Читать книгу About Face - Amy Lee Burgess - Страница 8

Chapter 4

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” A bulky shadow detached from the brickwork near the green door of the pub and resolved itself into the shape of a very tall, extremely muscular man.

The glow of the streetlights illuminated his green eyes and bright red hair. His expression was not exactly welcoming.

The sign above the pub doors read An Puca, and I was pretty sure I was in the right place. Although, after a hellish twelve-hour delay in Philadelphia due to some damn mechanical malfunction in one of the plane’s engines, I wasn’t even sure what frigging day it was anymore.

Instead of arriving in Dublin at just before eight in the morning with time to find a hotel and get my bearings before setting out to find Mac Tire’s pub, the plane landed just after eight PM, and I’d taken a cab straight from the airport to the pub.

My eyes were scratchy and dry, my throat ached and my stomach rumbled. I was sleep and food-deprived and pretty damn close to a meltdown. Whether it would be a temper tantrum or tears I wasn’t exactly sure, but I’d had enough.

Now this goddamn red-haired giant couldn’t even be civil?

“This is a pub, right? Don’t pubs want people to drink in them?” I curled my lip sarcastically which only made the red- haired giant angry. Good one, Stanzie.

“Can you not read the wee sign in the window that says Private party tonight, maybe? Or do they not teach reading in American schools these days?”

“Your big, goddamn hulking shoulders blocked the wee sign in the window,” I muttered rebelliously.

The red-haired giant cracked his knuckles.

“Excuse me?” I tilted my head to the side and regarded him with growing incredulity. He was not going to threaten to beat me up, was he? I wished I’d worn my six-inch spiked heels with the steel-tipped toes, but all I had were a comfortable pair of leather boots. “Look, I don’t know your name but I do know you’re Pack. And so am I. And if the private party tonight is for members of Mac Tire, well, then, here’s a funny thing—I’m a member of Mac Tire. So can I go in now? I’m fucking tired and I want a drink.”

Meltdown verged in the direction of temper tantrum. That was interesting. Most times it was tears.

“Well, I can smell too, can’t I now?” The giant sneered. “But, if you knew the first thing about Mac Tire, which I’m almost positive you don’t, you’d know we have pack jewelry, which, incidentally, I’m not seeing on you. And I’ll betcha my left nut you don’t have the jewelry because you’re not Mac Tire. Because if you were, you’d never take it off. Brilliant, isn’t it?”

Yeah. Brilliant. Of course I didn’t wear the damn ring. It was a lie. Paddy had put it on my finger and told me I was family and it was a fucking lie.

“I’m going to lose my temper,” I announced. The giant might be bigger than me, but I knew I could scream louder.

“I don’t give a fuck.” The giant crossed his beefy arms over his chest and smirked.

I cursed the fact I hadn’t let Jason alert Paddy or Murphy I was coming to Dublin. In my irrational fear of everything, I’d thought maybe they wouldn’t have let me come, but they could hardly object once I was already there.

I’d come armed with the name and address of the pack’s pub. That was all I’d let Jason give me.

Damn the man, why hadn’t he gone behind my back and called anyway? Of all the times to let me have my way, why now? Bastard.

“Look, I have the damn ring. It’s in my luggage. I am Mac Tire, I swear.” It galled to say that because I did not feel remotely as if I belonged to the pack, but I needed to get into the pub. I was tired, hungry, miserable and about to collapse.

“Doubtful.” The giant made no move to move aside and let me in.

“Do you want me to tear apart my suitcase? Jesus, I don’t believe this. I think you get off on hassling people.” I began to unzip my suitcase.

He guffawed, but did not uncross his arms. “What’s your name, woman? But I have to tell you, we don’t have Americans in Mac Tire.”

“Ha,” I crowed. “That’s just a goddamn lie. Because you do have one. Me. My name is Constance Newcastle.”

I don’t know what I expected. Maybe not that he’d break down into abject apologies, sweep open the door and personally escort me in, but at least some glimmer of recognition.

“Doesn’t ring a bell. Why don’t you fuck off? Right now I’m bored, but I’m edging toward irritated and there’s a thing you don’t want to see, I promise you.”

“How about Liam Murphy? You know him?” I spat out his name and hated myself for sinking so goddamn low.

One bushy red eyebrow elevated. Paddy could do that trick too. Was everyone in Mac Tire a direct descendent of Mister Spock or something?

“Him I know.” That figured. Murphy was an ex-Alpha after all.

“Then do you know he’s bonded with an American?” I prompted, my lip still curled.

