Daddies Brat

Sylan

Jesus fucking Christ.

She is more beautiful than I remember. Smells just as divine.

I’ve stared at surveillance pictures and videos of her for so long her image chases me into my dreams. I fantasize about how sweet her lips will taste again. But seeing her. Jesus help me. It’s hard to not scoop her up, take her off to some distant place and just be. Leave the life of crime and grit behind. But too many people depend on me.

Holding back and letting someone else watch over her for the last six months took vast amounts of self-control. And whiskey. Lots of fucking whiskey.

Until tonight. God, I can finally breathe again. Having her under our roof is a weight off my shoulders the size of a planet. The second her father’s body hit a stainless-steel slab at the morgue, I made my move.

Experience tells me Marcus isn’t far behind us and it won’t be long before we’re facing off.

Katriona glances around my penthouse nervously as she’s guided off the elevator. I’m the head of the underground mafia and conduct most of my business with a level of class most nine-to-fivers and one-percenters envy.

And I live like a king and want to give it all to her as our queen.

She takes slow steps, and Drake entertains her pace as she takes in the stained-glass dome and large floor-to-ceiling windows that offer a panoramic view of the Chicago night skyline. Another hour and the sunrise will color the horizon. I wonder if she’ll love the sight as much as I do.

She wraps her arms around herself as her eyes dance over the black leather sofa and the large wall of books directly behind it. Drake slips his jacket off and drapes her in the warmth, not leaving her side. In this one second I see the bliss-no the longing-smooth out the fear etched in her brow and it gives me hope.

She misses us. I hold that knowledge close.

I continue to watch from the darkened corner unmoving as she parts her lips and takes a deep breath. The slight movement pulls my gaze to her delicate mouth. Her face is sweet and matches her young age, but the sorrow in her eyes makes her appear broken beyond her years, and something inside me wants to fix the pieces to make her whole again. Erase the ugly life has dumped on her. I hope she lets us.

“Are we going to play the ‘who’s behind the curtain game again?'”Content rights by NôvelDr//ama.Org.

I smile. Smartass.

She glances over her shoulder and assesses Drake. He’s changed a lot in the six months she’s been gone. That nasty scar down his cheek for one. He comes off brutish and towers over most like a fucking animal, but not toward the people in this room.

Neither of us would dream of it.

I pull my hands from my pockets as I step from the shadows, and she immediately pinpoints my location. The second she sees me her eyes lock on mine.

“Sylan,” she whispers softly. She slips Drake’s jacket off and tosses it over the back of a nearby chair, her steel resolve replacing it.

Through the shock of feeling like I’ve been punched in the gut, I step close enough to touch her soft hair, but I keep my hands at my sides. I’ve never been more mesmerized by such beauty in my entire life. Her eyes are such a light brown they appear otherworldly when the low light from my desk lamp catches on the gold flecks in her irises as she drinks in her surroundings.

I take in her slighter frame and the barely-there tremble in her chin. She’s lost weight in our time apart. We’ll have to make sure she takes better care of herself.

She tries to hide her tears behind pinned back shoulders and solid-steel spine, but I see the fear and it tears me up. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other and that’s when I notice the black stilettos, which I know have to be killing her petite feet.

Even in those things she barely comes to just beneath my chin. From what Drake texted when collecting her, she was on her way home. In those of all the fucking shoes she could be wearing and a yellow uniform that stands out like a neon sign. She might as well be flashing like one too. The thought of her all alone while her father’s thugs look for her brings me back to the evening’s planned events.

She inhales under my sharp gaze but shifts her attention to a point over my shoulder.

“Katriona, look at me,” I command gently, pressing a finger beneath her chin until I have her attention back on me. She lifts those thick lashes softly, and the power knocks me back once again when her intense gaze connects with mine. I nearly groan aloud because that one flick of her lashes has my cock swelling behind the zipper of my slacks.

“Do you know why you’re here? Do you know about your father?” I ask.

“I do. It hit the evening news. I was at work. But you already know that.”

Her expression darkens and misplaced defiance clamps her mouth shut. Instead of continuing to rub her hands down the length of her uniform, she crosses them over her chest. The slight movement pushes her breasts up, and Drake and I are gifted the sweet sight of creamy flesh peeking out from the front of her uniform. She notches her chin a fraction higher, and I admire her strength.

In a word, she’s stunning and has no place working at some truck stop on some mile marker exit.

Business first. Then pleasure.

“With your father dead, there are complications that need to be dealt with. Marcus has a bone to pick with anyone with the Kane name. He’s not going to let you live if it means you’re a potential threat to him taking over the rubble of an empire your father left behind.”

Hell fury whips up behind Katriona’s thick lashes, and I’m momentarily drawn into the firestorm.

Her brows pinch together. “No one lets or keeps me from doing anything I want. Who the hell do you think you are, Sylan Ward? Are you wanting to take over my father’s whatever it is? Empire? What the hell does that mean, anyway? Are you going to take what you want from me before that asshole Marcus can? Is that why I’m here?”

She jabs a finger at my chest and I have to say, I prefer her pissed off rather than sad.

“I have news for you, you can have it. I want nothing from that man. Not even an apology. You all can fight to your heart’s content. I want nothing from any of you. Now if you can please take me back to my life, I’d like to get on with what’s left of it.”

The fire in her words stirs one in me. Her eyes drag between Drake and me as she parts her lips, waiting for my next move.

