“It’s not a lie, nor is it a way to take vengeance on you. I’m not that heartless. But what did you expect to happen, Tiernan? That I would spend time with Shay and Colin, get to know them intimately, both physically and mentally, and that it wouldn’t spark up feelings of love for the both of them? If you thought that was possible, then you were fooling yourself. I love them, Tiernan. And my life will have no meaning if they aren’t in it.”
“Enough,” he growls, getting up from the bed to run away from the truth he’s unwilling to face.
“No! You don’t get to tell me when it’s enough. Not when you refuse to listen to me.”
He fists his hands at his sides while I jump off the bed and breach the distance between us.
“If you love me like you say you do, bury your pride and ego, and let me live the life I want—with you and them. If you force me to do otherwise, you’ll only have a sliver of my heart. I’ll never be fully yours if you keep them from me.”
He turns around and grips my chin with a familiar brutish force.
“You’re wrong, acushla. I’m all that you need,” he spits out, making my shoulders slump in disappointment.
“That might have been true in the beginning. Not anymore. Actions have consequences, husband. It’s time you faced yours.”
I snap my chin out of his grip and then turn around to lie back in bed, turning my back towards him. I can feel the waves of uncertainty flow from him. Unsure if this is just another one of our games, or if I truly mean my threat.
I mean every word.
After a few minutes, he slides in next to me, his hands gripping my waist, his breath in my ear.
“You’re mine, acushla. You’re just confused. You don’t know what you’re saying.”
I slant my neck just enough to face him.
“No, Tiernan. You’re the one who’s confused. If you fight me on this, you’ll lose me. Is that what you want?”
“I won’t,” he seethes with gritted teeth. “I meant what I said when I told you that I will make you happy and give you all that your heart desires.”
“My heart desires Shay and Colin. Until you give them to me, then there is no happiness to be had. For either of us.”
“You’re wrong. And I’ll prove it to you,” he threatens, biting on my earlobe and then sinking his teeth into my bare shoulder.
He lifts my leg just a tad, enough to sink his cock inside me. One hand snakes around my throat, choking me, while his other hand begins to play with my clit. His hands are showing me no mercy while his cock fucks me ever so slowly, building up a crescendo my body is powerless to fight off. He knows every secret it’s ever had and forces it to dance to the tune of his own making. When he wrings another orgasm from me, he cums inside me once more, thinking he’s proven his point.
I press my palm to his cheek and stare at him, sweat covering his brow.
“All you’ll get is this, husband. You can have my body, but as long as you deprive me of what I want, you’ll never have my heart. The choice is yours.”
Chapter 23
Tiernan
I’ve become my wife’s warden yet again.
For the past month I have kept her hidden away in our apartment, unwilling to let her step one foot outside it. Fear of losing her has driven me mad, but as each day passes, I feel my obsession is slowly driving her out of my reach.
In war, I have always known what to do, what is expected of me. But binding Rosa to me is a battle I’m not sure I’m equipped to win. I’d lay my empire to ruin, burn it all down, if I thought it would be the key to unlocking her heart. I had a taste of its sweetness once, but nothing I do seems to grant me access to it again.
As promised, she has let me into her body, but never into her heart, and it’s driving me insane. I fuck the insubordination out of her at every turn. Fucking her seven or eight times a day if needed. I’ve even resorted to waking her up in the middle of the night just so she can ride my cock until the glimmer of the woman that professed her love for me shines through. I fucking live for those few seconds when she truly is mine, but once it disappears and evaporates into thin air, my grief multiplies tenfold.
Her flawless petals are withering right before my very eyes, and my love is the cold winter that is slowly killing her.
If all of this wasn’t doing me in, then my brother coming into my office every day, hassling me and demanding to see my wife, isn’t doing me any favors, either. The only one that hasn’t come out and made his demands of me is Colin. No. He’s done far worse. After the first few weeks when I ceased all access to her, Colin requested to leave Boston and return to Ireland. Unlike my hot-tempered brother, he understood why I no longer wanted them near her. That I wanted my rose only for myself and refused to share her. After I declined his request to leave, every time he looks at me now, I can see the growing resentment starting to build up inside him. Soon he’ll forget we’re kin, forget his allegiance to me, and become my enemy—all in the name of love.