“I know he showed up here four months ago without her and never talks about it. Rumor has it you two are on the rocks only he won’t face up to it.” The giant gave a huge shrug and his green eyes gleamed with protective ire. “Tell you what. You give me the real story of it and I’ll think about asking if you can go in. Fair’s fair. Liam Murphy’s a favorite in this pack and you’re some flighty American twat nobody knows or gives a damn about.”

Won’t face up to it? What the fuck? He walked out on me. I don’t know what showed on my face, but the red-haired giant’s expression altered and for the first time he looked unsure.

“Look, let me call Paddy and…” he began, but I couldn’t stand the sudden pity in his eyes. I guess he’d figured out I wasn’t the one who walked out. Fuck.

“Oh, screw this.” I wheeled around and stomped off. I ruined my exit though because I forgot my goddamn suitcase and had to scurry back to retrieve it and the backpack full of shoes.

The giant attempted to help me, and I slapped his meaty hands away, my cheeks on fire with mortification.

“Did you come to try to work it out with him then?” He didn’t seem to feel the stinging slaps on his hands, and pulled the strap of the backpack over my shoulder even as I fought against his help.

Where was my goddamn anger now? Mortification rapidly turned into blinding tears. My eyes burned.

“None of your fucking business.” I stomped away.

“Hang on,” he called after me. “Just let me call Paddy and maybe I can…”

“Fuck you,” I screamed over my shoulder and turned my head away before he could see the tears on my cheeks. But I think he saw them anyway. Goddamn streetlights.

* * * *

Two blocks later when I was about to shove my damn heavy suitcase into the middle of the street and watch it get demolished by the terrifying traffic that traveled on the wrong goddamn side of the road, my cell phone rang.

“This blows,” I announced as the backpack of shoes fell off my shoulder and dragged me by the elbow half into the gutter. I gave my suitcase a kick and it tottered a moment before it fell over—straight into a puddle.

Pedestrians gave me a wide berth, and once again I wished I had my steel-toed, spiked heels.

Instead, I dug into my purse, fatalistically convinced I would miss the damn call, and pulled out my phone. I pressed Talk.

“What?” I barked, and there was a strange silence on the other end, as if the person debated whether or not to gently hang up and say to hell with it.

“Where the hell are you?” The person on the other end obviously had no fear of death, but I wondered how he felt about death by disembowelment. Slow disembowelment.

I looked around at the unfamiliar street. A pharmacy. A men’s tailor. A shoe store. I knew I was not in a good mental space when not even the slightest desire to drift closer to the shoe store window passed through my head. In fact, I felt like throwing my backpack through the damn thing. Bad place. Stanzie was in a bad, bad place.

“I have no fucking clue,” I replied because I didn’t. Some street in Dublin. I smelled food—something thick and meaty like stew—and nearly wept, I was so damn hungry.

“Turn your ass around and come back to the pub.”

“Is that a direct order, Alpha?” I snarled. Paddy, who was on the other end of the phone, damn him, made a strangled noise halfway between laughter and a roar of outrage.

“You know what? Just shut up and frigging stand there. I’ll find you. You can’t be far, Colm said you didn’t have a car.”

“You have got to be kidding. A car? Everyone drives on the wrong side of the road, Paddy. I almost had a fucking coronary in the cab from the airport and had to put my head between my knees and close my eyes for most of the ride. The cab driver thought I was freaking insane, and there’s a distinct possibility he may be onto something. A fucking car. Please.”

“Are you gonna go ballistic if I start laughing now?” Paddy definitely struggled against hysterics, I could hear it in his damn voice. Fury, dull and hot, pounded through my veins and made my head hurt.

I heard traffic noises from his end and suspected he was outside. “Where are you?”

“Grouchy,” he commented. “I’m walking down the damn street, Stanzie, where the hell else would I be? I told you I was coming to find you. Do you suppose you could describe your surroundings? Give me a bit more than the cars are driving on the wrong side of the road?”

“Pharmacy, men’s tailor, shoe store,” I recited obediently, although I really wanted to reach through the phone and strangle him.

“Let me guess. You’re standing outside the shoe store and drooling over the Jimmy Flus or whatever the bloody hell they call them.”

“Choos,” I snapped. “Jimmy Choos. You’re fucking with me on purpose, aren’t you?”

“Maybe a little,” he agreed, and I growled.

“Did you just growl at me?”

I did it again and gave my suitcase another kick. It was still on its side in the puddle, and I bet all my damn clothes were now soaked in dirty Dublin rainwater. Fuck. Me.

“Just for my own edification, what might be the name of the pharmacy? Or the men’s tailor? Or the bloody shoe store?” Paddy was the one who sounded grouchy, and a grim smile flickered across my face.

