“What de fuck does dat mean?” The veins in his neck bulged as he leaned closer to my face.
“Exactly what I said.”
“Ye let anot’er man touch ye and I’ll fuckin’ kill him,” he whispered back, angrier than I’d ever seen him. “Go back to school, ye fuckin’ infant.”
He pushed off the wall and stalked away without another word as I leaned frozen against the wall. I hated the way he made all of our decisions, sure, but I knew he was doing what he thought was best. I didn’t know why I’d said those things; I didn’t want anyone else. I’d instantly regretted my words, but my pride refused to let me call out to stop him from walking away.
Instead, I just stood in that alleyway for long minutes, miserable and trying not to cry.
***
I was so late to school, I should have just gone home, but I was too afraid to see Patrick again. I knew that his feelings weren’t uncommon; there were still a lot of men who preferred their wives to be virgins when they married. It just seemed so unfair. Why did he get to have sex with whomever he wanted and was revered for it, while any type of perceived promiscuity on my part would label me a whore? It was so frustrating! That morning when he said he’d known Caitlin, I hadn’t thought about the way he’d said it—like he was one of many she’d had sex with. The only thing that had registered was that she knew him in a way that I didn’t, and that killed me. I just wanted to be closer to him and I wanted to stop feeling frustrated all the time.
I wanted to tether myself to him in that final way so I’d know he wouldn’t leave me.
I barely made it through the day, so unfocused and depressed that I was asked repeatedly if I was okay. I wasn’t, not in any sense of the word. My hands and arms had broken out in hives within the first hour of classes, and the physical discomfort made me even more miserable.
I could barely believe it, but I was beginning to miss the predictability of my life before I’d moved to Ireland. My parents had been awful, but at least with them I’d had a sense of familiarity. I’d been able to navigate that world on autopilot, secure in my position and the knowledge that eventually I’d be on my own and things would get better.
How wrong I’d been about the adult part. Being a so-called ‘adult’ didn’t make things easier, it only meant that your problems were that much harder to solve. By the time I walked home from school, I’d worked myself up to the point that I was ready to apologize to Patrick about everything I’d said and done that morning.
He’d become my best friend, my only friend, outside of his mother. If I was honest, the thought of being with someone else hadn’t seriously crossed my mind. I wanted only him. If I had to make some concessions in order for that to happen, I would do it. The rest of Patrick—the sweet, charming, protective part of him that I knew would never hurt me—was more than worth tolerating the controlling caveman that had made me so angry.
I had to believe that. I had to believe that the good parts outnumbered the bad and, if I was lucky, someday I’d stop worrying myself sick about the thought of waking up to find him gone.
Chapter 16
Patrick
My head was a mess.
There were too many things happening at once for me to focus on just one, and it felt as if, at any moment, I’d completely lose what little grasp I had on my sanity.
I’d been talking with Kevie almost nightly about the shit going on with my Da, and things weren’t looking good. Kevie’s older brother was a pretty high ranking soldier in the fight for a unified Ireland, and the conversations they’d had during brief trips to their mother’s home didn’t cast my da in a favorable light. The thought of Kevie’s older brother coming anywhere near my hometown where Mum or Amy could come across him at any time made my skin crawl, but I was thankful for whatever news I could get.
I still wasn’t clear on exactly what Da had done, but something had happened to make the boys question him. It wasn’t good. Loyalty was a precious commodity among those men, and if you didn’t have that, you may as well have a target painted on your forehead.
We’d also been getting calls to the house at all hours, and the minute Mum or I would answer, the line would disconnect. It was a fucking nuisance at best, and something far more sinister at worst. I wasn’t sure what the person was looking for when they called, but I had two guesses. If it was my da they were hoping to contact, that meant he was in the wind. Not good for anyone. And if it was Amy’s parents, well, I hoped they’d bugger off so we could have some peace. As far as I was concerned, they no longer had a daughter.
On top of all that, classes were starting again soon, and I needed to get back to Uni. My boss at the mechanic shop had let me take the time away, but that wouldn’t last much longer, either. They couldn’t just hold my place indefinitely. It wasn’t the best job in the world, but I liked the lads I worked with and it was easy. I couldn’t afford to let it go.
The thought of leaving my mum and Amy unprotected made my flesh crawl, but I couldn’t stay based on a bad feeling. I had a life, school, and work. I couldn’t just drop those for no solid reason, even though every day it became harder for me to envision going back. But what would I do in Ballyshannon? Work as a mechanic? That wasn’t the plan and hadn’t been for longer than I could remember. I couldn’t support a family on a mechanic’s wage without living like I’d grown up and I’d sworn to do better for myself than my da had. My wife wouldn’t have to work her fingers to the bone to put fucking food on the table, and my children wouldn’t wear handouts from the church.
Amy deserved better than that. She deserved to be cosseted.
The past two weeks with her had shown me things that I hadn’t even realized I’d been missing.
She liked to do her hair in intricate styles, but she rarely wore them out of the house, preferring it down if she had to interact with people.
She was stubborn, believing that she was always right, but willing to give in to make others happy.
