I feel like I’m floating around the New Year’s Eve party inside a bubble. I see people. I speak to people. But I can’t recall any conversations I’ve had or remember the names of people I’ve been introduced to. Sinead, sensing that I’m away with the fairies, tells everyone that Emmett got called back to the States on business so that I don’t have to keep repeating myself. I’ll thank her tomorrow when I’ll hopefully feel a little more normal.
I don’t know what I expected Emmett to do, but it wasn’t this.
He didn’t wish me luck for the new venture with Fianna.
He didn’t kiss me goodbye.
He didn’t beg me to go with him.
There was just … nothing. It was as if all the time we’d spent exploring one another’s bodies happened to someone else. As if it was just another fuck to him.
And this is what hurts the most.
I would never have treated him this way.
We put on our coats and stand outside to watch the fireworks display. The sky is illuminated by the spectacular bursts of color, but they blur through my tears as we count down to midnight. Being in different countries for the first few moments of a new year is an omen—this is obviously how it’s meant to be.
“Happy New Year.” I turn around to find Fianna standing next to me holding two glasses of champagne. She hands me a glass and clinks the side of it with her drink. “To us.”
“To us.” I sip champagne and swallow the sob that’s threatening to erupt inside me.
After a while, Fianna says, “Emmett was different with you.”
Tears finally spill over my bottom lashes. “Different how?”
“More like the Emmett I used to know.” Her face glows silver as a starburst firework explodes above our heads lighting up the sky. “He blamed himself for Oisin’s death.”
“How did he die?” I ask softly.
“Plane crash. He was on his way to New York to go and work with Emmett.”
“But…”
I could say that it wasn’t Emmett’s fault the plane crashed, but I guess everyone he knows has already said this. It’s a lot of baggage to carry around on his shoulders though.
“Oisin wanted to get away from here. He was nothing like Emmett. He was always so reserved, even as a child, and battled low self-esteem once he became a teenager. He always looked up to Emmett. He wanted to be like him.” She takes a deep shaky breath. “He was bullied at school. That’s why he wanted to go to America as soon as he could.”
“I’m so sorry.” I don’t know what else to say. But Fianna doesn’t even appear to be listening. She’s staring at the fireworks, pensive, lost in thoughts of her brother, so I take her hand and squeeze it.
She turns to me and her smile is sad. “It’s the reason why Emmett and Ronan will never be friends. Ronan was one of the bullies who made Oisin’s life hell.”
“Ronan?”
Now it all starts to make sense. The way Emmett’s hackles were up the instant Ronan Blackthorn walked into the house. The fight at the pub. His anger at Fianna for being nice to the guy. If Oisin wasn’t being bullied, he might never have caught that flight to New York. He might still be alive.
And Emmett might not be scared to come home to Ireland.
But then I think of the way Fianna looked at Ronan at the party, and the disappointment in Emmett’s eyes when he saw them together.
“You and Ronan?” I ask.
Another deep breath. “Ronan Blackthorn isn’t the kind of guy you want to cross. I thought… I thought that if I could get close to him, I could prevent him from hurting anyone else. But now…” She tears her eyes away from the stars fizzing in the sky and looks at me. “Emmett told me what happened at the pub. I’m sorry, Mary. I promise Ronan Blackthorn will never get close to you again.”
The O’Haras are protectors. Fighters. Fiercely loyal people. It’s lovely to know that they want to look out for me, but I can take care of myself. I always have done.
“You don’t need to worry about me. I’m a big girl now.”
Fianna throws her arms around me and hugs me tightly. “For what it’s worth, I think my cousin is an idiot for going back to New York without you.”
“His loss.” Only, I’m not sure if I’m trying to convince her or me.
Fianna and I move into the hotel a week later.
“It’ll be an adventure,” we tell her family. “We’ll sleep on camp beds until the owner’s accommodation is ready, and anyway, we’ll be too exhausted to care.”
It’s almost true. At least, the exhausted part is.
Once we start stripping plaster from walls and ripping up floorboards, we realize that the building requires a lot more work than we at first thought. Before we can even start renovating, we have to get the building moisture proofed, rewired, and replumbed, which means that we’re practically going to be living on a building site for a while.
Nothing fazes Fianna though. She has her vision, and while the tradesmen are carrying out their work, we start creating mood boards for the themed bedrooms to the backdrop of hammers, drills, and radios blaring out pop music.
Sinead and Erin pop in every day with homemade meals and try convincing us to go home until the place is habitable, but we quickly settle into a routine of waking up early, making coffee over a camping stove, and popping into a nearby café for breakfast. Besides, I’ve seen the way Fianna bats her eyelashes at one of the electricians, a dark-haired guy called Connor. I think he likes her too because not a lot of work goes on when she’s around, and I’m praying that he’ll ask her on a date before the work is completed.
One morning, I wake up later than usual feeling queasy, and almost throw up when I smell the coffee brewing in the small metal pot. One hand clamped over my mouth I wander through the building looking for Fianna. She never said that she was going out early, but when I hear voices coming from what will be the reception area when the hotel opens, I assume that she’s with Connor.
Then I hear a voice I recognize, and my heart starts thumping frantically.
Emmett?
I was going to leave Fianna to it, but I have to check for myself. Opening the door a crack, I peer around the room that’s littered with chunks of plasterboard, tools, lengths of cable, and radiators waiting to be installed, until my eyes settle on Fianna and a man who has his back to me.
My body immediately responds by sending shivers down my spine and a tingling sensation between my legs.
Why is he here?
Why didn’t he let me know that he was coming back?
Why didn’t Sinead say anything, unless she didn’t know either.
