Chapter 13

13

PATRICK

I haven’t been this drunk in years.

I usually stop at two or three, max. I can’t run a business, take care of my parents, and be there for my sister if I’m drunk or hungover all the time.

But between Saoirse—the sister I’m supposed to be helping—and Ian buying drinks, Cara showing up, and Maddie fecking kissing me... I’m a mess.

I stumble to the Jacks down the dark hallway—where I kissed Maddie the first time. After relieving myself, I trip back out into the hallway and my shoulder hits the doorframe, catching me from falling on my arse.

Where is she? I lean against the cool wood wall for a moment. I was half hoping to find her here, waiting for me.

I am so tempted to let myself go with her.

Logically, I know it would never work. Not only because she’s leaving, but because of who I am.

I’m wrecked.

Time to go home and sleep this off. I run my hand down my face. Luckily, the door to my flat is right here, and the keys are in my pocket. Brilliant. I unlock the first door, which leads to the steep, dark staircase up to my flat. The door shuts behind me and the noise of the bar immediately dims. A sensor kicks off a low light, but I fumble with the torch on my mobile anyway and climb up the stairs. Aye—leaving the pub is the right thing to do. I need to sleep this off.

It takes me five tries to get the key into the lock.

And the moment the door swings wide to reveal the living space, I realize what I’ve done.

This is not my flat.

Well. It is , but I’ve rented it out.

To Maddie Hart.

She’s standing a meter in front of me in the nearly pitch-dark, a beam of moonlight from the street side window gently illuminating her. She’s in her fecking underwear and the tank top she was wearing earlier, but— Christ save me —without a bra, looking hot as hell, and aggressively holding what appears to be a butter knife.

“Patrick? What the actual fuck are you doing?” There’s a slight shake to her hand, but her face relaxes.

“Shite, I’m so sorry, Maddie.” I run a hand from the back of my head through my hair to my face, rubbing my eyes and then opening them to make sure she’s still really there. Aye. I really did feck up this bad.

“Damn.” She lowers the knife to her side and relaxes her shoulders, easing her fighting stance. “You scared me.” Maddie puts her hand on her chest as if to feel her racing heart.

“I got confused. I forgot this isn’t my flat to stumble home to... there were too many shots tonight. But I’ll leave now.” I go to turn but drop my mobile on the ground. “I just need to get my torch on again. It’s dark as hell in that stairway.”

“Wait.” She steps forward. We’re an arm’s length apart now, the knife still in her hand at her side. “Where are you going? Because you’re trashed.”

“Back to the pub? Home?” I concentrate on making my words clear and understandable. I concentrate on not looking down again— shite! —at her breasts, covered by the thin fabric of her tank top, the lack of bra and low moonlight showcasing her nipples through the thin black fabric.

“How are you getting home?”

I shrug, truly unsure of the answer. “Can you put the knife away? It’s distracting.”

As if that’s what’s screwing with me right now.

She glances down and huffs a laugh. “Yeah. I was protecting myself from whoever was breaking into the flat.”

“You heard me coming in, jumped up from your bed, stopped by the kitchen for the bluntest knife you could find, and then had time to pose menacingly?”

“I fell asleep on the couch. And it took you a long time to get the door unlocked.” Maddie cocks her head, then seems to remember she’s wearing hardly anything at all. Her eyes widen as she quickly darts a look down at herself.

I lose the battle to keep my eyes on her face, and instead let them roam over her long legs, the curve of her thighs, and her high-waisted black underwear slightly askew and revealing a delicious curve of her arse. Her tank is bunched up on one side and exposes a line of skin between the top of her underwear and the bottom hem of the top. All the blood in my body rushes to my cock.

“Patrick.” Her voice is a warning, although I’m not sure of what. “Just stay for a few minutes. You can hardly stand up straight.” Even in the dark, Maddie’s cheeks are tinted pink.

Jaysus. Does she know what I’m thinking? About cupping her arse with my hands, feeling her curves in my palms...