“Boots, John O’Toole’s Menswear and Shamrock Shoes. That’s the dumbest name I ever heard for a shoe store, by the way. What’s next? Emerald Isle Organic Market? Blarney Stone Cosmetics? Jesus. H. Christ.”

“Hey,” groaned my Alpha. “Don’t be making fun of my culture, woman. It’s not nice.” Then he snickered. “Blarney Stone Cosmetics. You horrible bitch.”

I almost laughed myself. It was kind of a good one.

I saw him then as he rounded the corner. Black curls ran riot over his head, black jeans, black t-shirt, black jean jacket, black boots.

“Who are you? The Dark Lord of Dublin?” I eyed him up and down as he approached, and he rolled his eyes at me.

“And you? Who are you? The Bedraggled Bitch of Boston?” His gaze was equally derisive as he took in my jeans, t-shirt, gray hoodie and boots. My hair was a dreadful mess and my makeup long since worn off.

We glared at each other for thirty seconds before we both burst out laughing.

“You do look like shite,” he said when he’d recovered, but he sounded concerned, not derogatory. I shrugged and remembered what a bastard he was. The warm moment between us evaporated, and he sighed before he righted my suitcase. It dripped, and he grimaced. He shook his head but didn’t say anything, although I suspected it half killed him to keep his mouth shut.

“Did you not sleep at all on the plane?” He started back the way he’d come. My suitcase bumped along behind him, and I was forced to follow him if I wanted it back.

“I can’t sleep on planes.”

“Jaysus,” he muttered. “What is with you and your dire distrust of all methods of modern transportation?”

“It’s not just modern. I’m kinda afraid of horses, too,” I admitted, and he snorted.

“Well, doesn’t that figure.”

“Walking and running are the two best ways to get anywhere, Paddy.”

“If you never want to go more than a couple miles or get someplace in less than a month, I suppose.”

“I also like bikes. The ones with pedals.”

“Aren’t you awful scared you might hit a pothole and fly over the handlebars and break your arm, maybe?”

“If I’m that damn stupid not to avoid the pothole, I deserve to break my arm. Haven’t you figured out yet I distrust putting my life in the hands of someone else? Someone who may fall asleep at the wheel or screw with his cellphone just as the light changes?”

“Control—you just don’t like to give it up. Have you always been this way, or is this a recent character flaw?” He threw me a suspicious look over his shoulder.

“Define recent? You try growing up with a father who takes every last decision out of your hands and makes you feel like you’re too stupid to figure shit out for yourself, and top it off with killing your bond mates in a car crash—and you tell me why I don’t like losing control. Control makes me safe, Paddy O’Reilly, and I don’t think it’s too much to ask to feel safe, do you?”

“No.” His tone was subdued, and I became aware I’d screamed at him and, also, surprise, surprise, I was in tears.

More pedestrians scattered out of my way, some of them even went so far as to turn away so they didn’t have to meet my gaze and perhaps become infected with my special brand of crazy.

“Look, I’m tired and starving to death and all I wanted to do was come into the pub. Only I wasn’t wearing my damn pack ring, so that giant bastard wouldn’t let me in. Why should I wear my ring? You don’t give a shit about me. Apparently the whole frigging pack thinks I left Murphy and not the other way around.” I swiped at my eyes with my sleeve and cursed myself.

“A little advance warning would have been nice, Stanz.” Paddy slowed his pace so he fell in next to me and tried to put his free arm around my shoulders, but I shrugged him away.

“You want to watch me kick Colm’s ass? I didn’t have time to do it on my way out the pub door, but I’d definitely planned on it.”

“Violence doesn’t solve anything. I just think it’s stupid you have to be Mac Tire and wear a goddamn ring to get into a fucking pub. Why isn’t being Pack good enough?” I felt my blood pressure skyrocket, and Paddy groaned.

“Because the pub’s private, woman, but…”

“What the hell kind of bullshit elitist crap is this? A pub just for your own pack members and to hell with the Pack at large? Padraic O’Reilly, you sonofabitch, what kind of pack is Mac Tire anyway? Fucking private pub? Unbelievable.”

“Will you shut it, goddamn it?” Paddy cast a nervous glance around, but there were no pedestrians in the vicinity. Not anymore. Anyway, I hadn’t screamed. I had used a very vicious whisper.

“Why? What in the name of hell for?” Incensed, I grabbed his arm and forced him to stop his forward motion.

“Mac Tire’s a big enough pack as it is, Stanzie, and—” He broke off and pushed his hand through his unruly curls. His fingers stuck and with a grimace he yanked them free. “I’ll not be standing on the street discussing pack politics with you, damn it. The pub’s private and there’s a reason for it and to hell with you if you don’t like it. You don’t have to like it, do you? You aren’t—”

“Going to be a member much longer? Yeah, well, screw you, too. Bastard,” I hissed and would have taken a swing at him, but he stepped prudently out of reach.

