Chapter 11

Chapter Eleven

Líadan

T he door opens and closes at three in the morning. Because Jordan doesn't have keys to the townhome, I simply left the door unlocked. Brendan and I are two of the most dangerous people in Chicago, I wasn't worried about anyone who shouldn't be barging in.

I went to bed an hour earlier, but knew the second the door opened, that I would wake up.

"Alright, Lía, let's go see him then. I'm sure he's hungry, right?" Brendan says, kicking off the blankets.

If his mother had raised him and he had any shred of kindness given to him outside of me, I'd say that's why he seems to be obsessed with feeding Jordan. It's adorable, and very outside of Brendan's normal behavior.

Scrambling up, I shove my feet into knee high socks. I'm already wearing a long-sleeved shirt of Brendan's that I went to bed in, but no panties.

They're overrated, anyway.

Pulling my hair up into a high messy bun, I link my fingers with Brendan's as I come around the bed and walk out the door with him. Jordan is starting up the stairs as we begin down them, and I shake my head.

"Kitchen," I state. "Turn your tight ass around right now."

"Bossy much, Princess?" Jordan asks, chuckling. In the darkness, I can't really see much of him, but he's favoring one side more than the other.

"Yeah, I am. Move it," I say. "I'm serious."

"Alright," he sighs, turning more carefully than I'd like. Biting my lip, I follow him down the stairs and through the house to the kitchen.

Flipping on the light, I wince as I see his quickly blackening eye. It was just starting to heal.

"What happened?" Brendan asks as if it doesn't look as bad as it does.

Moving easily through the kitchen, he starts to heat some corned beef hash that he made earlier on the stove, making sure to crack eggs over it as it finishes cooking.

"Are you going to force me?" Jordan asks, using humor to avoid the question, but his stomach grumbles as the savory scents of the food perfume the air. "Fuck, food does sound good, though."

"I thought as much," Brendan muses, half turning to face him. "Your face looks awful. Does the rest of your body match?"

"Yep," Jordan grunts. "It's not too terrible, I'm just getting stiff from sitting so long."

"Bullshit," I mutter. "Take your sweater off."

"I'm not stripping for you unless you're giving me something for it," he says, snorting in continued amusement.

Rolling my eyes, I climb onto the island, scooting over until I'm in front of him and spreading my legs wide as I pull my shirt away to give him a clear view of my pussy.

"How's that?" I ask as his eyes grow wide.

Brendan makes a noise that passes for fucked up glee as he says, "No dessert before food, Lía."

"Jesus fuck, Princess," Jordan groans. "That's quite the welcome home."

My heart gives a weird flip flop at his words, and then I'm distracted as he spreads my thighs wider so he can enjoy the view.

"Pretty and pink," he growls. "The pussy that can bring this man to his knees and remove every argument from my mind. Well done."

His nose runs up my skin as his lips pepper it with open mouthed kisses. This man is worshiping me throughly.

"I don't remember. Was there something you wanted me to do?" Jordan asks.

My lips tip up further than they have in a long time as I nod. "Yes, I believe you were going to take off your shirt for me," I remind him. "Off."

Biting down on my thigh teasingly, he smirks when I moan as he releases me. Slowly, Jordan pulls off his sweater, struggling to keep the pain off his face.

"Don't hide from me," I tell him. "Out there, do whatever you need to, but don't hide from us."

"Habit," he grunts as he drops the article of clothing next to my thigh. "I won't hide if you won't, Little One."

"Deal. What happened?" I ask, my eyes bouncing over the bruises littering his torso.

"Your father sent Bruin," Jordan says, as if that's the most natural thing in the world. I guess it is in my family. "He was very worried about how I was going to corrupt you."

"Ah, that ship has sailed, I think," I say as Brendan comes over with the food. Scooting over, I drop my shirt and cross my legs, continuing to sit next to him. Brendan sits on the stool I vacated, his large hands massaging my thighs comfortingly.

"Daddy knows all about how not innocent I am, so it's one of his ridiculous mood swings."

" Milseán ," Brendan warns as I shrug. I'm not saying anything that isn't true.

"I've noticed he's contradictory with his words," Jordan says, picking up his fork to take a bite. I watch for the moment when the flavors all hit his palate, reveling in his deep moan. "This is so good."