I should really get out of here.

“Not sure that’s the best idea.” It’s a fecking awful idea. Stay here? In this flat, with her looking like that? With the memory of her kiss on my lips... again?

Yes. A dreadful idea.

She places a hand on her chest again. “My heart’s still racing.”

Wait. Maddie wants me to stay.

“I’ll stay to make sure you don’t have a heart attack.” I shove the door shut behind me with a kick of my foot and step closer to her. Within touching distance.

“Did you call me Maddie earlier?” A slightly breathless question. “Just now and back at the pub, when I...” She trails off.

“Did I?” I lift my hand. “Are you okay? Maybe I should feel your heartbeat.” I move my hand toward her chest, waiting for a protest, but she pulls it beneath hers and presses our linked hands just above her breasts. Her heart is pounding about as fast as mine is. There’s something soothing about feeling that steady beat.

The softest sound squeaks from her throat.

I take another step until we’re mere centimeters apart, and I slowly reach down for the knife, my fingers sliding down her hand, brushing hers. But instead of taking it, I leave my hand over hers and move my other one from her chest to the bare dip of her waist. She breathes heavily, her chest rising up and down, and I gently tug her closer until she’s flush against me. Maddie gasps, and I get why. The feeling of our bodies pressed together is intoxicating.

“You kissed me tonight.” I suddenly feel much more sober. Our bodies touching illuminates in my mind what I want.

Her. Christ, do I want her.

“Yeah, I did.”

The knife slips from our fingers and clatters to the ground next to my mobile. Neither of us glance down. She entwines her now empty fingers with mine and fists a handful of my t-shirt with the other hand, as if making sure I don’t flee.

“Are you mad about it? Me kissing you? You didn’t answer the question before.”

I shake my head, words lodged in my throat, and slide my hand over the top of her arse, down to where the hem has ridden up, giving access to her exposed cheek. Another quiet squeak emerges from deep in her throat. She feels perfect. I gently squeeze a handful of her arse.

“So you kissed me first in that dark hallway. I kissed you next in the pub. Now I think it’s your turn.” Maddie turns her head toward me, tugging on my shirt, pulling me down.

Those words are all that I need. I crash my mouth onto hers, bending so our height difference doesn’t even matter. Our connection is an explosion on my lips and desire roaring from my groin. I thrust my tongue in her mouth, sweeping and searching and exploring. She throws her arms around my neck and jumps up, wrapping her legs around my waist. I easily catch her and hold her in place by her arse, pressing her against me so hard, I can feel her center against my cock.

This is exactly what I need. Her body against mine, her moans in my mouth.

Right now, it doesn’t feel like I would break anything having to do with Maddie. How could this be wrong when it feels so good?

I back us over to the couch, dodging my homemade coffee table, and collapse so she’s straddling me, wiggling on my hips as our lips remain locked. Fuck, I’m incredibly hard. I run my hands up her back under her tank top, the feel of her skin like smooth, warm water on my hands.

I pull back for a second to look at her, her wild dark hair scattered over her shoulders and back and chest, those dark eyes smoldering into mine, like she’s a sparking firework about to explode and blow my head off.

“Hey.” I push a chunk of hair out of her face.

She smiles at me, leans in for one kiss, and moves her body slowly against mine. I’m hyper aware of the thin fabric of her underwear. I bet she’s soaked for me. I groan and savor the sensation, my mind craving the feel of her from the inside, but I focus on the curve of her face, her irises that seem almost black in the moonlight.

If only I could have her. Have this.

“You’re wearing too much clothing.” Her voice is husky and filled with need, and the movement of her pelvis is making it hard to think about anything except that raging need to bury myself in her.

I’d do anything to feel it.

But I don’t unbuckle my jeans. I don’t strip my shirt off.

This woman isn’t some random American tourist that I can sleep with and push out of my bed. She’s not someone who will leave tomorrow to drive the Ring of Kerry or take a tour bus through Dublin or Galway or head up to Northern Ireland to check out the tourist sites.

