I glance down at her hand, which still has a tiny amount of blood on it from the ceremony. Something I would have once considered strange and barbaric is now oddly sweet to me. Watching them pledge their love and devotion to each other in front of all of their friends like that. The words weren’t enough. It had to be said in blood too. Not only is that the way of the syndicate, but that’s how strongly they feel about each other.
Her devotion shines in her eyes every time she looks at Lachlan across the room. I’m happy for her, but a part of me is sad too. The last thing I should want or need is a relationship. Or the kind of wild, stupid love that makes people go temporarily insane. I never thought someone as jaded as me could be touched by a love like that. For the few brief times I was in Ronan’s arms, I felt the way Mack looks right now. Dreamy and completely untouchable to all of the bad around me. The only thing she can see is him now.
At first, I wanted to warn her away from him. But now I know that I was wrong. Lachlan loves her too. Fiercely. And I feel truly sorry for anyone who ever tries to come between the two of them. I doubt there are any lengths they won’t go to for each other.
“You better go to him,” I tell Mack. “He’ll just come to you if you don’t.”
“That’s the way it should be,” she tells me with a grin. “Make them work for it every once in a while.”
I laugh, and then my eyes move on autopilot across the room towards Ronan. The smile on my face dissolves, and the only thing that remains is the act.
“You should go dance with Ronan,” Mack suggests.
It’s all I can do to shake my head because I doubt Mack has any idea of the events that have transpired recently. “Nah. He’s not the dancing type.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” she agrees. “He’s more of the sit in the corner and brood type. Maybe you could go brood with him then?”
Lachlan sneaks up behind her as we’re talking and it isn’t long before he’s dragging her away. I’m grateful for the reprieve from that conversation. I have no intentions of speaking to Ronan tonight.
When I turn around again, I’m surprised to find one of the Russians has descended on me though. He’s a member of the alliance with the Irish, and a frequent client in the VIP area. I’ve seen him in the pit when I danced before and even delivered him drinks a few times.
His name is Niko, and although he’s handsome in a rough way, he doesn’t hold a candle to Ronan. Then again, nobody does.
“One must never drink alone.” He greets me by wiggling a vodka bottle in my direction.
“Wasn’t one glass enough?” I tease.
He shrugs and winks. “When the drinks are on the Irish, you take your fill before the bar goes dry.”
I laugh and Niko pulls two shot glasses out of his pocket. Before I have another chance to decline, he fills them both up to the rim.
I take my glass and hold it up to his while he utters a Russian toast. Then we both toss back our shots and the burn feels good in my stomach.
“What does it mean?” I ask. “The toast?”
Niko flashes me a boyish grin. “May you get drunk enough this evening to think me handsome.”
I’m smiling at him and shaking my head when a firm grip wraps around my arm. I look up to see Ronan, his eyes smoldering with barely contained fury.
His gaze flicks from me to Niko and back, filled with accusation. He yanks me into his side and leans down to whisper in my ear, never taking his eyes off Niko.
“Would ye like the lad to watch me give you a going over?” he asks.
“What the hell is your problem?” I fire back at him.
His response is to forcefully drag me away from Niko and pull me into an empty corner of the club, away from everyone else.
“Party’s over,” he says. “You’ll be going home now.”
“Like hell I will,” I argue. “You don’t get to decide that. Or who I talk to either.”
“You were smiling at him,” he accuses.
“So frigging what?” I retort. “We were just talking. At least someone around here knows how to use his vocabulary.”
We stare at each other in silence, both of us fuming now. He’s acting like a toddler. And after what he told Lachlan, he has no right.
I try to brush past him, but he just follows me. Niko has disappeared into the crowd which is probably for the best. So I take a seat at an empty table and Ronan pulls up a chair beside me.
We both stew in our own silences for a long time. I’m staring at the crowd, and he’s looking at me. I can feel it, but I won’t meet his eyes. Because my anger won’t hold up under that gaze. And I need my anger right now.
But then he does something that I can’t ignore.
His leg brushes mine, and it isn’t an accident. It might seem like such an innocent gesture, but with Ronan, it definitely isn’t. He doesn’t flirt. Or do anything in half-measures. He comes to me for one reason and one reason alone. To take what he wants.