“If you’d let me finish my sent—” he began, until I hissed, “Bastard” again under my breath, and he shut his mouth.

We stared at each other for a good forty seconds.

“I was gonna say Alpha, you annoying twat. You aren’t Alpha. Next time let me finish my frigging sentence!”

“Sure. I wouldn’t want to stop you from swearing at me and calling me derogatory names in these unfinished sentences, Paddy.”

“Oh, and bastard is a compliment then?” We glared at each other again until the silence was broken by my goddamn growling stomach.

“Tell me you ate something on the plane, Stanzie.”

“So now you want me to start lying to you? I’m sorry I’m not as good at it as you are, but maybe with practice I could get better.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and I swore I saw his lips move as he counted to ten. “Da always told me never to argue with a starving woman. So I’m not saying anything at all to you until you eat something.”

“Fine with me! Who the hell wants to listen to your bullshit, anyway?” I shoved my backpack back on my shoulder so I could follow him the few paces left to the door of the pub.

The red-haired giant had obviously eavesdropped if his expression of complete astonishment was any indication.

“Were you the freak of nature who called Paddy and told him I was here?” I snarled into his chest on my way past. I didn’t feel like tilting my head back enough to look him in the face.

“Ye—es?” He didn’t sound very confident and I rolled my eyes.

“Thanks for nothing, asswipe.”

“For fuck’s sake, will somebody shove some food down this woman’s gullet before we’re all doomed?” Paddy yelled, and the entire pub went eerily silent.

“We have shepherd’s pie or fish and chips tonight.” A redheaded woman with eyes the color of green sea glass stood behind the bar. She looked between me and Paddy with a curious expression and the barest hint of a grin.

“Bring both up to my office,” Paddy ordered. “And Guinness as well. And be goddamn quick. And don’t even think about turning that sly smirk into laughter, Alannah, or I’ll have Fee pull all that red hair out of your skull for you.”

The woman turned away and covered her mouth, but we all heard her stifled snickers anyway.

“Goddamn it,” swore Paddy and stomped up a flight of old wooden stairs just inside the door. A red velvet rope stretched across the bottom, but he had long legs and simply stepped over it.

I was not as tall and had to hang onto the banister to keep my balance, but I managed not to trip over my feet.

At the top of the staircase was a door marked Private. To the left was a small, very antiquated bathroom. Paddy shoved open the office door and stomped toward an old rolltop desk piled with papers and a desk calculator. He threw himself into a leather chair on wheels that squealed in protest and nearly bashed into the brick wall behind it.

A battered sofa, two armchairs with the stuffing coming out, an ancient coffee table and a set of built in bookshelves crammed haphazardly with books and magazines made up the rest of the furniture.

A grimy window covered with curtains in a faded red chintz pattern overlooked a dark alley.

“Very film noir.” I brushed off the seat of one of the armchairs before dubiously taking a seat. “Are you a private eye or a publican? All you need is a fedora and a fifth of rye stashed in your desk drawer, and you could be straight out of a Mickey Spillane novel.”

“Shut it,” Paddy advised and put his head in his hands for a moment.

“Dramatic bastard.” I looked around the room and grimaced at the grime on the window.

“I take it by your comment outside that you’re here to sever the ties with Liam?” Paddy moved his squeaky chair so the desk didn’t block me from his sight.

“Actually, the opposite. I came to work things out. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, right?”

“Huh?” He gaped at me, and I rolled my eyes.

“That was a Jaws reference, you dumbass.”

He continued to stare.

“American movie from the seventies? About a huge shark that ate half the damn town and then got blown up with an air tank and a lucky-as-hell rifle shot?”

“What the hell are you blathering on about now? You’re delirious—you do know that, right? You need to eat something and maybe then we can have a genuine conversation. Jaysus.” Paddy rolled the chair back behind his desk and began to sort through the phenomenal mess spread across it.

“This office is a joke. You can’t seriously run a business out of here. How can you possibly keep track of anything with it thrown all over the desk like that?”

“I have a system.” Paddy gave me a defensive glare and I shook my head.

“And I have nine lives like a cat. My ass, you have a system,” I sneered and something pounded the desktop. Possibly his fist.

“This is not the Stanzie Newcastle I remember,” he muttered. “Step one foot on Irish soil, and it’s like a fucking banshee possessed you.”

I settled back in the armchair.

“So where is he? Murphy?” My voice was casual, but I didn’t fool either of us. I thought of Faith’s dream again and wanted to beg the man to tell me Murphy wasn’t in over his head, but I had to play it just a little cooler than that. If I could. Subtlety was not one of my better talents.