I can’t move. I don’t know how Emmett is going to react to seeing me again, and the longer I stand here overthinking it, the more uncertain I become. Perhaps he came here to tell me that he’s never coming back again. Or… My stomach lurches sickeningly, sending another wave of nausea crashing through me when I realize that perhaps he’s here to tell me that he’s getting married … to another woman.
I’m about to back away, grab my shoes and coat, and disappear outside until he’s gone, when he turns around and looks directly at me.
Oh my God, he’s even hotter than I remembered. Clean and hot. And I suddenly feel frumpy in yesterday’s clothes and one of Fianna’s oversized cardigans. I haven’t washed my hair in days, and there’s dirt under my fingernails.
But he’s walking towards me, and I hear Fianna say, “I’ll leave you guys to talk in peace,” and my legs are refusing to cooperate.
Emmett opens the door and eyes me up and down, a bemused smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “I’m quite enjoying your new look. Very … homely.”
“Homely? That’s what you’re going with?”
Because hearing his voice has transported me straight back to our surreal Christmas, and I want to kiss him and feel him inside me and my body isn’t ever going to let me forget it.
“What would you prefer? Comfortable? It suits you. It’s kind of … sexy.”
Okay, what’s going on here? He flies back to New York early, doesn’t even kiss me goodbye, tells his family that we’re on a break, and now he’s telling me that I look sexy? Whoever said that women are complicated?
“Why are you here, Emmett?” Because if this is how it’s going to be for the foreseeable future, I don’t think I can handle it.
His mouth twitches like he has a lot to say and doesn’t know where to begin. Finally, he says, “I wanted to see you.”
“Me?” I blink. Did he just say that? “Why?”
“Because, Mary, you’ve fucking bewitched me. I haven’t stopped thinking about you, and every moment that I’ve spent away from you has felt like … well, like a part of me was missing. I knew it when I boarded the aircraft to go back to New York. I knew it when I landed at Newark, and I sure as shit couldn’t ignore it when I went back to the office.”
I’m trying to soak up his words so that I can replay them in my head when he goes away again, but my pulse is racing, and it’s hard to think straight. This is what I wanted. This is everything I wanted him to say to me, and more, but how can I believe him when I keep hearing his voice in my head telling me that this isn’t real?
“Say something, Mary.”
“I…” I shake my head. “What are you saying, Emmett?”
“I’m saying that I can’t live without you. I thought I could. I told myself that none of it was real, that I brought you here against your will, and you would never be able to forgive me for that, but I was lying to myself.”
“But…” Did he just say that he can’t live without me? “I don’t understand.”
He smiles. “What part of I can’t live without you don’t you understand?” Then his expression falters. “Fuck. I just poured my heart out, and you don’t feel the same way. Fucking idiot. I knew I shouldn’t have left it so long. I was going to fly straight back the next day, but…” He rubs his stubble with both hands. When he speaks again, he lowers his voice like a child admitting he ate the last biscuit. “I didn’t want to seem too desperate.”
I step closer, so close I can see the gray flecks in his eyes. “I do feel the same way.”
“You do?” So close I can feel his breath on my face. “But you didn’t want to come back with me.”
“I didn’t want to go back to New York. It’s not the same thing.”
“I-I can’t stay here though, Mary.”
“Why not? The Internet is a wonderful thing, you know.”
He laughs out loud. Then he picks me up and spins me around, his lips on mine. When he sets me down, his expression grows serious.
“There’s something I must tell you, Mary. I should’ve told you sooner, but, well…” He swallows hard, and I don’t think he has ever looked sexier than he does right now. “I didn’t want to frighten you.”
Frighten me?
“Emmett, I was frightened the night I met you.”
“I know.” He scrunches up his nose and blinks several times. “I wasn’t entirely honest with you that night.”
“You don’t say.” I smile.
He inclines his head, conceding the point. “I knew what was happening on the roof. You see, my family, we’re Irish Mafia. My father—”
“Patrick?”
I nod. “He’s kept the peace with the other families, but I’ll be expected to take over one day. When I’m married. And, well, I wanted you to be aware of what you’re getting into. It can be dangerous. My position comes with its own risks, but I promise I will never allow any harm to come to you. There will always be someone looking out for you.”
“You mean, like Dave? And Declan?”
“Yes, but you will always have me looking out for you, Mary. Always. I just … I just wanted you to know.”
It all falls into place now. I’d suspected, of course, when Emmett didn’t react to the murder on the rooftop, but it’s not something you think about when it isn’t staring you in the face. Then, when Declan was there in the pub, keeping an eye on me when Ronan followed me to the restrooms, it started to become clearer.
How do I feel about falling in love with a Mafia Don?
Strangely, I feel safe when I’m with Emmett, and I believe him when he says that he’ll never let any harm come to me. The rest I’ll have to figure out as we go along.
“I had my suspicions, Emmett.” I shrug.
“You did?”
“I didn’t put two and two together and come up with the word Mafia, but I guess I might’ve done it in time.”
“And…?” His eyes grow even bluer if that’s at all possible.
“And I still love you, Emmett O’Hara.”
He grins at me. “Don’t move.”
My heart is throwing a party inside my rib cage. Emmett O’Hara has the power to flip my life on its axis, and it seems that this is exactly what he is doing. Again.
He goes down on one knee, right there on the dusty rotten floorboards of the hotel hallway, slides his hand into his pocket, and produces Granny Mary’s diamond ring. “Mary Chrysler, will you marry me?”
My heart turns the volume up a notch. I’m smiling so hard my cheeks hurt, and I think I say, “Yes,” but I can hardly hear my own voice over the blood gushing in my ears.
Emmett slides the ring onto my finger and kisses me, and I know that wherever he is, is going to be home from now on.
