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“They’ve been perfect little angels,” I assured her, trying and failing to keep from touching where I could see one of her twin daughters kicking even through her shirt. “Which one is this?” I asked, in awe as I always was when a little foot pushed against my hand.
“That’s Israel,” she said lovingly, covering my hand and pressing it closer, always happy to share the experience with anyone who wanted to feel her little miracles wiggling around. “She’s always a bit more active than Ireland.”
“Not long now,” I murmured. “Are you excited?”
“Not nearly as much as Lyric is,” she said with a laugh. “He’s getting his girls. You should have heard him the other night on the phone with his parents. I honestly think his dad is even more excited than he is, and that kind of blows my mind. I adore his family.” She rubbed her hand over the other side of her belly, where the other twin was stretching. “Speaking of my delicious husband, he wants to run something by you. Why don’t you go talk to him before the party while I get these two cleaned up?” Shifting, she finally saw their faces. “Did you two have fun with Grandpa…? Why do you have tearstains on your faces, baby boys?”
While they told her what happened, I made my way over to where Lyric was standing with Max and Elias. Ciana and Delaney were now sitting in the back of the open SUV, and they waved as I passed them but quickly returned to their silent chat. From what little I saw of their conversation, Delaney was telling Ciana about her pregnancy and how well it was progressing.
A huge gift bag was hanging from one of Lyric’s hands. When the three men saw me coming, they stopped talking and grinned. “Hey, beautiful,” Lyric greeted, bending to kiss my cheek. “Happy birthday.”
I pretended to peek into the gift bag, but there was too much colorful tissue paper for me to get even a glimpse of what was inside. “What’s this?”
“Nope.” He laughed and shifted the bag to his other hand, putting it farther away from me. “Mila will kick my ass if I let you open this before it’s time. The boys helped her pick it out, and they will be disappointed if you see it before they can help you eviscerate all this paper.”
“Fine,” I huffed in faux irritation. “Your gorgeous wife said you needed to talk to me.”
“Oh yeah.” He rubbed his free hand over the back of his neck, looking vulnerable for the first time since I’d met him. “Well, it’s more of me begging for a favor. But it pays really well, and I promise you’ll have fun.”
My brows lifted. “Okay, you have my full curiosity at this point. Tell me already.”
Elias draped a heavy arm over my shoulders. “He wants to use your scary ability to speak every language known to man to help out his aunt when she goes to New York next month.”
Lyric nodded. “Yeah, Aunt Emmie needs a translator while she’s in New York next month. I talk about you all the time with her and my family, so she knows how good you are, and since she needs someone who speaks several different languages that she can trust—” He broke off with a shrug. “It will only be from the day after Christmas until New Year’s Eve. One of her clients doesn’t speak much English and he’s performing at some New Year’s Eve show, so that will be the last event you have to be at.”
I stood there, silently taking in all the details, leaning into Elias like I always did when he hugged up on me. He was a naturally affectionate person, and it was comforting. I didn’t realize how much I’d needed that until my muscles started to relax a little. The whole scene with my brother had gotten to me more than I realized, in more ways than one, but I pushed down the pain throbbing in my chest and focused on the guys in front of me.
“I know you usually go to Paris with that Anya chick, but I would really appreciate it if you could help out Aunt Em,” Lyric continued. “And I swear, she will pay you for all your time. Plus, I figured since it was happening in New York City, you wouldn’t be too unhappy about it because you could stay with your cousins and see Ryan while you’re there.”
Right then, what he thought was the selling point was actually the one thing that had me hesitating. After what my brother had just said to me, I wasn’t sure I could even be near Ryan. Not with my emotions so close to the surface. But I put on a smile and found myself nodding. “Okay. Let her know that I’m happy to help her out. Have her call or email me.”
“Great,” he said with relief, his eyes lightening with the shift of his emotions. The effect was kind of mesmerizing, and I couldn’t help wondering how Mila got anything done because I would want to sit and watch his eyes change from one shade of brown to another all day long if I were her.
“Tell her I’d like to stay at whatever hotel she’s going to be at. This is work, so I’m going to treat it as such. No goofing off with my cousins.” I wasn’t even sure I was going to tell them about my visit. Part of me thought I was being petty, but another part knew I was only trying to protect myself. I should have taken the hint Ryan had tried to give me over the summer.
It was time to bow out gracefully and let him move on with his life without having to worry about me trying to hang on to something that had never been possible to begin with. The crazy crush I had on him was never going to turn into something more on his part. I had to accept that and move forward with my life instead of keeping my head stuck in a dream that would never become reality.
“I’ll let her know, but it won’t be an issue if you want to hang out with your family in your downtime. I mean, these are rock stars. I’m sure they will be fucking around any chance they can get. You don’t have to babysit them or anything. Just translate for them during interviews and meetings.”
“No,” I said as two blacked-out SUVs pulled up at the end of the parking lot. My heart gave a little lurch, and I knew before the doors even opened who was inside. “I don’t even know if I’ll tell Ryan I’ll be in New York. He’s too busy to hang out with me anyway.”
17
Ryan
I was in a piss-poor mood before I even stepped off the jet. Not only had there been fuckups all week with work that had kept me from traveling with the rest of my family the day before—all thanks to my new personal assistant who was supposed to be top-notch but had only been creating one fuckup after another—but there had also been delays with takeoff times back in New York that had put us behind.
When the driver finally pulled up in front of Hannigans’ bar after I’d stopped long enough to pick up my parents and sister, the first thing I saw was Nova. She was standing with her cousin Max and the rocker’s son, Lyric. But what had me grinding my teeth was the sight of some fucker with his arm around Nova like he had every right to touch her.
“Hey, hey, hey.” Mom snapped her finger in front of my face when an unconscious growl left my throat and I started to open the door. “You will not spill blood at her birthday party. She’s been upset about something, and you don’t want to add to it.”
I tore my gaze away from the sight of the girl who owned my heart to look at Mom. “What do you mean, she’s upset about something? Is she okay? Why would she be upset? I just spoke to her last night, and she was fine.”
She scrunched up her forehead as she stared back at me, seeming utterly bewildered by the questions I was throwing at her. She opened her mouth, and I knew she was going to say something important, but Samara leaned forward from the third-row seat.
“Are we waiting for a parade or what? Come on, people, let’s go. We only have a few hours with Nova before we have to fly back tonight. I didn’t get to spend nearly enough time with her last night because she was so busy.” She clapped her hands impatiently. “Papa, tell your son to open the door already!”
