Colin
“I was starting to think I scared you away,” Rosa muses, trying to garner a reaction from me as we walk through the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
I’ve had it on my list of places I wanted to take her to, but after our obligatory conjugal visits these last few weeks, I haven’t been in the right frame of mind to take her anywhere. Thankfully, our noon encounters in apartment 9B back at The Avalon also ensure that most of Rosa’s energy is fully depleted, forcing her to stay indoors for the rest of the day, leaving Darren and his crew to watch over her.
“Well, Colin? Did I scare you off?” she asks again just as we stop in front of one particular painting depicting a full moon on a snowy winter’s day.
“Nothing scares me,” I lie, pretending to be focused on the artist’s handiwork instead of looking at the woman standing by my side.
“Is that true?” she questions curiously, craning her head back to stare at the scar marks on my face. “You’re not afraid of anything?”
“Aye,” I lie again, shrugging her attention off me and walking to another painting further down the corridor.
Rosa quickens her steps to keep up with my wide strides, her high heels click-clacking loudly on the floor.
“You’re lying to me. If we’re going to be friends, we shouldn’t lie to each other, Col.”
Damnú .
How can I tell this woman that the only thing that puts fear into my heart is her and how she makes me feel? That since she let me in, both into her heart and into her body, I’ve been consumed with thoughts of only her? That there isn’t a minute in my day where her sweet face doesn’t cross my mind, and that the ache of not being by her side at all times physically pains me?
“Colin?” she insists, carefully placing her hand on my forearm, scorching me with her innocent touch.
“What are you scared of?” I ask, flipping the script on her.
She pulls her hand away and lowers her eyes from me to stare at the painting in front of us. This one is of an old windmill up on a hill, red poppies all around it.
“Everything. Everything scares me here,” she explains, followed by a desolate sigh.
“Only here? Not back home in Mexico?”
She nods.
“How come?”
“I knew my place back home. My father made sure of that. Here I feel like I’m floating adrift in a vast unknown ocean, never knowing where to swim to for safety. Or even to whom.”
Swim to me, sweet rose, swim to me.
The words burn on the tip of my tongue, but instead of confessing such forbidden and foolish thoughts, I find myself answering her previous question instead.
“The only thing that scares me is not being a good, loyal soldier to my boss. That somehow I might break his trust in me.”
Like I have been doing since Rosa came into our lives.
“I didn’t know you cared for Tiernan’s opinion so much,” she replies, disillusioned.
“Why wouldn’t I? I’m a soldier. Soldiers should strive to gain their general’s good opinion of them.”
“You talk as if we’re at war. The Mafia Wars are over, Colin. Didn’t you get the memo? If they weren’t, I wouldn’t be here to begin with.”
“The Mafia Wars might be over, but there are always battles to be fought.”
“That’s disheartening.” She frowns. “If that’s true, then when can we stop and just live our lives without the fear that death is just around the corner?”
“We can’t. Death is a certainty. Either by the blade or from old age, it will come for us.”
“Then I prefer the latter.” She smiles sweetly, a twinkle in her eyes that pierces me right in the gut, deeper than any knife could.
“As do I.” I can’t help but give her a small smile of my own, making her grin stretch as far as the eye can see.
When Rosa stares into my eyes, only to drift back to the marks on my face, my miniscule smile falls dead onto the floor. It’s the second time she’s done that today, making my skin itch and my throat clog. I turn my back to her and walk further down the hall until I reach a dead end.
Fuck.
“I’m sorry,” she says behind me, placing her hand on my shoulder blade. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
“You didn’t.”
Another lie.
But the truth would only make her feel uncomfortable, and I quite enjoy Rosa being at ease with me. Not many people are.
“Can I ask you a question?”
My shoulders tense up and my back straightens, already mentally preparing myself for what I know she will ask next.
I can’t fault her inquisitiveness.
