Page 55 of The Endless Want

She barely looks at me when we’re sitting around the same table, but the heat between us simmers like a live wire. Every time she pushes her hair behind her ear, every time she tugs her sweater straight, every time she exhales in frustration, I feel it.

She’s close enough to touch, but she doesn’t look at me. That burns more than I expected.

At one point, she passes me a stack of financial reports without a word. Our fingers brush. She snatches her hand back like she’s been scorched. Snippy doesn’t even begin to describe it. “You could at least pretend to be civil,” I mutter.

She doesn’t even glance up. “I’m being professional. Try it sometime.”

I grit my teeth so hard my jaw pops. “I’m not your enemy, Ailish.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

“We need to talk.”

She laughs—short, hollow, sharp. “Oh, now you want to talk? After weeks of avoiding me and then inserting yourself everywhere I go like you have a tracking device shoved up your⁠—”

“Enough,” I snap.

She looks at me then. Really looks. And God, it’s a mistake, because she’s exhausted and furious and so beautiful I forget how to breathe for a second.

We don’t finish the argument. We can’t. There are too many eyes on us. Too many Italians watching with a mixture of amusement and worry, like they’re waiting to see whether we’ll explode or implode.

Over the next days, the tension doesn’t fade. But the work… The work thrives.

Apparently, when I’m being forced to be useful instead of brooding and drinking myself stupid, I’m impressive enough for the Italians to stop whispering about my instability. I excel at logistics, negotiations, and pressure—those things have always come naturally. And once Ailish stops biting my head off every time I open my mouth, our team actually functions.

More than functions. We dominate.

Her analytical brain and my tactical instinct balance each other. She sees the numbers; I see the threats. She spots the cracks; I patch them before they break. The Italians keep exchanging glances like they’re watching a miracle unfold.

By the end of the week, they’re practically glowing. “Your man is sharp,” Lorenzo tells Liam one afternoon.

“Not my man,” Liam mutters. “Not anyone’s man.” But there’s pride in his voice.

Ailish still avoids me outside meetings. Still rushes out of rooms. Still answers me only when professionalism demands it. But I don’t spiral. Not like before. I’ve found purpose again.

I’ll never admit it to my damn brother, but Liam was right about this.

Yet the obsession hasn’t faded—it’s simply buried under a thicker layer of denial. Because every night, no matter how productive I’ve been, no matter how many Italians shake my hand and praise my work, no matter how many fires I put out… I end up thinking about her.

Her fear she doesn’t show anyone but me. The way she holds herself now—tense, fragile, like a woman carrying more weight than she should. And I don’t know why it hooks into me the way it does.

Conor calls it obsession. I call it surveillance. The truth is, it’s probably both.

All I know is this: If she ever needed me—really needed me—I would burn half the city down just to take one fear off her shoulders.

And the worst part? I don’t even know why.

CHAPTER 16

Ailish

I feel Liam watching me long before he says anything. It happens near the end of the day when the compound finally quiets, and the corridors lose the electric buzz of constant movement. The afternoon meetings are done, the Italians gone, and most of the Irish men have drifted outside for a smoke or tapped out for dinner. I’m gathering a stack of updated route papers and trying to will my heartbeat into something normal when his voice comes from behind me.

“Ailish. Walk with me.”

The words aren’t harsh, but they aren’t casual either. Liam only uses that tone when he’s worried, or when something in his gut tells him a storm is forming before the clouds even show.

I fall into step beside him, matching his stride down the hallway lined with old, framed maps of territories long since absorbed. His hands are in his pockets, expression drawn in the way it gets when he’s thinking ten moves ahead.