She laughed at commercials on the television that weren’t meant to be funny, and read romance novels and classics interchangeably. She seemed to enjoy both equally.
She loved the freckles on my face and chest, and if she didn’t think I was paying attention, she’d trace the ones on my arms.
She was a contradiction, both vulnerable and incredibly self-assured. She knew exactly who she was and didn’t hide from that knowledge, but she didn’t like the scrutiny of others.
She treated my mum like the Queen of England.
She treated me like a king… when she wasn’t giving me shit about almost everything I did and said.
We could talk for hours and never run out of things to say, but could rarely agree on anything.
She could completely ignore things that she didn’t want to face, and had skirted around any mention of her parents.
She challenged me and made my blood burn until I didn’t know which way was up.
God, that girl drove me insane.
It was as if everything that made her who she was pulled at the opposite trait in me, drawing us together like magnets. She made me forget some things and remember others, and her presence gave me a peace I hadn’t felt since I was a child. She calmed me in a way no one else had ever been able to do. She was simply…everything. Both my compass and true north.
I suddenly came to the shocked realization that I loved her more than anyone else in the world—myself included.
I’d been up most of the night trying to sort out how I’d protect her and Mum, my mind going over and over different plans and rejecting them while the phone rang sporadically. I’d felt like the walking dead by the time I’d escorted her to school. My body ached from the hours I’d spent on Mum’s living room floor and I’d been short-tempered, anxious over the prospect of leaving them alone, and it took all I had to hide that shit from her. She didn’t need to worry about things she couldn’t change, and I didn’t want her to. It was my job as her man to shield her from that shit.
So I’d
painted on a cheerful face when she’d awoke and we’d almost made it to school without my façade cracking down the center. I could’ve kicked myself for getting into the situation in the alley, but to be fair, jealous Amy had been a sight to see. She’d been scowling, her face flushed, and I’d wanted nothing more than to take her home and fuck the jealousy right out of her, prove once and for all that she had nothing to worry about.
I couldn’t, though. She should wait. I knew that eventually, when our kids were old enough to ask, that she’d want to tell them with a clear conscience that we’d waited until we’d said our vows. She may be full of hormones and grand ideas now, but the minute it was over, she’d have regrets.
She was my ideal, the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen—and though I knew it was dangerous to put her on a pedestal, I couldn’t help it. She wasn’t a woman you fucked before you said your vows in front of a priest, no matter how angry that made her.
Amy didn’t want to wait and she thought I was an idiot for making her. I loved her, but she just kept pushing and pushing, and I’d finally had enough that morning. I was having a hard enough time keeping my fucking hands off her, and she wasn’t making it the least bit easy. I was tired, worried, and turned on with no relief in sight… and then she’d decided to push just a bit further.
Threatening me with other men? Was she out of her fucking mind? It may have been the worst idea she’d ever had. I’d seen red when she started going on about how she’d, what did she call it? Level the playing field?
She’d let someone touch her over my dead body and not a moment before.
My stomach was churning when I’d left Amy in that alley, but I didn’t even stop to look back at her. I couldn’t. If I had, I’d known that the look on her face would have me right back where I started—in her arms—and we’d be riding that fine line again, or I’d do something to scare her, like take her over my knee and thrash the hell out of her.
I hated hurting her, but if I was honest with myself, I’d admit that I was also livid about her threats and it felt good to leave her worried. How far did she think she could push before I pushed back? The tension in the house, both sexual and the fear of something terrible happening had us all on edge. I understood that she was feeling it, but that didn’t give her leave to spew venom all over me.
Honestly, I didn’t even know if Amy felt the oppressive weight of my mum’s fear. I hadn’t said a word about things happening with my da, and I doubted Mum had filled her in—she was too busy skittering around the house like she couldn’t find enough to do until she dropped into bed exhausted. It seemed as if Amy walked around with her head in the clouds, completely ignorant to what was happening around her. Did she not realize that I was fraying like a badly knit sweater? I tried to shield her, but I couldn’t understand how she missed the signs that something was looming on the horizon. Mum was acting like a maniac, Kevie was showing up unannounced at all hours, and I had bags under my eyes from lack of sleep—yet Amy moved blissfully along as if all was right in her world.
By the time I got home, I was almost dizzy with lack of sleep and fell into bed in a stupor. I couldn’t remember how long it had been since I’d gotten a decent night’s rest, and it seemed to be all catching up to me at once. I didn’t even have time to appreciate the smell of Amy on my sheets before I crashed.
By the time I woke up, I could hear both of my favorite women talking in the kitchen and my anger had cooled completely. After a bit of sleep, things always seemed a little clearer.
It only took me moments to realize I’d slept the entire day away and I hadn’t even gone to pick Amy up from school. She must have wondered where I was and if I was still angry with her. Guilt lay heavy on my shoulders as I walked slowly out of my room.
“Now, just lay yer arms in there,” Mum said soothingly as I stepped quietly into the kitchen. “That’ll help yer poor arms a bit, I’m sure of it.”
Amy murmured something back that I couldn’t catch because they had their backs to me, and it took me a minute to comprehend Mum’s words.