Brendan smirks at the words as he inclines his head. The time he spent in Ireland for a summer means he learned how to cook Irish food incredibly well. Just because the family put him through hell, doesn't mean he didn't have time to spend with the cook.

Maybe that's where his love of feeding people he cares about comes from. I've always been the one who's carried that favor, so it's interesting to watch his intense gaze eat up every noise and groan Jordan makes as he consumes every morsel.

"Ireland was good to me as much as she was a bitch of a taskmaster," Brendan says. "I spent a summer there learning how to…"

He makes a face as I remember the summer his dad shipped him off to teach him how to be a man.

"Be a killer," I finish. "That summer sucked for both of us."

"I came home to find Lía black and blue because grown men decided to beat on a twelve year old girl for being in the wrong place at the wrong fucking time," Brendan growls.

"Hold on, back the fuck up," Jordan says, pushing his plate away. Thankfully, he ate every bite and we aren't going to take away his appetite. "Who did this?"

"I used to hide from my father whenever I could," I explain. "Brendan was in Ireland for a summer, and I didn't want to deal with Daddy. I made a mistake and hid in his office to sketch when I was twelve, not realizing he had a meeting with Brendan's father, Cormac, and my uncle. Daddy smelled my hair conditioner and outed me."

"And?" Jordan growls in question.

"They did their best to make me scream," I answer. Lifting my hand, I show him my slightly bent middle finger. "This finger was never set and healed crooked. Brendan's dad has an awful temper, and used to beat him regularly until Daddy put a stop to it. He called it a liability to all of the resources he was putting into him as his future enforcer. So, when that ended, his father was allowed to beat the fuck out of me."

"I refused to leave ever again," Brendan grunts. "Our world isn't soft or normal. Seán made a plan that day to turn Lía into the scariest person in the room."

"He didn't care how he did it, either," I whisper, shivering as I remember the night I lost the last of my innocence.

"Will you tell me?" Jordan asks softly. "I'm not asking to be nosy, either. Bruin said some things that showed me some of what may have happened, but I want to know because I'm drawn to you. I don't know what that means or what either of you may want…"

"I told Lía life is too damn short to close yourself off to only one person," Brendan reveals as I kick him. "It's true, beautiful, I did. You don't know what she's survived, though, or what she had to do to hold onto the scraps of sanity she has."

"I don't have that history, that's true," he says with a nod. "Bruin said some pretty derogatory things that make me think he was part of it all."

"He bragged about it?" I ask, disgusted. I'm so used to feeling numb, it's a surprise when rumblings of emotion come to the surface. "God, I fucking hate seeing him. Moving out of the house helped limit our interactions which has been a relief."

"When did you move out of the house?" he asks.

"Two years and eleven months ago," I sigh. "The day I turned twenty, Daddy's birthday present to me was to give me my own place. No one outside of him knows I live with Brendan. I'm pretty sure he knows that Brendan and I are closer than normal best friends, but he's burying his head in the sand there, I think. We don't outwardly show affection much outside of these walls, so Daddy can live in his delusions."

"Can you tell me about the event Bruin was talking about? He acted like he's had sex with you before," Jordan says as gently as possible.

"I don't really count what happened that night as sex," I spit out. "I was supposed to spend my seventeenth birthday with Brendan. I didn't know that, because it was a surprise. Daddy promised him that he could take me out for my birthday. Instead, Daddy insisted that I dress in this ridiculous gown to be presented to the family."

"I fucking knew something was off," Brendan says, his voice full of pain. It makes his words sound gravelly, making me shiver. Jordan absently rubs my knee, listening patiently.

"Seán sent me out to the warehouse to interrogate a prostitute who was speaking to a cop. It was innocent, but he had proof so I did my job. It dragged on for hours."

"Brendan wasn't supposed to be in the house for that party," I whisper. "Daddy sold my virginity that night to a select few of the family. I don't know who anyone was, I haven't been out in public with any of them in years. It lasted hours, and no one cared how much it hurt."

Brendan is breathing harder as he remembers how he found me, and swallows hard.

"After… Lía says she was given to Bruin. His job was to break her completely," he says softly.

"He did," I say. "Broken, bleeding from areas of my body I didn't think was possible, that's how Brendan found me in my room. I don't remember how I got there. I think I blacked out."