She’s not a one-night stand.

One-night stands are my rule. It protects me from the inevitable rejection once they get to know me. It protects them from deep disappointment.

Maddie’s more important than all that.

Not just because she’s Oliver’s fiancée’s little sister.

Not just because she’s my current day manager.

Not just because she’s renting my flat.

The room spins lazily as we stare into each other’s eyes. She’s waiting for my move, and I want to make it so badly, to strip off her remaining clothes and be with her completely.

A flicker of doubt crosses her face.

“Oh shit,” she whispers. “You don’t want this.” Maddie practically leaps off my lap, throwing herself next to me on the couch, a chilly cloud settling between our warm bodies.

She thinks I don’t want her? I swallow hard and lean my head back. Feck, it’s hot in here.

“Maddie, if you think I don’t want this...” She couldn’t be more wrong. I shift my hips and obviously adjust my stiff, aching cock in my jeans, proof of my desire for this woman.

My cock is furious with me for what I just did.

I turn to Maddie, who has her legs bent up and tucked against her chest, forehead pressed to her knees. I can’t see her face through her thick hair.

How I want to pull her into my arms and kiss the pain away. As if I want to reject her? That’s the last thing I want.

“What are you doing here, Patrick?” Her voice is so hurt. It twists that blunt kitchen knife into my heart.

“I forgot. I just . . . forgot.”

She laughs gently without humor. “It was really a mistake?”

But was it? Or was I coming to find Maddie? I was searching for her in the pub, in the hallway, and I must’ve remembered somewhere beyond the half dozen pints that she was up here. And that I had a key.

She groans. “And then I assaulted you. This time with a weapon.” Her voice is choked with a tinge of humor.

“No.” I grin in the dark. “That’s not what that was.” Against my better judgment, I grab her by her waist and pull her onto my lap. Instead of burying my face in her breasts, I wrap my arms around her in a giant hug. She hesitates for a second and then nestles into me, her cheek pressed against my chest. A glowing warmth fills me, and I kiss the top of her head.

“I’m pissed.”

“Huh?” She jerks in my arms.

“Locked. Trollied. Plastered. I’m drunk, Maddie.”

Her body settles again.

“Oh. Right. So am I. Which is why I left the pub.” She turns her face up to me and our lips are so close, it takes just a slight movement to join them again.

This time, it’s gentle, a pressing of our mouths together, just the slightest flicker of her tongue against mine.

I moan and pull away.

“This shouldn’t happen, for so many reasons. You know that, right, Maddie?”

“You keep calling me Maddie.” Her mouth turns up in a lazy grin.

“Do you prefer Madison?”

“You know I don’t.” She settles in the nook between my shoulder and my neck. Her hot breath on my skin makes my heart race even faster.

My self-control is about ready to break, but then she nods against my chest.

“Because we’re drunk.”

“Yes.”

“Because I work for you.”

I hesitate. God knows I don’t give a feck about that. Not with her.

“Because of a lot of things, love.”

She pauses, then says in a voice so low I almost don’t hear it as much as feel it, “Because I’m too much.”

Feck.

“No. You’re not too much.”

She sighs, and I want to say more, but her body is warm and soft against mine, and I don’t want to ruin the moment any more than I already have.

We sit that way until our hearts slow and her breathing steadies. Wish I could say the same for my raging hard-on.

“Lay down,” I whisper. I adjust my body so we’re in a horizontal position, and she stretches out on the couch, our bodies touching in every spot. Her eyes are shut.

I should carry her to her bed. I should untangle us before we are hopelessly entwined in every fecking way.

Before I shut my eyes and wait for sleep to come, I have a realization.

I really like this woman.

I like her sunny personality, her bright smile, the way she lights up any room she walks into. The way she’s not afraid of me, not even a little. I like her laugh and her dark eyes and the layers of her, the top one a cheery facade and deeper ones etched with the pain of a past I know little about.

I press a kiss to her head and breathe her in. I haven’t felt this way in a long time.