SEALed Bride: A Bad Boy Romance (Includes bonus novel Jerked!) (28 page)

“Speak of the devil,” Davin mumbled.

I looked over as my father, Thom O’Brian, walked into the room. There was a subtle shift in the mood of the place; where it was a little relaxed and frivolous a minute ago, there was suddenly a strained formality to everyone.

He looked older. That was expected, since it had been years, but I couldn’t help but to take note of it. There was grey around his temples and he had more wrinkles than I remembered. He had also gained a few pounds, though he had never been a thin man to begin with. As his gaze turned to me, his entire face broke out in a smile. Nostalgia slammed through me; that was the dad I remembered, the smiling man who was always supportive and quick with a joke, not the violent mobster I had built up in my head.

Still, though he looked older, he was without a doubt my dad. There was something about him, something magnetic, which probably explained why he always had people hanging around him. Thom O’Brian had “the gift of gab,” as he liked to tell you, and was quick with a story and a joke when the situation demanded it. That was also part of his special talents: he was incredibly good at reading a room. I had never seen my dad get involved in an awkward situation without finding a quick way to diffuse it. People liked him, and he carried himself with the easy confidence and genuine self-assurance of someone that knew it.

But I was frozen. Despite how easy I knew it would be, and although I knew I should go to him, or at least say hello, I couldn’t do anything. The bad memories were still too thick, too real, even after so long. Seeing him again made everything fresh, the good and the bad, and those two things were inextricably linked together.

He walked into the room and stood facing me, and the tension was thick. I was suddenly terrified that he was going to throw me out, that I’d have to find some other way of keeping myself safe from Vince. I wanted to reach out to him, to apologize for everything that I said, but my feet were frozen and my lips were heavy and nothing was coming out.

And he wasn’t speaking either. I could sense the men around us begin to shift in their seats as the seconds dragged on, painfully awkward and silent. I was the center of attention and hated it, hated that I was seeing my dad for the first time in years in front of his people, and wished I could get out of there. Part of me wanted to look around for Colin, hoping that maybe he could whisk me out of there, but I didn’t. Instead, I looked back at my dad, and wondered about the years between us, and how much had changed.

We were practically strangers, I realized. Sure, we spoke on the phone maybe once or twice a year, but that was it. The last time he saw me, I was going to leave for college. I was barely 18. I couldn’t even fathom how much I had changed since then, both physically and emotionally.

“You look well,” he said softly.

“Thanks, Dad.”

Then his arms were wrapped around me and I had a stone in my throat the size of a baseball. I couldn’t let myself cry, knew there were way too many people watching, but I wanted to anyway. He held me tightly for a second, and although nothing was the same and never would be, although so much had happened and so much had changed, for a second I felt like the same naïve girl that had left home so long ago. He felt like my dad and I felt like his daughter.

I didn’t know how much I had missed that feeling.

“It’s been too long,” he said.

“I’m sorry.”

He pulled away and looked at me, still smiling. “Past is past. I’m just happy you’re home.”

I nodded, not able to say anything back. He looked around the room.

“Okay, assholes,” he said to the crowd, breaking the tension. “My daughter is home now, so let’s all drink and quit staring at her.”

A few men laughed and the place returned to normal, the soft buzz of conversation creating a background pattern. Dad looked back at me, a huge smile on his face.

“You look so much like your mother,” he said.

“Really?”

He nodded. “Spitting image.”

“You’ve gained weight.”

He laughed loudly. “Yes I have, and nobody around here has the balls to tell me it to my face.”

“Well, you won’t have to worry about that anymore.”

Over my dad’s shoulder, I noticed Colin leaning against the counter watching us with a soft smile. There was something strange in his expression that I couldn’t place. He caught my eye and nodded to me, his smiling turning more genuine. I gave him a little nod back, but was quickly whisked away by Dad, apparently to be paraded around to the guys and introduced to everyone.

The night was a haze, but I felt so much more relaxed than I had in a long time. I hadn’t realized how much of a burden it had been to be in an unspoken feud with my father for so long, especially considering how close we once were. But suddenly I was back, and although things could never go back to normal, I could at least try and move forward.

