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I turned to the left, driving carefully down the road until the pub was out of sight. Gearing up, I started back the way we’d come.
* * *
About an hour and a half later,we were back inside the safety of the compound, and I pulled the car to a stop in the turning circle. I got out to find Keir already standing there.
His brows rose in question. “Did Orin lose the Rover?” he asked.
“The Fiach Reaper came looking for us,” I replied. “It was either this or walking back.”
Keir’s eyes roved over the small hatchback. “Where’s Orin?” Movement in the back seat caught his eye. “Ah, there he is.”
Orin extricated himself from the blanket and back seat, then pulled himself from the car. He looked pissed off for having been crammed into the back, but it had been his idea. He walked straight past Keir, barking the question, “Where the fuck is Finnan?”
“Office,” the other man called, then to me, he said, “You want some hot cocoa?”
Of all the things he could’ve said to me, that wasn’t what I was expecting. I glanced at Orin’s retreating figure, then back to Keir. Now that I’d met him a few times, my anxiety about being alone with him had gone from an eight down to a three. “Okay.”
I followed his broad back into the house and through to the kitchen. Because it was open plan—despite the outside looking like a stately home—I could see that the TV had been turned on to a football game. There was also a sweating bottle of beer on the table beside the couch.
Keir got started on the cocoa, pouring milk into a small saucepan and setting it on the stove. The blue flame licked the bottom of the copper pot.
“Do you like your cocoa with whipped cream?”
“Do you have any?”
He moved toward the fridge and opened it. His eyes scanned the contents before he reached in and grabbed something. He turned back to me with a triumphant smile that seemed to soften his face. “I knew we still had some.”
For some reason, I found it funny to think of someone from the clan going shopping and filling their fridge.
“What’s that smile for?” he asked, putting the can of whipped cream down on the counter between us.
“It’s nothing.”
He folded his arms and leaned his hip against the granite counter. “Come on. It’ll be a few more minutes before the milk is heated enough. What’s so funny?”
“I was just thinking about who does all the shopping for this house. I can’t imagine Finnan wandering the aisles of Tesco, picking up fresh fruit and bread.”
That comment earned me a chuckle. “No, it’s definitely not Finnan who shops.”
“Who is it then?”
“One of the sentinels goes usually, but the whipped cream? I bought that last time I was in town.” Keir winked at me, a smile on his face. Then his eyes shifted up over my shoulder, and the smile wilted.
I turned to find Orin there, his energy volatile, as he stared at Keir. “What the fuck are you doing?”
Keir actually stepped back a pace. “Man, chill, I was just making her a hot cocoa.”
He turned those black-as-sin eyes on me, and a thrill went through me. “Fallon.”
It was only my name, but he didn’t have to say anything more. I rose from my stool and walked toward him. His eyes never left me, and as I walked past him, my arm brushed his, sending a shock wave through my body. Orin was at my back, a heat-seeking missile following its target.
Once I was inside his room, he shut the door and leaned against it. Still staring. Still stripping me bare.
“Are you okay?” he asked—nodemanded.
“Fine. We were only talking.”
He growled, his top lip peeling off his teeth. “I don’t want you talking to him.”
