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“I belong only to you; it’s your right to protect me.”
If only she could protect him with the same ferocity. How far did that go? Was she testing him with her risks or trying to embrace his world? This man, all of him, belonged to her with such purity of intention that her embrace would never be enough to repay him.
His lips brushed hers, slowly pressing harder until his fist dug into the back of her skull. They could just be there together, everywhere, whatever else happened in the world couldn’t touch them in the intoxication of their kiss.
And that was the worry she hadn’t faced.
He’d murdered a man for touching her. Wasn’t the first time he’d killed for her, and she doubted Evander’s goon was innocent. For all Conn gave her, she took and took, only digging him in deeper. One day, as Whisper said, they could face criminal action or injury. Because of her. Some McDade illicit misdeeds might not be on her, but the list of those that were grew daily.
Shooting Evander wasn’t something anyone would just get over. It wouldn’t be forgotten. The man had been obsessed with her for years. Maybe seeing her with Connel broke the spell and changed Evander’s perspective. Had she become a cheap slut? No, she couldn’t let him into her mind like that, couldn’t let him control any of their narrative. If anything, she feared being with Conn would fuel Evander’s desire, not with any kind of love or genuine emotion, spite would be the source.
She turned her head to free her lips. “Mo Grá, will there be retribution?”
Evander wasn’t just shot, wasn’t just bleeding, he’d been humiliated in front of others. Who would pay the price for that? The immature egotist wouldn’t let it go easy.
“Always, Macushla.” His hand loosened to comb through her hair and his other arm locked around her waist to drag her up the bed beneath him, landing her head in the pillow. “For you.”
But she didn’t want to be that. “I don’t want to be the cause of—what about your deal with Evander?”
His mouth didn’t leave her skin. “Nothing’s more important than this.”
Was there anything more important? Submerged in him, in them, the future could be dark, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Except she had to care about him, about more than the way he made her feel and how he appreciated her. Support, that was her role. She couldn’t just stand back and watch everything turn to shit.
Something within her, something—she pushed him back. “Connel.” His curious frown required a beat. Breathing deep, she licked her lips. “I’m in love with you.” When he tried to kiss her again, she resisted. “There’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do for you. I know you say it all the time and prove it over and over and I’m…”
“Baby—”
“I’m not pulling my weight,” she confessed a truth that startled her. “The words aren’t enough, the words are useless, an insult, when stacked against what you bring to the table.”
“That’s my call.”
Was it? He’d never ask anything of her. Never had, never would. He took protecting her and solving her issues seriously while she… how did she show her love?
“You could go to prison. For killing that man, for shooting Evander.”
“I’d have killed him if you hadn’t told me no.”
“How does that make me good for you? I jeopardize your freedom. The family need you. Your job is to run things, to take care of your people. If loving me distracts you from that, jeopardizes your freedom…” The McDades would come to hate her. “You’ll resent me one day, when you realize what loving me has cost you.”
“It’d cost me more to lose you.” Propping his weight on his elbows, his forearms framed her face. “If you walk out, if you leave me, it better be because you don’t love me. It better be that you’ve figured out you’re better than this, more worthy than my level. And you’d better hope I believe it, because if I don’t… there isn’t an obstacle I won’t obliterate.”
Desperation raced her heart. “What does that mean?”
“Only you can stop this. I’ll never see you as anything other than mine. You are the only one with control.”
Over him? Over them?
“I’m bad for you, for the family. How can you give yourself to this? Your people… they’ll see I caused this, that just by existing, I weaken you.”
The twitch of his brow became almost… disbelief.
He rolled away, cutting all physical contact. “Then go.”
Bewildered, the move took her aback. “What?”
“Go. If you mean what you say, go.”
To prove that the family meant more, was that his point? Though she’d made her own. If all she did was damage, he’d be better off without her.