After all, the man was always going to be my dad, whether I wanted that or not. And in that moment, I had to admit that it felt good to be home.

Even if I was surrounded by a bunch of scantily clad women and dangerous criminals.

D
avin, that piece of shit
.

I scanned the room, trying not to let my sour mood show too much. The beer in my hand was cold and I could feel the condensation drip down onto the floor. I rubbed the water into the tile with my foot, grinding my teeth.

The girls were not supposed to be part of the party. It was meant to be just some core guys, a few people Bren would recognize to make her feel at home. Instead, Davin had decided to invite a bunch of goons Bren had never seen before, plus a few of the mob groupies that hung around O’Brian’s pub. They were pretty much the opposite of welcoming, with their big tits and skanky outfits. Fortunately, Bren didn’t seem to notice the girls, or at least she didn’t seem to make a big deal about them, but it pissed me off anyway.

It was a subtle dig at me and everyone knew it. There was no other explanation. If O’Brian got pissed about the girls being in his house, Davin knew that I’d be held responsible, since I was the one supposedly watching over his daughter. Worse, he knew there was no way I’d throw him under a bus for it, either. You just didn’t rat on someone like that in the Mob, it just wasn’t done, even if that person was being a two-faced snake. I had to admit, it was a pretty devious and clever play. Fortunately, when O’Brian showed up, he was in too good of a mood to give a shit about the girls, but he did give me at least one meaningful glance. I’d probably pay for it later on.

But the thing that pissed me off the most was that I had fucked every single one of them.  Davin must have picked them out for that reason, and the other guys all knew it. Back when things had first happened between Bren and me, Davin had noticed the tension between her and I. Which meant that he was well aware of our past, and he probably suspected that tension hadn’t completely gone away. He was absolutely right about that. The mob sluts were a way of reminding me that he knew, and could tell O’Brian at any time.

I shook my head. Davin was a dangerous piece of shit. I was going to have to do something about him sooner rather than later.

As I took a drink, I noticed one of the girls, a blonde named Stacey, was staring at me from across the room. She smiled at me, this seductive little look, and I quickly glanced away, not interested in dealing with her shit. Of all the girls there, she was the one I had been with the most recently. I could still remember her full tits and thick blonde hair as she sucked me off just two weeks earlier.
And now she’s sitting in my boss’s kitchen, giving me ‘fuck me’ eyes,
I thought. I wasn’t the type to give a girl more than a night or two, but she didn’t realize that yet. I hoped she wasn’t interested in more.

But who was I kidding. They always wanted more.

That was the last thing I needed. I looked back over at Bren and smiled softly. The reunion between her and O’Brian had gone really well, much better than I had expected, and they were busy catching up. There were plenty of cliché Irish toasts to health and happiness and alcohol and whatever else. Bren was smiling in a way I hadn’t seen since she had come home, and she looked absolutely fucking perfect, like the girl I had kissed that night years ago. She made all of the other women look plain compared to her. I remembered the feeling of her full tits pressed up against my chest earlier when I pulled her against me, and how frustrated and annoyed she seemed. I wasn’t sure what I had been thinking, but I suddenly needed to have her against me, and loved how hard she pretended that she didn’t like it. And how fucking hard it made me to feel her warmth and body so close. It brought back a whole wealth of feelings, and I was having trouble not thinking about all of the dirty shit I wanted to do to her.

As I scanned the room again, I realized that it was late, and the guys were starting to filter out. I wasn’t drunk, but I could tell everyone else was. Bren was on her fourth or maybe fifth glass of wine and had a healthy red shade to her cheeks, and O’Brian was laughing a little too loudly.

Fucking Brenna. I knew it was crazy to get involved with her, especially with the adoption looming over my head, but I couldn’t stop myself around her. It was like I had no control over my dick. Or maybe my dick had all the control over me.