Most people have a morbid curiosity to know every detail of how I got so disfigured on the left side of my face and neck. But not many know the truth. All they know is that I got caught in a fire back when I was still living in Ireland. The specifics of said fire, however, I leave out. I’m not sure I can be so withholding with Rosa’s intense gaze on me, though.
“Just ask,” I grunt.
“Did we…” she begins to stammer. “I mean… did my family do that to you?”
I’m suddenly taken aback by the guilty sorrow in her voice.
“Is that really what you want to know?”
“Yes. I want to know how deep your hatred of me is.”
I turn to her and snake my hand behind the nape of her neck, bringing her face closer to mine.
“I could never hate you, Rosa. Don’t ever say or even think such things.”
Again her gaze softens, and this time when she glances up at my scars, I don’t shy away from her. This gives her the courage to press her hand on my cheek, gently caressing the hideous part of my face.
“Does it hurt?”
I shake my head.
“The skin feels rough, ragged even.”
“Aye. Scars tend to harden over time.”
“Even the ones people can’t see?”
“Especially those, sweet rose.”
Her gaze begins to water in sadness, provoked both by the endearment and by the harsh truth of my words.
“Don’t shed tears for me, lass. These scars no longer hurt me as much as they used to. They only serve as a reminder.”
“A reminder of what?”
“That monsters exist.”
And that all you can do is hope you become an even bigger monster to scare the others away.
She pulls away by taking a step back, a stern expression overtaking her delicate facial features.
“Just tell me. Was it my family? My father? My brother? Did one of them do this to you?”
I shake my head, to which she immediately lets out a sigh of relief, her stiff stance instantly relaxing with the knowledge her family had no part in hurting me. I don’t have the heart to tell her that even though her family wasn’t responsible for my scars, they had a hand in creating Tiernan’s.
I pick up her hand and place a tender kiss to her open palm before letting it drop again to her side. I then turn to the painting, this one, oddly enough, of a forest deprived of sunlight. Its darkness calls out to me and pulls me back to a night where the sky was pitch black, and only my childhood home burning up in flames illuminated it.
“I was sixteen when it happened,” I begin to explain, my gaze fixed on the painting, almost as if I’m being transported to that fateful night. “It started off as just another ordinary summer night in Ireland. Nothing gave me the inkling that after that night, I would never sleep in my bed again. I had spent most of my day with my Da and Patrick in town running some errands for my Ma. It was blissfully normal. Maybe if it wasn’t, I would have been able to predict what was about to happen.”
“Patrick was with you? As in Tiernan and Shay’s brother, Patrick?”
“Aye. My uncle Niall had been worried about Patrick’s mental wellbeing and constant melancholy. He thought sending him to spend the summer with us would improve his sullen disposition. Boston was in a full-fledged war at the time, with too many deaths to count. My cousin had always been softer compared to his brothers and sister. His bleeding heart just couldn’t withstand attending another funeral, so my uncail thought sending him off to stay with us for a few months would lift his spirits. Maybe all my cousin needed was a change of scenery to get him out of the depressive state he had been in.”
I frown, thinking how wrong that assumption was. Maybe if Patrick had stayed back in Boston, he’d still be alive somehow. I know for a fact that if he had, my family would be.
“Anyway, I was just happy to have someone my own age around. Most boys our age were already sworn into the war, fighting the good fight, but both Da and my Uncle Niall were reluctant to have us play a role in it. Uncail had his obvious reasons for keeping Patrick out of the war, and as for my Da… well… he had plenty of his own, too.” I shrug despondently. “I was his only son, you see? Aside from me, my parents only had daughters. Three of them, to be precise. Aoife, Riona, and my baby sister of just eight months, Ciara. They were little rugrats, the lot of them, and though I loved them dearly, a part of me also resented them for not being boys. If they were, then maybe my father wouldn’t have kept me from fighting in fear of losing his only heir.”
