Page 13 of Conor
“I don’t care. Honestly, I wanted him dead. You guys did me a favor. You freed me. I would never say a thing to anyone. I haven’t so far, can’t you see that?”
“For fucks sake,” I growl. “Just stop talking before you condemn yourself any further.”
Her tears continue in soft, silent sobs all the way back to Boston. And I can’t think. I can’t figure out how I’m supposed to sort her out. We end up back at my townhouse. I’ve never brought a woman here, and I don’t know what I’m thinking doing it now.
Ivy sniffles as I drag her inside. “What are you going to do?”
I don’t have an answer to that. Crow is counting on me, and he was right about her. But chrissakes if I want to kill a mam.
I haul her into my bedroom and point to the bed. “Sit.”
Blonde strands of hair fly around her face as she shakes her head, arguing and carrying on all over again. I can’t deal with this shite right now. I can’t even look at her. And maybe it’s cheap, but I’m not going to manhandle her, so I yank my Glock out from the back of my jeans and gesture to the bed again.
“Sit. The. Fuck. Down.”
A flood of tears leak from her eyes, but this time, she doesn’t hesitate to do as she’s told.
“I’ll do anything you want.” She closes her eyes and bows her head. “All the cash I earn dancing, it’s yours. I can clean your house. Cook. Whatever you want, Conor. Please…”
She looks up at me with a face so broken it physically hurts me to see her this way.
“I’ll let you do whatever you want to me,” she blurts. “Just give me your word that he’ll be okay.”
“Stop carrying on like that,” I snarl. “Did I ask ye to spread your goddamn legs for me?”
She curls into a ball and sobs harder. “I don’t know what you want. I’m desperate, can’t you see that? I’ll do anything! I don’t care.”
“Just stop fecking talking!” I edge my way toward the closet and rifle through the duffle bag I keep there. After a few minutes, I finally find what I’m looking for. Ivy freaks when I approach her with the rope, and this time, she tries to scramble for the end of the bed.
I catch her around the ankle and drag her back, climbing on top of her and using the weight of my body to pin her. It doesn’t take much. She’s only a wee thing, and I didn’t think she had much fight in her, but she’s wilder than I imagined. She bucks and screams and tries with all her might to wiggle from my grasp, and we’re not getting anywhere like this.
“Ivy.” My fingers clamp down around her jaw, forcing her to hold still and look at me. I brush the tangled mess of hair from her eyes, and when she looks up at me, chest heaving and lips wet, I freeze. An unbidden image of her lying naked beneath me comes to mind, and I have to shake myself out of it.
“It’s okay,” I force out roughly. “I’m just tying your wrists. Now be a good girl and hold still.”
She squeezes her eyes shut and releases a shaky breath, and all I want to do is sample those salty tears on her lips. My fingers brush over her throat for no particular reason and she shivers. Her eyes are glassy and beautiful when they open to meet mine, and I don’t know how the fuck she’s doing this to me. She’s poisoning me against everything I love, trying to take away my life. My brotherhood. And I can’t look at her.
I force my gaze away and finish the task at hand, securing her wrists to the bed frame.
“Please look at me, Conor,” she begs. “I’m human. A mother. A person. I got wrapped up in some bad shit, and that isn’t my fault. I’ll explain it all to you if you let me. I’ll tell you everything, and then you’ll understand.”
“I don’t want to understand.” I finish off the knot and retreat from the bed. “That’s what you don’t get.”
She curls into herself and I aim to put as much distance between us as I can while I figure out what the fuck I’m going to do.
I shut the door behind me and walk down the hall, taking up residence on my sofa. My eyes fall to the Glock in my hands, and an empty cavern opens up within my chest. Since my induction into the syndicate, I’ve never hesitated to kill anyone who was a threat to my brotherhood. But when I think about doing it now, it isn’t what I want at all.
Heaviness settles into my limbs when I imagine her death. Seeing those pretty blue eyes so lifeless? I’ll never get over that. I’ll never find a way to make peace with this decision. But what choice do I have?
The hours tick by as I bounce from one conclusion to another, debating every possible alternative. But there are none. Every route is a dead end with the same conclusion. Crow asked this one thing of me. The only thing he’s ever asked me to do in confidence. It’s my chance to prove myself, show my loyalty. And if I don’t do it, I’m fucked.
Ivy’s fucked anyway. If it isn’t me that kills her, somebody else will. At least I could make it easy on her. It doesn’t have to be a bullet. There are a million other ways. Pills, for example. I could make it like she just fell asleep. But when I close my eyes and her face haunts my mind, I know that doesn’t make a goddamn difference. She’ll still be dead, and I’ll still be the fucking piece of shite who did it.
I turn to my old friend Jameson to help me decide. Only, that just makes everything blurrier and less logical. I’m not any closer to a decision, but I am drunk when I wander back down the hall, Glock in hand.
Ivy is wide awake, curled into a ball, a trembling mess of nerves. She’s afraid of me. And it isn’t something I ever wanted to see in a woman’s eyes. Her gaze is fixed on the weapon in my hand, chest heaving as she waits for me to use it on her.
“There’s only one way to fix this mess,” I slur.