“No,” he decided. “We are not having this conversation until after you eat and after I drink copious amounts of beer. Not gonna happen.”

“I know he’s giving everyone in the pack the impression I walked out on him. Or maybe that was you,” I accused and Paddy’s mouth fell open.

“Me?” he bellowed. “I’m not in the habit of blabbing pack members’ private business all over the place.”

“Fine. It was him, then.” I tried to keep the hurt out of my voice but I knew I failed. “That red-haired giant hurt my feelings,” I yelled. “I wasn’t in half so bad a mood before he treated me like shit and talked about the pub being fucking private.”

“I told you I’m gonna kick his ass. Why do you have to take it out on me?” Paddy shouted.

“I’m also mad as hell at you! Worse than I am at the giant!”

“His name is Colm, damn it,” snapped Paddy. “And why the hell should you be mad at me?”

My blood pressure zoomed again at his treachery.

“You said I was family. After my father disowned me at the tribunal, you took me aside and told me I didn’t need him because I had a family. You. Mac Tire. You fucking lied to my face, Paddy, and what’s worse, I believed you. I believed in you. And then you just walked away. You couldn’t even look me straight in the eye the day you and Murphy left. And in four months not a phone call or an email to see if I was okay. Nothing. Not one goddamn thing.”

“Fuck.” Guilt spread across Paddy’s face, but I was unmoved. Then the guilt turned to anger, and he yelled, “And why the fuck has it taken you four months to get your ass over here anyway? I didn’t think it would take you even four days, but no, you’ve got to be a bitch about it!”

“Me? A bitch? What?” I spluttered, unable to form a coherent sentence due to the rage strangling me.

“You heard me. You sat there and didn’t say one word when he said he was leaving, and how the hell do you think that made him feel? Like complete shite, that’s how it made him feel. And here I am, having to pick up the pieces for you, and now you have the gall to be mad at me, woman? I’m the one who should be mad, and I am. I am good and frigging mad, so don’t you glare at me like that. You tell me what the hell took you so long to get here.”

“He left me,” I screamed. Rage burned up and down my spine and all through my blood until I thought I might spontaneously combust. “How many times do I have to keep telling people that? Why is everyone blaming me? He walked out on me, and I’m supposed to come crawling after him to beg him to take me back? Fuck you! Oh, you arrogant bastard, I cannot even believe you!”

“Where in the hell did you hear me say the word crawl? Stanzie Newcastle, will you calm your ass down and shut the fuck up for one minute? I can’t even hear myself think.” Paddy tore at his hair with his hands, and his cheeks were so red I thought he was close to combustion too.

Affronted, I turned away from him and stared at the damn brick wall. He wanted me to shut the fuck up, did he? Fine. I would not say a word.

The office door banged open, and the redhead from behind the bar walked in with a tray of food and Guinness. My stomach rumbled, and she flashed me a smile I didn’t trust an inch. Too many teeth.

“I’m Alannah Doyle,” she introduced herself as she set the tray down on Paddy’s desk. “My bond mate’s Declan Byrne.”

“Constance Newcastle.” I took a deep breath. “At the moment, anyway, my bond mate is Liam Murphy.” I wanted to throw up or crawl beneath the sofa, but I managed to look her in the face, braced for pity or ridicule.

“What took you so long to get here?” she demanded, hands on hips.

“Thank you,” Paddy yelled rudely.

“Does this shit happen all the time in Mac Tire? People walk out on other people, and other people chase after them, even though they were the ones that were walked out on?” My tone was snotty, but, honestly, what the fuck?

“For three years every eligible female in this pack and some not so eligible chased after Liam, and he spurned us all. So forgive me, woman, for being a bit pissed the female he finally does choose deserts his ass at the first sign of trouble. It’s been a terrible thing to watch him these past few months. At least after Sorcha died we didn’t have to see him because he ran away to Belfast, of all fucking stupid places, and we weren’t constantly exposed to his sad, pitiful face day after day. Has the man smiled even once in four months, Paddy?” Alannah turned to him, and he looked up guiltily from his Guinness and swallowed the wrong way.

“Stop drinking that and participate in this discussion. It’s important.” Alannah stomped a small foot on the wooden floor, but by the way Paddy cringed I would have expected her to be an Amazon or at least brandishing a weapon.

More and more it seemed my interpretation of Faith’s dream was dead-on. Paddy needed my help with Murphy. Only, was I the one who could give it? That man never took anybody’s help—why the hell would he take mine?

“How many goddamn times do I have to say that I am the one who was deserted, not the other fucking way around?” I wanted to get up and kick her pretty face in but somehow controlled myself.

