Daddies Brat

Katriona

Their intoxicating scents warp the voice of reason screaming at me that I should be ten levels of afraid instead of turned on right now.

Focus, Kat.

Monitors in uniformed lines cover the spacious walls. Nearly every inch is covered with live video from one room or another.

I shake a finger at the moving wall. “Like a little TV, do we? Do these people know you’re recording them?” When I get nervous my mouth tends to run a little more than it should. Glad to know my bad habits follow me into the devil’s lair. “Do you save it, go home and kick back and watch them like porn reruns?”

I hear something like a soft chuckle come from one of the guys behind me.

“Do you always insult your employers?” Comes the voice again and I’m getting closer to pinpointing its exact location.

I shake my head, my lower lips sliding between my teeth a moment before my mouth decides to run with the first thought that pops into my head. “Um, no. Not really. Only when I’m led to dark rooms with mysterious voices talking down at me like some wizard behind a curtain.” I continue to scan the room.

Then he appears.

My eyes draw to his when a slash of light from overhead clicks on.

Green. Magnetic. I can’t look away. Intense just like the man.

He wears his hair short similar to Grey and Drake and has a hard set to his jaw. Where they have their suit jackets neatly buttoned, no doubt hiding guns, I find this one’s discarded, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up to reveal flourishes of ink marking both arms completely to the wrists.

I inhale sharply. Sylan Ward.

As mysterious as he is powerful. I shiver as he steps from the far corner of the room to stand in front of me. I force my limbs to break free from the momentary paralysis and take a half step back. Which puts me in Drake and Grey’s arms. Or at least pressed up against their chests. A wave of intoxicating power engulfs me.

My gaze rises to Sylan’s mouth first, then dips to his chin. Both smooth and strong. Over and over again I find myself attracted to the way the right side pulls a little higher than the left. My attention drifts to his hands and my mind fills with ideas of his mouth on mine. Tasting the whiskey I smell on his breath when our tongues stroke together.

To my complete shock he smiles down at me as if he can read my thoughts and then he touches me. He gently grasps my arm right below the forming bruises Muscles left on me earlier. Sylan turns it this way and that so he can examine the full extent of the goon’s fingerprints on my arm.

My head drops and I cast my gaze to the floor. Please don’t let him ask, please don’t let him ask.

“It’s nothing,” I say, trying to head off the questions I know are coming.

Chills erupt over my exposed skin and believe me when I say there are not many inches of my body covered in clothes. These uniforms leave nothing to the imagination.

“Look at me, Katriona.” I raise my eyes to meet his. Banked fury rages behind thick lashes. Instinct drives me to pull my arm free and flee, but there’s a wall of muscle behind me keeping me in place.

“Shh,” he soothes, stroking the pad of his thumb over the bruises. We stand like that-him touching me and me caught in his hypnotic gaze-until my heart settles again.

“I won’t hurt you. We won’t hurt you. Now tell us who did this to you?”

What the hell is happening here? My body responds to his gentle words like he has whispered them into my ear after a long lovemaking session.

My core tightens and I’m not imagining the heat slipping from my folds to wet the strip of cloth between my legs.

Am I going crazy? I didn’t go wild for guys, especially ones with dark reputations like his-theirs. I pull my arm free of his hand and cross them over my breasts.

“It doesn’t matter who did it. It happened. Maybe we should talk about why I’m here,” I urge more calmly because I have a feeling if I can get them to answer, I am going to need it just as slowly.

He waves my words away. “The incident downstairs is of no matter. We won’t speak of it again.”

“Like I said,” Drake speaks up. His sharp eyes catch mine. “You don’t need to worry about him. He won’t be touching you again.” His words are dry, emotionless. Like he’s done this a million times and has no problem ridding the world of people who irritate him.

“Or any woman for that matter,” Grey adds and a million questions run through my head but boil down to one important one.

I tilt my head to the side. “Did you kill him? For touching me?” To keep my hands busy I smooth them over the front of my bodice and down my skirt again and again. I have no right to question the dangerous-looking mobsters who are surrounding me like a pack of lions, but I can’t help myself. My momma liked to say I was a glutton for punishment every day of the week. I guess I’m proving her right.

That brought me back to the question at hand. “Answer me, did you kill him?” Were they going to kill me, too?

Each of them watches me intently.

“We’re not in the habit of letting others commit disrespect in our establishments.”

I cast my attention between the three of them. I swallow a rising wave of bile. Is that what they consider a for sure yes without saying it, or an excuse?

I swallow quickly and feel my breath catch in the back of my dry throat. “Maybe I should go.” I pivot on my heel, yanking a little on my foot when my four-inch spike digs into the carpet. “Yeah, I don’t want to cause any more trouble than I already have.”

A finger hooks over the lip of my bodice and I’m stopped in my tracks. Held prisoner by a single finger.

Fuck. Fear battles with an equal dose of excitement.

Sylan runs the pad of his finger over the swell of my breasts, causing goosebumps to rise in the wake of his seeking caress. Despite the blast of cool air filling the dark, spacious room I’m overheating at a surprising rate. I tense under his hold and fully expect him to rip through the ties any second and bare me to the entire room. Take what he wants. Use me. Just like every man ever did with my mother.

But he doesn’t; he enjoys the lingering moments our skin connects it seems. But I can’t read his stoic expression any more than I can a slab of stone. The only indication I might not end up in a gutter by sunrise is that I’m still breathing.

