50: The Lovers’ War Plan

KARA

Snug­gling with Mick post­coital or­gasm is one of my fa­vorite things. It’s the only time his body is com­pletely free of ten­sion and the dark aura that sur­rounds my hus­band dis­si­pates.

I never named that dark aura be­fore, or even con­sciously rec­og­nized it as be­ing there, be­cause I told my­self that Mick was the man I saw on the sur­face.

Now I know the truth, and that dark aura doesn’t bother me. Be­cause it’s real.

It’s Mick.

And I love ev­ery atom of Michael Fitzger­ald and his tar­nished soul.

Mo di­a­b­hal

I trace the words on the tat­too over his heart. “What’s wrong?”

He jolts. “You know some­thing has me fashed?”

“I know you bet­ter than any­one else, just like you know the very depths of me.” I press my hand over his slow-beat­ing heart. “Now, tell me.”

“I have to de­cide whether or not to tell the Nor­thies about Dier­dre and her brother’s plans for my fa­ther, or sim­ply kill him qui­etly and elim­i­nate the threat.”

“Why not tell them?” I ask.

“If his fa­ther re­fuses to kill him, I will any­way and that could cause a schism be­tween our two mobs.”

“Be­cause even though you don’t feel love for your fam­ily like you do for me and Fitz, you’re loyal to them.” Mick’s loy­alty is bet­ter than a lot of peo­ple’s love if you want my opin­ion.

I’m just lucky enough to have both.

“I can­not al­low a threat to my fa­ther’s life to con­tinue to ex­ist.”

Try­ing to un­der­stand why there’s a quandary then, I ask, “What are the down­sides of not telling your fa­ther about Dier­dre and his plans?”

“He may have things in mo­tion that Dier­dre doesn’t know about.”