The look of scorn she directed at me could have stripped paint.

“What are you doing here, then?”

I didn’t say anything, and she blew out her breath in impatience. “You silly cow. Why can’t you admit you want him back? Bloody stupid, prideful Americans. You get on my nerves.”

“Did you—you did not just call me a cow.” My face heated. I turned in Paddy’s direction. “Did that bitch just call me a cow?”

“Jaysus, I want to eat dinner in peace. Woman, get your ass back to the bar. You’re the one who wanted the job, didn’t you? Begged me for it, in fact. And now you’ve got the job, what do you do? Stand around in my office, badgering poor Stanzie. If she doesn’t want to answer you, she doesn’t have to. Why should she tell us her strategy anyway? You’re gonna spoil all the fun we’ll have watching her.”

“I did not beg you for this job.” Alannah tossed her red hair as she moved for the door. “Declan fucked Fee for it, you bastard.”

I waited until the door was shut before I said anything. Spoil the fun, would she?

“You made her bond mate fuck yours so she could have a job behind the bar? Oh my God.” He ducked when I threw my boot at his head.

“Stanzie. It was a joke! The stupid kind between brother and sister? Alannah’s my half sister, for Christ’s sake. Her ma was bonded to my ma and da.”

“She introduces herself as Declan Byrne’s bond mate but conveniently leaves out the part where she’s your sister? Unbelievable. And rude. And you didn’t say anything either, you bastard.” He ducked again when I threw my second boot.

The lure of the food on the desk was too much to resist. On sock feet, I padded over.

He kept his hands prudently out of the way as I made my choice between the shepherd’s pie and the fish and chips. I retreated back to the armchair with the shepherd’s pie and a foamy glass of Guinness.

Before I dug in, I gave him a dark look, and he groaned.

“Okay, so we’re frigging rude barbarians here in Mac Tire. From now on I’ll make sure to give you everyone’s family ties before I even tell you their names when I’m introducing you. I will never understand women. Particularly American women. I don’t even know why the hell I try to reason with any of them. Ever.” He muttered the last bit to himself and abruptly grabbed a fistful of chips from the plate and stuffed them in his mouth.

“All right then,” I allowed after I savored a forkful of the delicious shepherd’s pie. It was spicy and warm, and hit my empty stomach like a welcome friend.

“Glad to have the royal pardon, your Majesty,” he mocked, and I flipped him off because my mouth was too full to yell at him.

I decided to concentrate on my food and not Paddy because he’d just ruin my appetite, the sonofabitch, and I was starving. I applied myself to my plate, and by the sounds he made, he practically made love to his fish and chips.

Replete, I leaned back in the armchair. My plate was incredibly empty, and so was my glass. Paddy remedied the latter by refilling it from the pitcher on his desk.

He studied me for a moment as he stood before me. “You’ve got some color back in your face. Non-choleric-rage-related color, that is.” He reached down to brush some hair from my face, and I flinched. His mouth tightened.

“I know you think I’m some sort of complete, unfeeling bastard, Stanzie, but—”

“I don’t think—I know,” I interrupted.

He sighed and stomped back behind his desk. Faith’s dream had to be bullshit. There was no way I would forgive this man for abandoning me after he told me I was family.

“So where is he?” At my question Paddy nearly dropped the pitcher of Guinness and set it down carefully. “Paddy?”

“Belfast,” Paddy told me, although by the look on his face he’d rather have eaten glass than answer me. “He got an offer for his cottage, and he went to the closing. He’ll be back soon. I think.” His tone was doubtful.

I thought about the cottage in Belfast. I’d never seen it, but Murphy and I had had plans to go there together for weekend getaways after we made our home here in Dublin. We were going to keep my condo in Boston and his cottage in Belfast, and now he’d sold the cottage. It shouldn’t have hurt because the man walked out on me four months ago, but it still did. Now I’d never see it. Of course, it could be cover for his investigation into the whereabouts of Mick Shaughnessy, but I could not blurt that question in case Paddy didn’t know about the conspiracy.

Besides, Murphy wouldn’t have to put the cottage up for sale to support his investigation of Grandfather Mick. If anything, he’d want to keep it as a base away from home as he traveled around the UK. My stomach soured, and I wished I hadn’t wolfed my food so fast.

“Well, I guess he’s not planning to leave the pack and grow vegetables this time around,” I remarked, chin jutted.

After Sorcha died he’d left Mac Tire, bought the cottage, and escaped. After he left me, he’d sold the cottage and apparently planned to say in the pack. Which meant…

“Who is she? He’s got someone new, hasn’t he?” My heart beat painfully in my chest, and I wanted to rip it out and stomp on it to make it stop.

