CHAPTER 9: ONE YEAR II
766 Words
Cillian
I pulled out the chair beside me.
The wood scraped across the floor.
She looked at it. Then at me.
"Come here," I said.
Her mouth tightened.
"Why?"
I glanced at my father's hand near the contract.
She followed the look.
For a moment, she stayed where she was.
Then she gathered the pages and moved to the chair beside mine.
Her shoulder brushed my arm when she sat. She pulled away so quickly the chair legs scraped.
The brief contact of her body against mine sent a pulse of heat straight to my c**k. I wanted to grab her wrist, pull her into my lap, and make her feel exactly how hard she made me while my father watched.
Declan noticed.
"What happens if I don't sign?" she asked.
My father folded his hands.
"Your brother continues to be useful."
The pen slipped from her fingers and rolled across the page.
She caught it before it reached the floor.
"No." Her voice was thin. She cleared her throat. "You leave Mateo out of this."
"Then sign."
She looked at me.
Not a challenge this time.
A question.
I had used Mateo first. There was nothing I could say that would make that clean.
"If I sign," she said, still looking at me, "he goes home? No one follows him?"
"My men leave him alone," I said.
"Your men. What about his?"
She nodded toward Declan.
Nobody answered.
Valentina stared down at the contract. Her breathing had gone shallow.
Then she began crossing out lines.
Declan's chair creaked.
"What are you doing?"
"Changing it."
"That isn't how this works."
Her hand paused. For a second, I thought she would stop.
Instead she wrote beneath the signature block.
Mateo Romano was not to be contacted, followed, threatened, harmed, recruited, indebted, or used by anyone connected to the family for the term of the agreement and five years afterward.
She added allies, contractors, employees, and medical facilities. The writing grew less neat toward the end.
"Five years," Declan said.
She pressed the pen harder. "Yes."
She kept writing.
I took the pen and initialed the addition.
Her eyes followed my hand.
Declan's voice dropped.
"You do not sign for this family."
"The men in Boston answer to me."
"For now."
I held the pen out to him.
"Then sign it before that changes."
The room went still.
My father's anger did not look like anger. He became quieter. That was when men usually started apologizing.
Valentina stared at the tabletop. One of her knees had begun to move beneath it, a small rapid shake she was trying to hide.
Declan initialed the clause.
She crossed out Kavanaugh's authorization next.
Her hand hesitated over the line.
"I won't go anywhere with a man I haven't met," she said. "Not alone."
Declan looked at me.
Then he initialed the deletion too.
Only then did she sign.
Valentina Romano.
One year beneath our roof.
She pushed the papers away as if they were dirty.
Declan closed the folder.
"You will be expected to cooperate."
Valentina stood too quickly and caught the edge of the table when her ankle shifted.
I moved before I decided to.
My hand closed around her elbow.
She flinched.
I let go.
But I wanted to keep my hand there. I wanted to slide it up her arm, under the sleeve of that grey sweater, and feel the heat of her skin while I told her the truth: she was already mine. Contract or no contract. One year or forever. I was going to f**k her until she forgot there had ever been a choice.
"I'm fine," she said.
She was not speaking to me. She was speaking to herself.
My father kept one hand on the contract.
"For the next year, you live under this family's authority. Do not mistake the alterations for freedom."
Valentina looked at me again.
I should have answered whatever she was asking.
Instead, I watched her leave.
Ronan waited until the door shut.
"You made that harder."
"For whom?"
"Everyone."
He picked up the folder and tapped the crossed-out transfer clause.
"Declan saw you move her. Finn saw it. She saw it."
I said nothing.
Ronan's voice lowered.
"Kavanaugh will see it too."
He left the folder in front of me.
I looked at her signature until the ink stopped shining.
One year.
One year to make her want the man who had taken her. One year to ruin her for anyone else. One year to hear her beg for my c**k the way I had already promised she would.
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