I kick the air at my feet, hating how bloody ignorant and headstrong I had been that summer—always giving my Da a hard time for not letting me fight and complaining about it twenty-four-seven. My resentment had grown worse over the past couple of years after news broke out that Tiernan joined in the war. Since my uncail had three sons, he had no reservation in having Tiernan pick up a gun and fight for his family. There was no need for him to be cautious with his eldest when there were two more sons in line to take his throne if the worst was to happen. But if my uncle ever had an ounce of fear that he’d made a mistake, then Tiernan exceeding all expectations only solidified that he had made the right decision. Everywhere I went, people talked about how my cousin was making the Kelly name proud. Even from across the pond, news of my cousin’s exploits in the war sounded more like tales of legends. You couldn’t go into a pub and not hear Tiernan’s name. All of Ireland was in utter awe of his bravery and calculating mind, and I desperately wanted to be at his side and have people sing my praises, too.
How fucking vain I was then.
I don’t even recognize that boy anymore.
Not that it’s surprising.
That Colin Kelly died that night, too.
“Anyway,” I continue on with my shameful rant. “Safe to say that at the time, I didn’t know any better and resented my father for restricting me and ordering me to stay put with my sisters. Now I realize he just wanted to protect me. Keep me safe as long as he could. Give me a childhood when most boys my age had been deprived of one.”
“Sounds to me like your father loved you very much.”
“Aye, that he did. I just wish I had told him how much I loved him while I had the chance instead of acting like a brat.”
“I would have never used that word to describe you,” she says, a trace of a smile playing on her lips.
“Aye, but that’s what I was back then. Blame it on the Kelly gene. We’re all cocky assholes when we’re young. Some of us never outgrow it.”
“Are you saying that you were like Shay?” She laughs.
“Ah, lass, I wasn’t that bad. Just headstrong, that’s all. At sixteen, I thought I was a man. It took that night happening for me to figure out I wasn’t,” I chastise myself.
“You don’t have to tell me more if you don’t want to, Colin. It’s okay if you don’t.”
I shake my head.
“I want you to know,” I tell her, entwining my fingers with hers.
It dawns on me how true those words are. I want Rosa to know everything about me, just as much as I want to know everything about her. It should trouble me how much I need to tell her every little secret I have. And it should trouble me even more that I want to share such intimate information with a woman who doesn’t belong to me. With a woman who is married to a man I vowed to follow and obey until the end of my days. The word betrayal flashes in my mind, making the acrid taste of my treacherous feelings tough to swallow down.
“Okay,” she replies, giving my hand a comforting squeeze, bringing me back to the conversation at hand and away from my duplicitous thoughts. “Tell me. I want to know.”
“Aye.” I take a deep inhale before continuing on. “That night, I had another row with my Da. It got so bad that he kicked me out of dinner and sent me to my room like I was a five-year-old in need of discipline. And like the unruly shite I’d become, I locked myself in my bedroom, cursing him and everyone else around me that had a hand at keeping me from the war. Little did I know that the war was going to come to me.”
I clear my throat as if I can still smell the smoke all around me. I close my eyes, comforted only by Rosa’s tender hand in mine, silently urging that I continue.
“Sometime during the night, I must have dozed off in my tantrum, only to wake up startled by the heat in my room. When I opened my eyes and saw my room up in flames, I panicked. I forgot all the lessons my father taught me about dropping to the floor and crawling my way out to safety. Instead, I ran towards the flames, screaming my parents’ and my sisters’ names as loud as I could while trying to make my way up the stairs towards their bedrooms. It was only when a burning joist fell on top of me, pinning me to the floor, that I honestly believed we were all going to die that night. The fire on the wooden beam kissed my skin, and blistering heat began to claw its way through all my facial bones, muscles, and tendons, leaving its permanent mark and damaging every nerve ending. Whether it was the smoke inhalation or the pain of my third-degree burn, I must have passed out. It was only when I felt someone covering my face with a wet blanket and pushing the beam away from my chest that I came to.” I swallow dryly.