“What’s wrong wit’ yer arms?”
Amy jumped, but Mum just turned to me with a smile.
“Ah, yer awake then! Hungry?”
“No, I’m not hungry. What’s wrong wit’ her arms?” I strode toward them quickly, imagining all sorts of horrible injuries.
“It’s nothing,” Amy said hoarsely, still looking toward the sink. “Just some hives.”
“Hives?” I came to a halt, standing stupidly in the middle of the kitchen. Something was off. What was it? Mum was smiling like always, but I felt the tension she was attempting to ignore.
Amy was making no move to look at me.
“Amy, me love.” I took another step toward her and watched her shoulders bunch with tension. “Sweetheart?”
“I’m just goin’ to run up to the grocer, forgot some cabbage for tonight’s supper,” Mum commented quietly as she moved away from us.
As soon as the door closed behind her, I stepped forward again until my chest was flush with Amy’s back.
“I’m fine, Trick,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “Just some itchy hives.”
“Ye caught somet’in’?” I wound my arms around her waist and peered over her shoulder as she hunched a little farther into the murky water, her forearms almost flat against the bottom of the sink.
“No, I just get these sometimes.”
Her arms were red as a tomato and from what I could see, covered in big blotches of raised welts.
“What in God’s name?” I lifted one of her arms out of the water even though she pulled against the movement. When her forearm cleared the sink, I couldn’t stop the noise that came from my throat. It was far worse than I’d thought and it looked incredibly painful. “What did ye do to yerself?”
“Nothing! It just happens.”
“It doesn’t just fuckin’ happen! Yer arms are swollen to twice dere size!”
“It’s not that bad. Stop being so dramatic,” she snapped back, trying to rip her arm from my hand. When she gasped in pain at my firm grip, I immediately let her go. Shit. My fingers had left small white imprints in her flesh that quickly turned crimson again before my eyes.
She hissed as she laid her hand back into the water, and I gripped her belly in response, trying to brace her. Her arms looked like they were on fire, and I still couldn’t understand what had happened.
“Talk to me, sweetheart. Tell me what happened.”
“I already told you,” she replied dully. “It just happens sometimes. I get hives, and they itch, and since I was wearing my uniform sleeves all day, any time I scratched them, they got worse.”
“Why do ye get hives?”
“It just happens.”
“Bullshite. I’ve not seen dem on ye before.”
“Yes, you have, they just weren’t as bad as they are now. They usually go away after a while.”
“Why, Amy?” Our voices got quieter the longer we spoke, as if that could stop us from yelling, so by this time we were practically hissing at each other.
“I get them from stress or if I’m upset.”
“Stress?”
“Yes.”
“What are ye stressed about?”
She went silent at that, and my mind raced through the past few days, wondering if something had happened. Had her parents tried to contact her? Were they the ones who’d been calling at all hours? They’d left the house they were renting in the middle of the night—probably because they owed money to someone—and no one had heard from them since. No, she would have told me if it were something like that.
She didn’t say a word as I tried to think of a reason for her stress. When I remembered our fight that morning, my gut clenched in apprehension.
“I did dis.” It wasn’t a question.
“No! No, it was just stress,” she countered, backpedaling.
“I hurt ye.”
“I hurt you back.”
My arms tightened aroun
d her and she sighed as I rested my face against her neck.
“I apologize, me love,” I whispered against her throat. “I was cruel.”
“No, I was a bitch. I kept pushing. You asked me to stop and I ignored you. I shouldn’t have said I’d be with someone else.” Her words drifted into a whisper.
“De day ye stop pushin’ is de day ye no longer want me. Dat’s not somet’in’ I ever want to happen, darlin’.” I kissed her gently beneath her ear. “I was fuckin’ tired, and I could feel me good intentions sailin’ away in de wind, and I had to stop us. I went about it all wrong.”
“I don’t understand why—”
“I know ye don’t. But can it not just be enough, for now, to allow me to make dese decisions?” My words were exactly what I should have said that morning… but my wandering hands were completely contradicting anything I was trying to get across.
“I don’t want anyone but you,” she said quietly as I bit down gently on her neck.
“I know.”
My arms were still wrapped solidly around her waist, but I couldn’t resist the lure of the bottom curve of her breasts. They were heavy against my forearms as she bent over the sink, and without thinking, my thumbs had begun sliding back and forth against the sides. She was so full there, thick and round and perfect.
My hips were snug against her arse, and I knew the exact moment that she realized my cock had become hard as stone. She froze, barely breathing as I kissed her neck, running my tongue against the pulse there. She tasted so good, a bit salty with a hint of something sweet. I couldn’t help but imagine my mouth on other parts of her body, places where I knew the taste would be magnified.
The longer she remained frozen, the more I wanted to thaw her out. My thoughts were consumed with the idea of making her warm and willing against me, and for a few moments I forgot the frustration I’d experienced that morning over Amy pushing me for more. I couldn’t think of anything except the fact that she wasn’t responding to me like she usually did, and I wanted—no I needed her to, especially after her words that morning. Why wasn’t she arching her hips like she usually did, or tilting her neck to give me better access?