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Walking through the front door, I throw my keys onto the hall table in the foyer, which is decorated with a bunch of shit plus whatever crap we all throw on if we use the front door. There is another one by the garage door as well.
Static from a walkie talkie catches my attention.
“The eagle has landed,” Darragh says.
Before I can blink, two little girls jump out and spray me with Nerf bullets. Then Cian pops out from fucking nowhere with a Nerf gun that looks like a damn military weapon and his bullets hit me in the junk.
“What the fuck,” I boom, and Harper laughs, running down the hall and throwing a Nerf gun at me.
“Bullets are in tubs around the house. It’s every man for themselves.”
Darragh leans over the railing of the stairs and starts shooting at the girls, causing Sadie to scream.
“Hide, he’s coming!”
They all run in different directions, and I follow where Harper ran toward Ronan’s office. I watch her crack his door open and fire a single bullet. She then laughs as I fire some at her ass as she runs through the door. When I walk in, she is pointing the gun at Ronan, and he is smiling at her.
“You wouldn’t,” he says, and his cheesy grin tells me he loves her too.
His arm vanishes beneath his desk and I fire my gun at him. My bullet bounces off his arm, then he laughs as he pulls out his own Nerf gun and fires bullets at me in return. I step outside of the office to take cover and hear Harper scream before she comes barreling out, with Ronan hot on her heels. I take chase as well. She is fast, sneakily ducking into the kitchen, and I follow her inside. Though she is nowhere to be seen now, I smirk when I look at the pantry.
As I open the door, she holds her hands in the air, and so I step quietly inside and close the door behind me. Tucking the Nerf gun into the waistband of my jeans, I pull her into my body.
“I missed you today,” I say, gazing down at her. Harper is tall and slender. She is a damn supermodel and way out of my league, but I’m grateful to her every day.
“I missed you too,” she replies, tangling her fingers in my shirt.
“Love, I need to tell you something,” I say, the guilt sitting low in my gut. I have never felt guilty about keeping a secret from a woman before.
“What’s going on? The look on your face is scaring me.”
I smile at her, reaching my hand out to cup her face, and I run my thumb over her cheek. “I was with Sam today.”
She doesn’t reply straight away. Instead, she narrows her eyes—not suspiciously, but more in confusion. “I thought . . . you know, they . . .”
“Killed her? No. Ronan gave me the choice, but Cian and Darragh think she’s dead. If they know she is alive . . .”
I can’t finish the sentence. In the heat of the moment—after shrugging Harper off at the Inventory—I’d told them to kill her. I was angry and Ronan knew that. He also knows me well enough that if they had done it based on my words that day, it would have eaten at my conscience.
Harper nods in understanding. “Okay. So why were you with her today?”
“I got her a new identity from your stepbrother.”
Her mouth falls open. “You went to see Ransom? He doesn’t do anything for nothing.”
I laugh at her response even though I don’t mean to, but she thinks he could do what, exactly? Hurt me? “I’m Sullivan O’Brien. Those punks will do what they are told, but for the record, I paid them well. As for Sam, she is gone and won’t ever be back.”
“Okay,” she says, and I frown at her.
“Just, okay? I tell you I was with another woman—my ex—all day, and all you say is okay?”
She laughs at me. “Yes, Sullivan, okay. I trust you, and I know you could be in a room with a hundred women, and you would do nothing. Cian, however, I might have to learn to use a weapon; the man flirts as soon as he opens his mouth. Though, don’t get me wrong, I might get jealous and stake my claim when I see you with another woman—I’m still human.”
“I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”
“You are the best man I know. Just don’t tell the others I said that. I think I might love you, Sullivan.”
“I don’t have to think about it—I know I love you. You are the strongest, bravest, smartest, most beautiful woman I have met in my life and you’re mine . . . or mostly mine. I would sacrifice everyone—man, woman, and child—for you. You’re it for me, and my life now means nothing without you in it.”