I got you, Col.
I got you.
“It was Patrick who pulled me out of the fire that night. And once he made sure I was safely outside, he willingly went back into that hell. I just sat there on the lawn watching my home burn down as my cousin ran back into the burning inferno, in the hopes he could save someone else. I was so petrified with fear and pain that I couldn’t move. I tried to tell my legs to get up, to save my family, but they wouldn’t budge. It must have been only a few minutes until Patrick made it out of the house again, but to me it felt like hours. As he drew in closer to me, I could see he had my baby sister cradled in his arms, wrapped in a blanket.”
My body trembles so hard at the memory, Rosa has to wrap her arms around me just to keep me steady.
“She didn’t make it, did she?”
The sob that escapes me is all the answer she needs.
“Patrick, is that Ciara? Where is Da and Ma? Where is Aoife and Riona?!” I cry out, my tears stinging my raw flesh.
The smell of burnt skin churns my stomach, but as I try to move closer to my cousin the awful stench heightens. Patrick shakes his head, pain and misery coating his light blue eyes as he steps away from me.
“Give her to me! Give Ciara to me!”
“I’m sorry, Col. I’m so sorry,” he cries, hugging my sister’s small body to his chest.
“I said give her here,” I yell. “Ciara!”
“I tried. I tried,” he repeats, gripping the blanket.
“Give her to me, Pat. Please. Give me Ciara.”
My arms shake as I stretch my arms out to him so that he can hand over my baby sister. Reluctantly, he places her in my arms as delicately as one would a sleeping newborn. He does it with such tenderness that my heart flicks with a speck of hope that she’s alright. It’s only when I lift the blanket off Ciara’s sweet face that I have confirmation that she’s not sleeping at all. All that’s left of her is a mangled burnt corpse.
The scream that ripped through me afterwards must have been heard all throughout Ireland, coast to coast, and still it didn’t reflect the pain I was experiencing. Nothing could.
“I lost my whole world that night. These scars can’t even begin to truly depict the horror of watching everyone I ever loved go up in flames and turn to ash right in front of my eyes. I’d suffer a million scars like these ones if it meant that they wouldn’t have had to.”
“Who? Who did it?” Rosa asks between sobs.
“Who knows.” I shrug defeatedly. “After uncail brought Patrick and me stateside, he put out feelers to find out who could have sent the order to kill his brother and his family. Soon word came back that both the Bratva and The Firm learned of a rumor that Uncle Niall’s son was spending his summer in Ireland. It seems they were under the impression it had been Tiernan with us instead of Patrick. Killing the heir apparent to the Kelly dynasty would have been a great achievement for any of our enemies. We never really knew for sure if it had been Vadim Volkov or Trevor Butcher who gave the green light on the attack. Not that it ever mattered. By then, we Kellys had as much blood of the innocent on our hands as any of our enemies did. The names of my parents and sisters were just added to the long list of casualties of a war I had been thirsting to be a part of. Safe to say my first taste of it was less than bittersweet.”
I wipe Rosa’s tears away with my thumbs as I watch her heart break for me.
“It’s all in the past, sweet rose. Your tears cannot bring back what I lost any more than mine can.”
“Our world is so ugly, Colin. So ugly. How can we even look at ourselves in the mirror after all the depravities and monstrosities our families have committed in the name of preserving our way of life?”
“Aye. It’s not an easy thing to do, but as you reminded me not a few minutes ago, those days are long over. Thanks to you, and women like you, there won’t be another child or innocent soul taken before their time. And as the decades pass, and peace reigns, any recollection of the years we suffered during the Mafia Wars will be forgotten. As will the names of my parents and sisters. As will ours, sweet rose.” Another stray tear falls down her cheek, and this time I kiss it away. “Best spend our time appreciating the beauty this world still holds, than waste it reminiscing on sad events we can’t change.”
“Is there still beauty in such a world?”
“Aye. I’m looking right at it.”
