First and Only (Callaghan Brothers #2)

Clearly Lexi hadn’t told anyone about their time together last night, and given the day’s events, that was probably a good thing. Tensions had been running high as it was, and she buried her father, for Christ’s sake. If there had been any hint that he had spent the night in her bed... well, he didn’t even want to think of what Kayla would have done with that information, let alone his father and brothers.

Keeping their little secret off the radar made things more difficult, but not impossible. For now at least, discretion was paramount, for both of their sakes. But he would be visiting her soon.

They had a lot to discuss, and he had a lot of questions. He hadn’t recognized her at first, but was the same true on her end? Had she known who he was all along? Or was that something that she realized afterwards? And why had she turned him down at first, only to surrender so completely to him later?

And dear Lord, had she surrendered to him! Never had a woman taken him so well and given so much in return. Ian got an odd feeling in his chest every time he thought about it.

Was it possible that Lexi still had feelings for him, even after all these years? The more he thought about it, the more he believed that to be the case. It was in every touch, every word, every nuance of their time together. That’s what had made the night so spectacular. His brief time with Lexi went beyond the lust and physical needs he was accustomed to. Plenty of women had said they cared for him, but he had never felt the pure concentrated power of the real thing before. Now he had, and he was afraid that nothing else would ever do.

Except he feared it might already be too late.

Ian bided his time, waiting for Kieran to return. He sat with his family, nursing his beer and half-listening to their conversations, his eyes kept glancing toward the door every so often. Once Kieran was back he would slip away and see her again.

“Give it up, Ian,” Shane said finally, when everyone else had grown tired of his single-syllabled answers and gone to shoot darts. “Kier’s not coming back tonight. Dad told him to stay with her, to make sure she was okay.”

Ian turned to Shane, his gaze intent. Anyone else might have been intimidated, but Shane only smiled. “You haven’t taken your eyes off that door since you got back,” he explained.

Ian shrugged, containing his exhale. Shane was the equivalent of a human lie detector. It would do no good to deny it. The most he could hope for was to provide a little redirection, at least until he knew what the hell was going on.

“So what’s her story? Lexi, I mean.”

Shane grinned widely, and Ian knew he’d made the smart choice. Shane wouldn’t have believed for a moment that Ian wasn’t thinking about her. At least this way it sounded like a legitimate inquiry, as opposed to something a lover might ask. He would hit his beloved computers later and know everything there was to know about Lexi O’Connell, a.k.a. Alexis Kattapoulos, but Shane would have the interesting personal insights he couldn’t get anywhere else.

“Yeah, I was wondering when you were going to ask. Saw you looking at her all day.” At Ian’s surprised look, he added, “But don’t sweat it. You weren’t alone. There wasn’t a man there who wasn’t checking her out for one reason or another.”

So far, this conversation was not doing anything to settle his unease.

“Alexis O’Connell, only daughter of Brian and Adonia O’Connell,” Shane began, slipping into his subject analysis mode. Shane’s mind was like a computer, storing images and data effortlessly. It was one of the things that made him such a genius.

“Adonia?” Ian questioned. It was not a common name.

“She was Greek,” Shane told him. “Brian met her on one of his tours in the Mediterranean.” Ian nodded. That explained a lot, especially her daughter’s goddess-like features.

“Adonia died when Lexi was only a few years old, leaving Brian to single-parent before it was socially acceptable. When Lexi hit junior high, Brian thought his daughter would benefit from having a woman around. Enter Patricia Jennings with her own daughter, Kayla. They married, and it was the classic Cinderella story.” Shane grinned. “Guess who the ugly stepsister is?”

Ian bit the inside of his lip, something he only did when deep in thought. “Let me guess. The dad was clueless, right?”

Shane’s expression grew more serious. His brows creased together and his eyes lost a bit more of their teasing twinkle. “Not so much. According to Dad, he realized his mistake right away, but he’d already married Patricia, and he was a devout Catholic. Nothing short of a burning bush was going to make him renege on his vows.”