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“I’m brave but I’m not that brave, Lena. I know full well the reach your family has. I’m not willing to do a damn thing that will compromise my relationship with him. That will make you tear us apart—”
“We’d never do that!” Lena gasped.
I peered at her over my shoulder. “Don’t be naive.Youmight never do that, because you’re a mother.” I cast a derisive glance at Aidan. “He’d do it in a heartbeat. But if you treat my son right, we have no reason to leave.”
And with that, I returned to the living room.
Maybe I’d made things a thousand times worse for myself, maybe I’d caused a war within the family, but I needed to lay down the law from the start.
I wasn’t a kid anymore. Wasn’t an ingenue. I was a woman. A mother. A successful artist. Wealthy in my own right.
I’d consider the conversation a solid check that would lead to a stalemate. And they were odds that I’d never have envisaged having over the O’Donnellys.
* * *
DECLAN
When Conor helpedme out of the car, I wanted to shove him away. I wanted to get out on my own two feet, because the last thing I wanted was Seamus and Aela to see me acting weak.
Strength was everything in my world.
That was why Conor had blacked out the cameras in my building during the ride into the garage, and my parking area was blockaded by our most trusted men so that no one would see me and think less of me.
If I was weak, someone could try to attack, thinking to hit me when I was down.
The only problem? Iwasweak.
Very weak.
I felt like shit, and if I was in another world, I’d still be in the hospital. But that wasn’t going to happen.
I had some downtime coming to me as I recuperated, but the second I was better, I’d be back on the job. Vacation time? Sick pay? Ha. What were they?
So, while I was off, I fully intended on getting to know my son. This was the perfect moment for it, while I had patience and a lot of time on my hands. When he could get to know me without me coming in at two AM with blood on my face after a beatdown, or as I strode in for dinner with the stench of gunpowder still in my nostrils after I’d shown some punk what it felt like to get on the wrong side of the O’Donnelly clan.
“Jesus, you’ve put on weight.”
I scowled at him. “Maybe you need to work on your arms more, pussy,” I groused.
Conor sniffed, but Brennan, rounding the car, countered, “It’s the ten tons of crap they’ve been pumping into his system. Plus, you need to work out more.”
His grin was sly, wicked, and fast, and Conor frowned at both of us. When I was standing, no longer relying on him for support, I watched him cock his arm up and test his biceps. He couldn’t see shit, not through his suit jacket, but it didn’t stop him from kissing the muscle.
“Don’t listen to them. You’re growing nice and big.”
“You taking steroids? Or just buying miracle creams?” Brennan asked, but his eyes were twinkling.
One of the family’s favorite pastimes, Brennan included, was winding Conor up. Mostly because it was so easy to do. Kid was on cloud cuckoo land. And yeah, I called him Kid when I was two years younger than him.
That was just Conor.
A perpetual teenager with the body of a thirty-four-year-old, the sex drive of a post-pubescent kid, and the mind of a genius.
“Miracle creams,” Conor said drolly. “Already got one addict in the family. Don’t need another.”
Bren scowled. “Stop giving him such a hard time.”
“Aidan isn’t here so he can’t hear me being mean,” Conor retorted with a sniff. “The way you all tiptoe around him, it’s no wonder the dipshit can’t accept what he is and what he’s going through.”