"Princess," Jordan rasps. I've been staring at Brendan's chest, refusing to glance over at him. I don't want to see the pity, the disgust, or worst of all, the regret for my loss of innocence. It's not a story I've ever shared with anyone before, not since I helped Brendan piece things together.

"Yeah?" I ask, wishing my hair was down so I could hide. Unfortunately, I've never been allowed to hide from a damn thing in life, and I'm not about to now.

Just look up, Líadan. You can do it.

Pulling in a breath that sounds as if I've been without for too long, I look at him. There's nothing even remotely condescending or threatening about him as he gazes at me.

"God, the things you've survived would make most people collapse into a screaming mess," he says reverently. "Princess, I wish you'd had someone to protect you, even though you no longer need it. You're the biggest, baddest person in every single room you're in. You do not, however, need to be your father's weapon forever."

Brendan sighs as he nods. "The Banshee is going to step into the light soon, and her father will never see it coming. She may be the scariest person in the room, but unleashed, I'm right there with her. The only difference is that I have enough control not to kill every time I am in a position to."

"When I need to have that control, Brendan is usually by my side helping me," I confess. "It's not that I didn't have a protector, either…"

I don't want to throw Brendan under the bus for what happened. I've loved him my entire life, and it feels wrong to say that he didn't protect me the best he could.

"I failed, milseán ," Brendan says, shaking his head.

"You were maybe twenty years old when it happened, right?" Jordan says, rubbing his face as he yawns. Fuck, it really is so late. "There were parameters you had to follow in order to be able to protect her, Brendan. You work for him. I didn't mean any harm in what I said. You both deserved so much better."

Brendan relaxes a little as he nods, his hands squeezing my thighs as he gazes at me. I know I'll probably hate what he's going to say next.

"You need to understand that there are things that trigger Lía," he says slowly.

"We talked a bit about them," Jordan rumbles. "I'm sure there are other things I'll need to know, and that's fine. I operate on strict consent. If there is a safe word or something that will tell me when I'm riding too close to a trigger, then I want to know those too. I realized tonight I'm too deep to be saved when it comes to you, both of you. I haven't had the slightest inclination to date, always taking care of other people. This time? I want to keep my people safe, but I don't have the slightest intention of leaving after I've done that."

"No?" I ask, my vision darkening as I try to figure out what that means. Stress and panic will do that to a girl, I guess.

"Breathe, baby," Brendan barks. Stupid, stupid girl.

Sweet, sweet oxygen is dragged into my lungs as I gasp in a breath, nodding rapidly. Yeah, in and out. That's what I need to keep doing.

"No," Jordan says. "Your father dragged me down to the club, because he forced Layla to meet with him. The bastard sent a ransom note, making her dance to his tune. Only, the women in my life are apparently meant to misbehave, and she killed a man named Jack today."

"Fuck. Jack-o!" Brendan crows, huffing out a laugh. "He was a bruiser of a man. You haven't had a lot of interaction with him, Lía, but he came over from Ireland to work for your dad. Follows direction well, but a meathead."

"Layla's sister taught her how to fight recently," Jordan chuckles. "She took him down with her knife. Fucking opened him up like a fish, and now your father is screaming about a blood debt."

"A life for a life," I grumble. "I don't know how he's planning to get her to repay that, but it won't be pretty."

"She and I will cross that bridge when we need to," Jordan says with a shrug. What must it be like to have that kind of support? I don't even know.

"Layla was upset that I didn't reach out, but there's spyware on my laptop. It's the first thing I looked for. Every keystroke is being tracked."

"Daddy is paranoid as fuck," I sigh. "So where does that leave us? You should know before things go any farther, I can't have kids. I got an infection…"

Jordan cups my face, lurching forward to kiss my lips hard. "I'm in my fifties, I've raised a kid already, Princess. I just want you. Though, I was thinking…"

"What?" Brendan asks. His eyes are wide and pupils blown wide as he gazes between us.

"I don't know either of you well enough. If I were to do this the normal way, there would be dates and late night chats, but I'm in uncharted territory here," Jordan says with a shrug.

"Lía is usually home more than she has been," Brendan stresses as I blush. "She's been hiding a bit. I can find a way to be here more for meals, even if it's breakfast and dinners, and we do whatever people do to get to know each other. I've known Lía her entire life. I fell for her little squishy angry face when she was a baby. At some point, I fell in love with her and she became my world."