“Don’t be daft,” Paddy advised. “Sure and he’ll have to bond with somebody if you don’t figure out a way to get back with him, but you heard Alannah, didn’t you? He’s been scowling and moody the whole bloody time he’s been here. Snapping at people or more likely ignoring the crap out of them. If he’s got somebody new, she’s a masochist for sure.” Then a grin spread across his attractive face. “You’re jealous.”

“You’re fucked in the head,” I snapped, and he laughed, the bastard.

“You do want him back,” he crowed.

I scowled at him. “Well, duh, that’s why I’m here. But you don’t have to get all smirky about it. So I admit it. I want him back. But since I wasn’t the one who walked out, I don’t see how what I want means shit.”

“Then why are you here?”

Because of you, mostly, I thought to myself but didn’t say since Paddy didn’t know that part. Ask him, Stanzie. Ask him if Murphy’s in bad trouble. But I wasn’t sure it was the right time. I wasn’t even sure that’s what the dream meant. I wasn’t sure of any goddamn thing.

“I’m tired. Do you know any good hotels? Since Murphy’s not here, there’s no sense in me sticking around here tonight.” I yawned and stretched my arms over my head.

An affronted expression made Paddy look like a mule.

“A hotel now? You’ll be traveling all this way, and you being Mac Tire and asking me if I know any good hotels? You rude little bitch.”

“What?” I glared. “What did I do now?”

“Mac Tire don’t stay in hotels in Dublin, woman,” Paddy roared, and if they didn’t hear him downstairs in the pub, it was only because everyone had gone deaf.

“Where would you suggest I stay?” I made my voice as sweet as I could, but he still grimaced as if I sounded like nails down a chalkboard.

“Not a hotel,” he barked. He fished in his pocket and came up with a set of keys. He extracted one from the main keychain. It had its own keychain, one with a small Eiffel Tower dangling from it. My heart gave a lurch in my chest.

“Here,” he tossed it to me, and I caught it automatically. My mind flashed back to a windy afternoon in Paris when Murphy and I had sat together on a bench on the first level of the Eiffel Tower and drank coffee while we read case files Jason had given us.

I’d bought the keychain in the gift shop, and somehow he’d ended up with it. I’d forgotten all about it until I saw it in Paddy’s hand.

“I’ll give you a lift to Liam’s place. You’ll stay there.”

“What if he comes home?” I said, panicked.

“Oh, the horror,” Paddy screamed in a girlish voice. “The man you want to get back with comes home and finds you sleeping in his bed. Whatever would you do?”

“Shut up,” I snapped. “You’re such a bastard, Paddy.”

“If you continue to hurt my feelings, I’ll make Alannah give you that lift,” he threatened, and I gritted my teeth.

Paddy watched me drink my Guinness. His eyes fascinated me. I’d never seen anyone with different-colored eyes before him. I wondered if his wolf’s eyes were two different colors and tried to remember if I’d noticed the afternoon I’d had to shift for the tribunal. My mind had been focused on other things—like how my wolf had refused at first to come out, so it was no wonder I didn’t have a clue.

“I meant what I said, you know.” He had that wistful, remorseful look on his face again—the one I didn’t trust because he was a lying, manipulative bastard. “About you being family. About how you belong to me.” The possessiveness in his voice was not overtly sexual, although there were undertones since he was an Alpha male and I was a fertile female. Instead he evoked feelings of protectiveness—feelings I fought because they weren’t true.

Was this the prelude to the scene from Faith’s dream? Would he open his mouth and say, Now do you believe in me again?

I hoped not because I sure as hell didn’t feel like saying I belonged to him. Maybe I ought to put the dream aside and concentrate on dialog that actually took place versus the stuff of Faith’s unconscious imagination.

But if Murphy was in trouble, Paddy would know it. And he’d tell me, I hoped. So maybe the dream had nothing to do with Murphy and everything to do with me and Paddy. Somehow I was supposed to learn to trust him again? Was that it?

“You want me back with Murphy, don’t you?”

“Right,” he agreed.

“Then I’m only family if I’m with Murphy, is that it?” I guessed bitterly. “I only count if I’m Liam Murphy’s bond mate.”

He shifted uneasily on his squeaky chair. “I told you before, you’ve got to prove yourself to this pack. You don’t just waltz in and take your place near the top of the ranks without a struggle.”

“Who says I want to be near the top?” I whispered.

He scowled at me. “For fuck’s sake, Stanzie, you’re an Advisor to a member of the Great Council. And, yes, you are Liam Murphy’s bond mate, at least for a little while longer—hopefully more if you get your head out of your ass and kick his. Fee and I have been Alphas for three years. We’ve got another two to go, and then this pack will choose a new Alpha pair. And there’s every chance in the world it will be you and Liam if you play your cards right.

