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Sloane watched the golden liquid flow into the glass, and I—in turn—watched her. She looked amazing in this light—a soft glow of yellow. Her cheekbones were sharp, her nose perfectly proportioned. Her eyes were expressive, and her lips were plump and perfect. For a moment, I wondered what they’d taste like.
The waitress finished pouring and left us alone.
I shook my head and gestured to the glass in front of Sloane. “Taste it.”
With a shaking hand, she reached out, wrapping her long fingers around it. Bringing the rim to her mouth, she took a sip, her eyes closing as she savored the flavor.
Fuck, that made my dick hard.
“What do you think?” My voice was nothing but a rasp.
Her lids fluttered open, and she blinked a couple of times. “It’s amazing.”
I nodded and picked up my own glass, taking a sip and never taking my eyes off her.
“How did you join the Mac Tíre clan?”
She’d even got the pronunciation right—mok cheer-a.
Setting the champagne back onto the table, I thought about how much I wanted to tell her. Self-preservation told me not to expose too much, no matter how badly I wanted to spill everything.
“I never finished school. My da died when I was fifteen, and my ma had died of cancer the year before. It was just me and Fallon. I didn’t want her to drop out of school, so I started looking for work. When I was sixteen, I started running errands for Finnan’s father, Kellen. He saw that I was tall and strong, street-savvy too, and he took me under his wing, taught me how the world worked when you were looking at it through mob glasses.”
“I’m sorry about your parents,” Sloane whispered.
I jerked my head up to look at her, not realizing I’d been staring at the empty table in front of me to start with. “It was a long time ago, lass. Nothing to be sorry about.”
“Still, I’m sorry. I know what it’s like to lose a parent.”
I asked a question I shouldn’t have asked, “Your ma?”
She nodded once. “At least I thought she was dead. For the last eighteen years, I’d been told she was. Until…” She frowned as she thought. “How long has it been since I was abducted?”
My shoulders tensed. “Almost twenty-four hours.”
Shaking her head, she continued, “Until about twenty-six hours ago when she showed up in my life, very much alive.”
I thought back to the auction. To the woman who had the same platinum blonde hair and gray eyes. I’d thought she looked familiar at the time, but now that Sloane was talking about it, I realizedwhyshe looked so familiar.
“The woman who was with the man who bought you at the auction, she’s your ma?”
Sloane lifted her chin by way of answering. “She’d come to rescue me from my father’s evil plan to sell me in a flesh auction. She and Dagger had saved me, but thenyoushowed up.”
The waiter reappeared with four plates balanced on his hands and forearms. While he was placing them down on the center of the table, another waiter set some empty plates in front of us.
When everything had been unloaded, the waiter stood up straight and announced, “Tonight, the chef has prepared for you two different tasting plates. One is what’s available now, and the other is a new menu that has yet to be rolled out to diners.”
I watched Sloane’s face as he rattled off the contents of each plate, enjoying the way her eyes widened with each course. By the time the waiter walked away, she glanced over at me and smiled.
“You enjoy dining out,” I told her.
“I do.” Her gaze traveled over the four plates between us. She picked up the squid while I tried a beef dish.
As we ate, I carefully cataloged each of her expressions, quickly learning that when she enjoyed something, her eyes fluttered shut. When something was sour, she wrinkled her nose. When she didn’t like something at all, her mouth flexed into a grimace—but only for a second—before she smoothed her expression out into a pleasant sort of passivity.
After the plates were empty and cleared away, I ordered a selection of desserts we could share.
She picked up her champagne flute and finished what was left in her glass. “That was delicious.”