She raises her head, her eyes colliding with mine.
“You’re beautiful, too. I see you, Colin. And you’re just as beautiful as any painting hanging on these walls. Both inside and out.”
My heart squeezes in my chest at her words.
“No one has ever called me that,” I croak out, emotion taking its toll on me.
“Then everyone is a fool. I see you. The real you. And you are beautiful.”
Damnú.
I push her against the wall and grip her chin, turning her my way.
“You have to stop saying things like that to me, sweet rose. You don’t know how starved I am to hear them come out of your mouth.”
“Then I’ll keep saying them. I’ll keep saying them until you believe me.”
I scan her beautiful face in search of the lie I expect to see and find none. All that exists is sweet adoration, and fuck me, if it doesn’t look a lot like love, too.
I spin her around, gaining a small shriek from her when I raise her skirt up to her waist and press her face against the wall.
“Colin, what are you doing?”
“Putting a fucking baby in you, that’s what I’m doing,” I growl, pushing her panties to the side.
“Someone might catch us,” she says, her voice already thick with lust.
“Let them.”
I couldn’t give two fucks right now. As long as my cock is deep inside her pussy, stretching it out until she cums around it, I couldn’t care less who sees.
Tiernan included.
“No. Wait, wait,” she insists, earning a low grunt of disapproval from me.
“Why? Isn’t this what you want?”
She shakes her head and slowly pulls herself off the wall, until we are yet again facing each other.
“I want to see you make love to me more. I want to see your face, Colin. Please.”
My brows pinch together as she runs the pad of her finger over my scars.
“Every time we’re together, you always take me from behind. I want to see you, Colin. Memorize your face as you cum inside me. Can you give me that?”
Can I give her that?
I don’t think there is anything I wouldn’t give this woman if she asked.
And that’s the problem.
I stand still, my whole body quivering with need yet waiting for her instructions.
“Kiss me,” she commands on bated breath.
I bend down and offer her my kiss, which she takes with greedy abandon. She tastes like the sweetest wine that ever touched my lips, and all too soon I am submitting to her tongue’s every command. My fingers go to her core, her wet slit proof of her desire for me. Her body has always been welcoming, but a part of me was convinced that her invitation had only been extended to me because Shay had coaxed it out of her. Or worse, because her husband demanded so. It’s only at this very moment that I realize my feelings aren’t unrequited. My hold on her is just as strong as the one Rosa has on me.
“I need you, Colin. Please,” she moans out in between kisses.
Not one for delaying gratification, I pull her legs up to cradle around my waist, unleashing my cock from my jeans and then thrusting it deep inside her in one brutal push.
“ARGH!” she shouts, making me clasp my hand over her mouth.
My eyes are on hers as I pound into her pussy like a man gone mad.
And God help me, I think I might have.
“This. I can never have enough of this. You’ve ruined me, sweet rose. All I dream about now is having this pussy clench around my cock,” I groan in her ear, her muffled moans getting louder. “And then you go and tell a fucking monster like me how beautiful I am? Don’t you know what you do to me? Can’t you see how much you’re under my skin?”
Her hooded gaze grows wild with heat as she claws at my shoulders, needing me to pound my love inside her until she can’t walk without feeling me in between her thighs. I capture her lips in mine again as my hand travels in between us to play with her clit. I know Rosa well enough that a few well-placed strokes to it, as my cock impales her pussy, is enough to push her over the edge. It only takes a few moments after that for her to cry her release, making me cum right after her. My heart is still jackhammering in my ribcage when Rosa starts blinking fresh new tears from her eyes.
“What have we done?” she mumbles to herself more than to me, as I place her feet back on solid ground.
With those bleak words hanging in the air between us, I realize the repercussions my actions might have if Tiernan ever finds out.
My boss might take offense to me fucking Rosa raw without his say so.
In fact, I know he will.
Because if the roles were reversed, I’d kill him for it.
And that is a whole problem all on its own.