“So people like Alannah Doyle and Declan Byrne, your main competition, are not going to quietly let you sneak ahead of them in the ranks. No matter what I want or what Fee wants, our votes only count so far. The pack has a say, too.”

“The main contender for the next Alpha female is a barmaid?” I spoke without thinking and Paddy groaned and threw up his hands dramatically.

“A barmaid who’s my sister, remember, you horrible bitch? What the hell do you want her to be? A nuclear physicist? Stanzie, for Christ’s sake, since when do we judge who should be Alpha by their damn day jobs?”

“I figure this is a huge pack and it doesn’t just revolve around the fertile duos and triads, so there has to be more criteria than that. Why not day jobs? Sorcha was a scientist, wasn’t she?” I wanted to throw my Guinness at his face, but it was too good to waste.

“A lab technician with delusions of grandeur.” Paddy’s voice was flat.

I wanted to argue. She’d been murdered by the conspiracy, so obviously she’d been more than a simple lab tech. She had to have been.

“She was working late to impress her bosses. She was taking classes and wanted to move up, and maybe she would have, but all that would have been put on hold so she could have her baby. She shouldn’t have even been working still, the stubborn bitch, but nobody could ever tell her what to do. Liam begged her to stop working and act like a real Alpha female, but she laughed in his face. He’s the one who carried that duo when they were Alpha, and everyone in Mac Tire knows it. So they’re going to be doubly hard on you. For all they know, you’re the next Sorcha. Maybe you won’t even stop being an Advisor when you’re pregnant.”

Paddy talked like it was a done deal.

“And when they find out about my wolf, game over, wouldn’t you say?” I looked him in the eye, determined to brazen it out. Did he know my wolf was normal now? Or supposedly so. I inwardly winced when I remembered I’d just taken off for Dublin and hadn’t told Scott I wasn’t going to hunt with him after all. That was rude. I made a mental note to call to apologize, but meanwhile I stared Paddy down.

“Do you not think your Alpha has kept track of you?” Paddy’s eyes burned with triumph, and I knew my bluff had failed. Damn that Jason Allerton.

“Well, since my Alpha never called me once in four months, how the hell was I supposed to know? Who told you? Allerton?”

“I have my sources.” His smile was enigmatic, and I really wanted to slap him hard.

“So Murphy. He told you.” I felt my face turn sullen, and Paddy rolled his eyes.

“He and Allerton do communicate, being that Liam’s his Advisor and all.”

“What’s that got to do with me?” I bunched my hands into fists and looked around for something to pummel. Murphy knew about my wolf. Why did he get to know everything about me even when he’d walked out on me?

Until that moment I hadn’t realized how much I’d wanted to be the one to tell him about my wolf. He’d helped me so much with her. If anyone in the world had ever initiated my wolf, it was him with the help of his wolf.

What had he thought when he’d found out? Had he been pleased? Indifferent? Maybe he’d changed the subject because it didn’t matter to him anymore.

“So you know about the pack bond, too, then,” I said, my voice hard.

“Only the bare bones of it. Just that that bastard father of yours was exiled, mostly because of you figuring it all out. But not the specifics of how you did it or what you felt like going through it.” Paddy’s voice was soft and encouraging. As if I’d tell him anything.

“Well, it’s no wonder you seem to want me back with him. Now that I’m normal and a real contender for Alpha. You’re such a treacherous bastard, Paddy, you know that?”

“Goddamn it,” he swore helplessly. “I never thought your wolf would hold you back even before the bloody pack bond thing. Liam was working with you, and that was good enough for me. I saw what your wolf did for the bloody Council wolves. It wasn’t an issue with me.”

“Maybe not you,” I said through gritted teeth. “She’s normal now, and I’m still apologizing for her. Still making excuses for her.”

“Yeah, and I don’t understand that at all. Nobody in Mac Tire knew about your wolf anyway.”

“Why not?” I thrust my chin out angrily. “You kept it a dirty secret, didn’t you? Afraid it would ruin my precious chances at Alpha? What if I don’t want to be Alpha? Normal wolf or not?”

“You don’t want a baby?” Paddy asked. “Because I don’t believe you. I saw the way you looked at your friend’s baby daughter, and I heard what you said about the subject. I was there, remember?”

“I’m tired, and I want to go to bed.” I knew I was being a coward, but fuck it. I couldn’t even think straight, and maybe I was getting belligerent for no reason. But I was not going to fall for his Irish charm and his bullshit lies. I wasn’t.