I step in and I let her take me in for a few seconds before I close the distance between us until we’re breathing each other’s air. A hint of jasmine and honey hits me as she flicks a fallen strand of hair from her eyes.

I dash away her worries. “We’re not interested in what Kane left behind. Marcus will find out he killed for nothing soon enough.”

That sends her back a couple of paces. “Are you saying he killed my father?”

Drake mirrors my movements and we both take her hands in ours and my memory trips back to the last time we held her this close. Only Grey had been with us then.

“That’s exactly what he’s saying, sweetheart.”

Drake’s words dissipate some of her anger. “I thought…”

“… that we had something to do with it,” I cut in.

She nods. “And that I was next, honestly. What happened to Grey. It was my fault.”

She turns to look at Drake and strokes a finger over the jagged scar running the length of his right cheek. Damn near took his eye out. “It’s all my fault. Had I not come to work at your club, being the daughter of him… just existing has put a lot of people in danger.”

Drake grunts. “And I thank whatever god is out there for you every day.” Drake, the fucking romantic poet, has her full attention and watching her take in the truth of my friend’s words has me questioning my entire life. Are we bringing her into the fold for her safety or because we’re bastards and want her all to ourselves?

Both?

“I told you on the ride over here, you were safe with me. With us.” Drake holds her hand over his heart.

I brush aside a few stubborn strands of her long hair. Everything about her is soft like a rose petal and chilled beneath my light touch.

When we don’t offer a deeper answer, she continues, the savagery of her tone slowly bleeding away to sadness.

“I’m sorry about Grey. You should have left me to just fade away. Forget about me. I don’t belong in this world. My father knew it. Maybe he was actually looking out for me in his own twisted way.” I hear frustration peeking through and rightly so.

She glances nervously between us.

Drake pulls her hand to his mouth and places a kiss on each knuckle.

“You’re here because this is where you belong. Don’t let that man’s twisted mind poison your sweet soul.”

Her cheeks flush and she slides the plumpness of her bottom lip between her teeth.

I look away. Last time she did that we nearly devoured her with our kisses. Grey would kill us if he could see us barely hanging on with her between us like this.

A look over her head at Drake and his darkened expression says he’s feeling the same plight I am, but we have a lot to go over before morning comes. Since hauling her off to bed isn’t the best foot forward, I settle for the second-best thing for now. I slip my suit jacket off and wrap it around her trembling shoulders, taking comfort my body heat is now warming her.

I’m not seeing things when I see her shoulders relax a fraction or when she buries her hands in the dark cloth and inhales my scent.

That one action makes my already hard cock twitch.

“Mo chroi,” I whisper before I can help myself. My heart.

I think back to my family when I was only a small child and what my Irish father would whisper to my mother in the old tongue before he headed out the door each morning to provide for his family. Growing up, we were near penniless and more often than not did without. After I looked on as my father died beaten down, overworked and still broke, I vowed to work for a better life. My two best friends followed, and now we sit at the top of the food chain of the underworld. A white-collar life with a criminal infrastructure. Crime pays. Don’t ever think it doesn’t.

All that doesn’t mean I don’t value the lessons my father taught me. My father understood love and family came above all else and no amount of time or money will change that. The legacy he instilled in his son early on in life will carry on long after I’ve left this world through the children we father with Katriona.

We are no saints, but we are not evil either and live by a set of rules. Human trafficking, drugs, and prostitution are all off-limits. Most think those are the only areas to make a handsome living, but they are wrong and have a limited imagination.

Unlike Katriona’s father. With him, anything was on the table. And now his right-hand man wants the Kane family business. Eventually his own ego was his downfall, and I plan on being the man behind the bullet that will send him into the afterlife to protect what’s mine. And I’ll make no apologies for it.

I reach out and tighten my jacket around her shoulders and take comfort when the fear in her eyes lessens as she leans into me.

In that instant, it all becomes crystal clear. She’s our queen and means more to us than the air filling our lungs. How is that even fucking possible? I’m a fucking criminal by any definition of the word and here I am ready to recite God damned lines of Shakespeare for a woman I’ve only kissed.

My gut churns with disgust. She deserves better than men like us, but I’m a bastard and can’t help myself. “Mo chroi.”

“Why do you keep calling me that?”

I want to tell her because she stole my heart, but I hold my tongue and wait for a better moment. If I tell her the truth now, she’s likely to think I’ve lost my good sense. Truth be told, she might be right. What sane person falls for someone with a single kiss? She stands there in my jacket and stares at me. Despite the heaviness of the early morning events, I smile down at her and it provokes the same reaction.

“Your father signed a contract after getting indebted to me. Us,” I correct. “He owed us ten million dollars. In a show of good faith in uniting our families, he offered a deal. Pay us back with something more valuable.”

Her eyes widen with surprise and understanding. “Me. Why does that not surprise me? Of course, he would throw me away like that. A freaking pawn so he can get what he wanted?”

“Yes.”

“And then he reneged.”

I take her chin in hand. “Yes.”

Hurt fills her eyes and I move on quickly before she gets the wrong idea.

I drop my hand from her chin and gesture for her to take a seat, but she refuses.

The side door from the home office opens and Katriona turns.

Drake and I look on as surprise fills her expression but it’s quickly replaced with an injection of anger and then it’s right back to surprise.

“No. You’re dead.” Her voice drops to a whisper. Like she’s seeing a ghost.