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By the time I get to Niall’s apartment, I feel like a complete mess. I don’twantto spend my time with him listening for things to bring back to Connor, but now that he’s brought it up, I feel as if I’m obligated to do so if Niall does say anything. Not only that, but anything we do together feels slightly tainted now by Connor’spermissionthat it happen, but only for his own ends.
“You look upset, lass,” Niall observes keenly as he lets me in. “I got a bottle of wine for you this time,” he says with a smile, gesturing towards the bottle and glass on the countertop. “I could tell you weren’t all that partial to the beer last time.”
I’m picky about my wine, too, but I don’t tell him that. It’s the thought that matters, and I pour a glass after he pulls the cork out, swirling it as I face him while we stand in the kitchen.
“I don’t know if this can work,” I say softly. “There’s so much conflict of interest here. And I—” I see the hurt instantly on Niall’s face, and I know he must be thinking that I’m leading him on.Maybe I am. There’s so much for me to juggle, so many things for me to think of, to worry about. “You need to convince Liam and Anastasia to just leave,” I urge him. “It’ll be so much better for them if they do. Connor’s patience is wearing thin, and—”
“You know I’ll go with them, if they do?” Niall interrupts me, his dark blue eyes focused on mine. He gently takes the wine glass out of my hand, setting it aside as he sets his beer down, and taking my hands in his. “Is that what you want, lass? For me to leave? For this to be over?”
Of course not,I want to say, but I bite it back. “At the end of the day, my loyalty has to be to my husband,” I tell him firmly. “That’s my duty. It’s what I’ve promised, what I’vecommittedto. Anything I’m allowed outside of that—it can’t conflict with what my family needs from me. Whatheneeds from me.”
Niall moves closer to me, his leanly muscled body nearly brushing against mine, his hands moving from mine to my waist as he pulls me closer to him. “What feels better?” he asks, his fingers skimming over the silky fabric of my dress, tightening on me as our bodies touch. “Duty, or this? I know there’s something in you that wants this as badly as I do, Saoirse. Or am I just filling in the gaps that your husband can’t?”
“I told you what this is.” I feel a little breathless from his hands on me, but I force myself to focus. “Niall, there’s a spy in my husband’s men, or someone causing problems. If Liam is infiltrating Connor’s gang, trying to take him down from the inside instead of negotiating with him face to face or justleaving—”
Niall shakes his head, his grip on me loosening as he backs up a little, frustration plain on the tense lines of his face. “Are you playingmenow, lass? Using me to get information for your husband? After you accused me of using you?”
I feel my eyes prickling, but I swallow hard, shaking my head. “That’s what he wants me to do,” I admit softly. “But no. I don’t want to do that. I want—Iwishthis could be separate from all of it. Liam, Connor, the politics and lies and mess of it all—I wish we could have something that had nothing to do with any of that. But this is the world we live in, Niall, and everything seems to come back to—to this. To the Kings.”
Niall presses his lips together. “Maybe I was a fool,” he says roughly, and even as he speaks I can see how much he wants to touch me, how much he wants to come to me. “To believe I could ever have anything with the Irish princess.”
This time it’s me who goes to him. “Niall—it’s not that, it has nothing to do with that—”
“I always admired you,” he says softly, his hands going to my hips again, as if drawn there, resting lightly against me. “I watched you, wanted you, thought how beautiful you were. How strong. I was prepared to want you for the rest of my life, because I was always going to be Liam’s best friend, and I’d never hurt him. Never break that loyalty that I owed him.” He lets out a long, shuddering sigh. “I can understand, lass, how loyalty like that works. How you can never put me first, because you owe that to Connor. But it’s a damn shame, Saoirse, that you belong to him now. That you’ll always be his, before you can ever be mine.”
He leans down, his mouth capturing mine, but it’s not the fierce, passionate, hungry kiss of before. It’s slow and sad, as if he’s memorizing my lips, tracing me in his mind as his hands rove over my body. “I want you,” he whispers against my mouth. “And it kills me, every moment, to think I might have to leave without ever having had you.”
“I know,” I whisper, my forehead pressing against his as his lips brush over mine, his body shuddering as his hands tighten on my waist. “But I know how much you love Liam—like your own brother. And if he keeps this up—he’ll die.”
“I know.” Niall closes his eyes, his hand going to my hair, fingers running through the strands as he kisses me. “Come lie down with me, lass. We won’t go too far. I know the rules. But I want the memory of you in my bed.”
The unspoken words, hanging between us as he takes my hand and leads me to his room, are that we don’t know how many more times we’ll get—if we’ll ever get any more at all. This could be goodbye—to a man who was my friend and might have turned into more, and as Niall picks me up gently and lays me back on his pillows, I feel the ache of sadness spread through me.
He pushes my skirt up slowly, lying between my thighs as he kisses me soft and slow, running his hands through my hair, along my cheek. His hand finds my breast through my dress, cupping it, his fingers brushing over my stiffening nipple, and when the kissing becomes too much to bear, he pushes the top of my dress down along with the cups of my bra, baring my breasts so he can run his lips and tongue over them.
“I’ve wanted to touch you like this since you sent me those pictures,” he groans, his other hand sliding up my inner thigh. “You’re perfect, Saoirse. Every part of you—”
My hand slips between us, fingers skimming over the thick line of his hard cock, pressing against the front of his joggers. Niall groans against my breast, sucking my nipple into his mouth as my hand closes around his cock through the fabric, stroking, feeling the size of him against my palm as we grind together, panting, wanting more.
“I want—” Niall trails off, and I can hear the yearning in his voice. I know everything he wants is too much to put into words, too many things, and not enough time.
I feel him throb against my palm, feel his hips jerk forward as he thrusts into my hand, needing friction, needing pleasure, and I let out a small, gasping moan as he squeezes my breast in his hand, his mouth on my throat.
“We should stop,” I whisper. “If we keep going—”
We’re playing with fire. I’m hurt from Connor’s actions, aching and wounded, and Niall’s desire for me, his plain and unashamed longing, is like kindling to a fire. If we keep going, if clothes come off, if his fingers slide inside my panties, my hand in his joggers, mouths and fingers pushing us to the point of no return, I have a feeling I might beg for him to fuck me. I might break my promise. And with the possibility that he could have to turn his back on me at any moment and leave with Liam—I think he might do it, if I asked.
“Fuck, lass, I need—”
“I know.” I feel hollow and aching, drenched with arousal, every part of me throbbing with it. I can feel how hard he is, the weight of him against my hand, the straining of his body—and I know what we both need. What we want.
What we absolutely cannot have right now.
“I have to go,” I whisper, pushing at his chest, and Niall pulls back with a groan. I can see the taut desire on his face as he reaches down to massage his cock, trying to ease the ache, and I yank my bra and dress back up, smoothing my hair as I scramble off of the bed. “I’m sorry.”
“No need to apologize, lass.” Niall’s voice is tight, raspy with need. “I wouldn’t stop you, if you needed to leave. If you want to—”