“Hey Colin.” I looked up, pulled out of my thoughts, and saw Stacey leaning against the counter next to me, smiling that seductive smile of hers.

“What’s going on?” I asked, distracted.

“Nothing. Just wanted to see what you were up to.”

I shrugged and looked away from Bren. Stacey was giving me that look again, the one that practically screamed how badly she wanted to ride my thick cock. Two weeks ago, I would have taken her up into the shower and fucked her from behind until she yelled my name, but for some reason that had absolutely no appeal to me. The only person I wanted was Bren, as much as I hated to admit it to myself.

“Drinking. It’s getting late.”

She didn’t take the hint. “Yeah, it is. Want to go somewhere?”

“I have to stay here.”

She took a step closer to me and put on finger on my chest, her little smile playing along her lips. I could tell she was purposefully leaning forward to give me a good view of her full tits, and I didn’t mind taking a little look. Still, I frowned, not at all interested. Even if her tits were pretty damn nice.

“Are you sure?”

“I said, no thanks.”

She pouted. “Come on, Colin, I was just thinking about two weeks ago.”

I gave her a look. “Don’t make me say ‘fuck off’ again, Stacey.”

“Whatever, asshole.” She turned and walked back to the table, hips swaying.

I glanced back over at Bren and my heart nearly stopped. She was staring over at us with a weird look on her face. As we locked eyes, she turned away, said something to her dad, and disappeared upstairs.

Fuck,
I thought. She must have misread the situation and figured I was into whatever Stacey was desperately trying to sell me.

After Bren disappeared upstairs, O’Brian looked around the room like he was seeing it for the first time. “Hey, assholes,” he called out. The conversations died down. “Night’s over now.” Without another word he headed upstairs in the wake of his daughter.

I grinned. Typical O’Brian. He went from affable and the life of the party one second, and gruff and short the next. He sure knew how to tell people to get the fuck out when he was sick of them.

The room was still for half a beat, and then everyone stood up and began filing out the door. I looked over at Davin, who was busy smirking at me like he had won some fucking bet. I looked away and began cleaning the place up, tossing away empties and straightening the cabinets.

“Good little party, eh, Colin?” Davin said, coming over and grinning.

I looked at him. “The trick with the girls didn’t work, asshole.”

“Oh, I’m not so sure about that.”

“You got a problem, you come to me. No more of these fucking games.”

Davin frowned and stepped closer. “Listen to me, boy. You should feel lucky I’m playing games with you. I’ve been in this business a lot longer than you have. If I wanted to ruin you, I fucking would.”

“You sure you want to be saying this to me?”

The air was thick and tense with the promise of violence.

“You may outrank me, boy, but I don’t bow to you.” There was something dangerous and slick in his eyes.

I stood firm, face impassive. “Go home, Davin. I have to clean this shit up.”

He grinned and the tension broke.

“Yeah, you sure do. Get to work, little maid.”

I tensed my fists as he turned and walked out the door. Nothing would have satisfied me more than breaking his teeth on my knuckles, but that would have been suicide. No matter how annoying Davin was, he still was a Right Person, and one of O’Brian’s closest people. I couldn’t settle my issues with him through violence.

I’d have to come up with something else, and soon.

Shaking my head, I turned back to the kitchen, and finished straightening the place up. I knew that I could have left it all there until the morning, and let O’Brian’s staff take care of it, but I felt bad staying in his home and not carrying my weight. When it was decent enough, I grabbed another drink from the refrigerator, and paused. Bren’s face as she turned and went upstairs came back to me. I grabbed a glass of wine, poured it full, and went upstairs.

I had a pretty good idea of where she would be. I wasn’t sure why, but I figured it would be good to have some time alone with her. I went up to the third floor and pushed out through a pair of glass double doors that opened out onto a fairly large roof deck. The railings were all wood, clean and painted white, with furniture scattered around the space. White Christmas lights were strung around the edges, but only the nearly full moon provided any visibility.

Sitting in a chair off to one side, her feet kicked up on a little glass table, was Bren. She looked up at me as I walked over.

“What do you want?”