"You two are so in sync. I feel as if I'm interjecting myself here," Jordan mutters, sitting back down. "Christ, what am I even doing?"

"Oh no," I say. "You started this very uncomfortable, very adult fucking conversation, you're not allowed to quit now. So, I'll say this: I hate men and most people. You're the first person I've met that I didn't want to stab or tell to get fucked. I know that sounds like a ridiculous reason to want to follow the thread of attraction, but that's a big deal for me."

"I've only ever had eyes for her," Brendan says. "While we were torturing you, my cock was hard and leaking. When Lía wrapped her hand around your dick, I didn't want to cut it off. My love language is feeding people that I care about, and if you've noticed…"

"You're almost neurotic when it comes to reminding me to eat," Jordan teases him. "Well, traditional relationships don't mean much to me when I have a niece with several husbands, and Layla is probably going to follow in her sister's footsteps. I don't want to be selfish in wanting to pursue this if it's going to fuck things up between you two though."

"It won't," I say, knowing I'm right. "I've been a shell of a person for a really long time, and I don't know how to explain it? You seem to pull emotions from me, some of which I've never felt before. I'll be twenty-three soon, and the term ‘dead inside' is pretty accurate."

"There are good reasons for that, Lía," Brendan reminds me.

Sighing, I know he's right. "After the infection, I tried to kill myself. Brendan doesn't think I remember, but I do. I felt as if everything that could ever be normal had been taken away from me. My father went on a business trip right after everything happened, ignoring any evidence of what he'd done. Brendan made me promise never to do that again," I rasp.

"He helped put me back together. Most days I feel like Frankenstein's daughter, only it's my emotions that have been cut off."

"When Seán came home a month later, he made Lía undergo plastic surgery for the scars left on her skin by Bruin," Brendan says. "Everything was swept under the rug as if it never happened, all the family members had non-disclosure agreements so they could never speak about that night, and any evidence left on Lía's body was removed. Seán never spoke about it again, either, which is why it's interesting that Bruin mentioned it at all."

"Bruin isn't normal," Jordan grunts. "Your father had him programmed so he would follow his instructions, and he said that Bruin couldn't feel pain at all."

"No one can do that, though," I say, unbelievingly.

"One person could, and he's dead now," Jordan says. "That's way too much power for one person to have. When you make whatever move you're planning on, kill him. As satisfying as you may think it'll be to torture him, it won't be. He won't scream for you, though his blood will run."

Jordan's tone is flat and dead as if he's talking about the weather or a new pair of shoes he plans to buy. There's no inflection or emotion.

"That's disappointing," I grumble, making Jordan smirk.

"I know, baby. If I thought he'd scream for you, I'd truss him up like Christmas ham for you," he says.

"Bloodthirsty," Brendan teases him.

"Karma is an Irish man or woman with an ax to grind," Jordan corrects. "Fuck, I'm about to fall over. I can't stop yawning."

"Some of those punches may have broken ribs," I tell him. "I'm going to need to wrap them, and then I'll call Dr. Kurtz tomorrow. He doesn't like Daddy."

"As long as my head can hit the pillow soon, you can do whatever you want to me, sweet girl," he groans, making me smile a bit more.

Maybe smiling and feeling things is like a muscle, maybe you have to exercise it? Teaching a made psychopath how to feel emotions is going to be a feat in itself, I think.

"You're thinking too hard, Lía," Brendan whispers against the shell of my ear as he helps me off the counter. "Quiet your thoughts, there will be time to voice them tomorrow if need be."

Nodding, I herd Jordan upstairs to play doctor, and then tuck him into bed to sleep. A part of me feels awkward leaving him, but his body is probably too sore to do anything more than sleep alone.

"Come lay down, baby," Brendan says once we're in our room. Pulling off my shirt and releasing my hair, I crawl into bed and his arms.

"Is this only weird for me?"

"You mean dating a man who has more self awareness in his pinky finger than we do?" Brendan teases me as he rubs my back. "Maybe it's supposed to be uncomfortable, because we're stepping outside of our comfort zone. Different doesn't mean bad, it simply means we're going to have to do the work to bridge whatever gaps in understanding there may be. You heard him, he wants this."

Holy shit, Jordan Miles wants us. Bubbles of surprise and excitement tingle through my body as my eyes get heavy and I fall asleep.