So I stick with the silver lining.

And the utterly strange fact I like his touch. And the feeling of Drake and Grey so near.

He fingers the hanging silk bow holding the two sides of my bodice together, his sharp green eyes taking in every detail. The way my breasts quiver under his heated gaze. How my breath comes shallow and most importantly, how the outline of my hard nipples stand out against the confines of the soft leather.

His attention shifts to my upper arm.

Drake curses under his breath from my right and I hear something similar come from Grey. Sylan is who speaks. “The man who assaulted you.”

“What about him?”

“Did he do it at Kane’s command?”

I blink twice before I shake my head. I rub at the tender spot they’re all eying. “Not so much. But his goon didn’t seem to care when I didn’t follow orders.”

Did I just hear them say Kane? I grow still. Did I say something wrong? Do they know my father? Know I’m his daughter? They had to, right? God, I knew I should have taken the job at the diner instead of letting Nikki talk me into this gig. She swore the owners never paid attention to anyone as long as they did their job.

I ask the dangerous question I know I shouldn’t. “How do you know my father?”

My words bring a small smile to Sylan’s lips and a murderous tinge to his eyes.

“Everyone knows your father, mo chroi. We’ve been looking for him. Where do you think we can find the devil?”

Two simple questions tell me everything I need to know.This text is property of Nô/velD/rama.Org.

Sylan leans close. So close I can feel his breath brush against my bare neck, his warmth meld with mine. Any closer and I could be in his arms.

“I know you’re scared. You can whisper the answer to me and no one will ever know. Ever hurt you. That I swear an oath to.” With his nearness comes a masculine scent that only warms the flush in my cheeks.

When I say nothing, his fingers move from the silk strand to tease over the lacy ruffle lining the top of the bodice.

My teeth skim my lower lip.

“Answer me, mo chroi. Where? And don’t lie. We know who you are as well. We don’t have time to fuck around.”

I ignore how my nipples turn to stone under his gentle touches. My already tense muscles go so rigid I feel like I’ll crack down the middle at any moment.

The look on my face must have screamed shocked as hell, because Grey sighs heavily, shaking his head.

I jerk toward Grey. “How? How did you know?”

“You don’t think you’re under our roof by accident, do you?”

I press a hand to my rolling stomach. “I don’t anymore, I guess.” Confusion crinkles my brow. I don’t have time to mull over what Sylan means, he’s already talking again and he has my full attention.

“When someone like your father gets into business with us, knowing all of his assets makes good business sense.”

“Assets as in family? For blackmail. You dig up family connections, dirty kinks… whatever… on people for blackmail or so you can kidnap them to get what you want? But how did you know about me?” Since we’re not trying to tiptoe around details anymore, I don’t hold back.

Sylan narrows his eyes at me, a dark smile on his lips. “You’re not very good at covering your tracks. Nor is he. Or we’re just better at what we do.” Sylan skims his fingers down my skirt only to stop at the hem and trace the thin edge. Leaving me breathless as to what he would do next. Strip me, pull the leather up to reveal my bare ass cheeks to his business partners.

Drake pulls out his phone and flips it around to show me a picture of myself. A couple of years back. The day I walked into my father’s house. Back then I had pure titanium for a backbone and enough hope to drown out all the evil in the world. Despite the nagging fear my mother was right, I held onto that hope until my father shoved me out of his life and slammed the door in my face. I’d been so wrong and now I’m paying the price for it.

That was the day I found out who my father really is. A slithering snake. An opportunist who crushed others to get ahead. What did that make me?

Sylan cups my face, his thumb just below my jaw. I can’t help but lean into the warm, gentle touch a little. I’m only human.

“We’ve watched you from that day on, mo chroi. How do you think you found a roommate so fast when your last one bailed? Landed a job with no experience in a place like this? How not a soul has bothered you? You don’t think your father has other enemies who know about you?”

The relative peace I’ve lived all starts to make a lot of sense as twisted as it sounds. “Keep friends close, enemies closer. Or should I say the daughter of the enemy?”

Sylan’s smile turns smug.

I take a sharp breath and ground myself inside from the pain his words cause. “Nikki?”

“Paid member of our establishment who doubles as a bodyguard.”

Betrayal, thick and black, sinks into my soul. All the nights we spent talking. Me spilling my guts about my mobster father, telling her about all the nasty shit I had to deal with while her life was almost peaches and cream in comparison. All the fake sentiments she blubbered back about always being there for me. My ride-or-die chick for life.

How could she! Fucking bitch.

Sylan drew me out of my thoughts by taking both sides of my face in his palms.

“Answer me and we can move on from this. Get to the real reason you’re here.” His voice became darker this time, slightly edgier, almost irritated. My lips quivered, drawing his gaze and what he did next drew a gasp of shock from both of us.

Or did he groan? I don’t know. I can’t focus at all on how good the mobster’s mouth feels on mine. He hauls me against his body so that I land on his chest, the heat of his body searing into mine. I feel a hard chest against my back and more hands on me than my shocked brain can focus on.

Callused hands take me by the waist and I’m leaning against someone’s broad chest, my legs wrapped around Sylan’s waist.

Spreading my legs wide, my skirt gives enough to ride high. Between my legs I feel Sylan. His arousal is hard and thick pressing against me. “Sylan,” I whisper before he swallows my voice.