I lifted my head as a file was dropped on my desk. Frowning, I picked it up, barely sparing my personal assistant a glance before skimming over the top page. It had taken longer than I had anticipated to get information on everyone who worked in our security department following the office break-in.
On the surface, every single one of them checked out—including my old assistant, CeCe. I hadn’t been satisfied, however, and had Zio Ciro’s computer expert look, Desi, further into their personal lives. The man had dug deeper, going so far as to hack their bank accounts to see if there had been any unusual activities in the months before and after the break-in.
The only thing that had stuck out was that CeCe had a great-uncle in Ireland.
Normally, where someone’s distant relative lived wouldn’t be something I was concerned with. But considering the particular city the uncle lived in, that set off warning bells for not only me, but Pop as well. Just to play things safer, Desi had been asked to look into this great-uncle of CeCe’s. Since the man lived off the grid and was untraceable even on the dark web, it had taken time to get any intel.
“That will be all, Eduard. Thank you,” I told him dismissively before turning my full attention to the file.
My gaze fell on the name I’d been dreading seeing by the time the door quietly clicked closed behind my male assistant. Just reading that last name made my skin feel uncomfortable. Too tight, too itchy…too scarred.
The scars were faded now. The slightly raised burn marks nothing more than light lines on my chest and back. Nova didn’t even see them when she touched me, but she knew what they were from. She and Mom were the only two people in the world I spoke to about how I got them.
The O’Brion name was a powerful one in Ireland. My maternal grandfather had held one of the top positions in the IRA until his death. But while Cormac was still powerful in his home country, he’d turned over what he’d had in the US to the Vitucci family when Pop had married my biological mother, Sheena.
I had vague memories of Cormac, having only seen him a few times in my life. Pop killed Sheena the night he’d discovered her abusing me, but Cormac must have already known about the evil that lived inside his daughter because he’d accepted her death without the threat of retaliation.
The rest of Sheena’s family, however, was another story.
Sheena’s grandmother—my biological maternal great-grandmother—had wanted blood for the death of her beloved favorite grandchild. Cormac forbade it, from what my sources told me, but I’d had ears to the ground since the moment news of his death had reached me. So far, there had been no retaliation, but my gut was telling me that this had something to do with my great-grandmother’s thirst for blood.
Sheena, whom my mother had been named after, was just as evil as my biological mother had been, from all that I’d learned about the old woman. What little I knew about the rest of her family, they weren’t much better, if not worse in some regards. She had several other great-grandchildren, and the worst of them all was Bain O’Farrell.
Muttering a curse, I picked up my phone. After letting Pop and Zio know what our man in Ireland had reported back, I didn’t have to explain to them how potentially serious this was. There was a reason the picture of me with C
iana had been taken rather than the one of Nova and me. If Bain had his eye on my cousin, then I was sure he would try to use her against us in some way.
Once they assured me they would take extra security measures with Ciana, I opened the app on my phone to check in on Nova. Since I’d left her back in California after spending a few days following the new year, I’d been constantly looking at the live feed of the hidden security cameras that had been placed not only in her room and around her house, but at her school as well.
The first camera I checked was her locker, but other than a few people passing, I didn’t see my little angel. It was just after eleven in California, which was lunchtime for her, so I scanned the cafeteria for her but couldn’t spot her beautiful blond head. Finally, I found her in the library, which had been remodeled after her attack a few years ago. She was seated at a table in the back corner of the room, her favorite spot. A sandwich wrapped in a napkin was on the table, an open book in front of her…
And some douchebag sitting far too close to her as they both looked over a notebook. His shoulder brushed against hers, his lips moving as he said something that made her laugh. I couldn’t hear either of them since the camera feed didn’t have audio. Jealous that he was getting to hear her precious laugh when I couldn’t, I tightened my fingers around the phone in my hand until it cracked in protest.
Gritting my teeth, I called Nova, putting her on speaker so I could return to the CCTV feed on my screen. The picture was a bit blurry around the edges now from the slight damage I’d caused the piece of technology, but I could still see her and the guy beside her.
As she pulled her phone out of her backpack, her face lit up when she saw who was calling, and she swiped her thumb over the screen. “Hi.” Her sweet voice filled my ears. “Did you eat lunch? How is work going?”
I tried to rein in my jealousy and leaned back in my chair to enjoy the view of her, attempting to ignore the asshole beside her. “It has been a long day, so I haven’t eaten yet. It’s only been a week since I left you, and I already need to hold you again.”
Fuck, I’d needed that from the moment I’d stepped foot back on the jet without her. It took all my strength to stay on board and fly back to New York alone.
“Maybe you can come back for Valentine’s Day,” she suggested, a smile teasing at her lips. “It’s on a Friday this year, so we could spend the entire weekend together.”
“It’s a date, my heart.” The guy seated beside her shifted closer, pretending to look over the page of the notebook, but while Nova’s head was turned away, I was able to see the way he sniffed her hair.
My hand slapped down on my desk, hard. The unexpected loud clap caused Nova to jump, her head snapping up and nailing the guy in the chin. “Ouch,” she cried, rubbing at her head, while the guy groaned and touched his hand to his mouth. From the looks of it, she had caused him to bite his tongue when her head connected with his chin, because when he lifted his fingers from his mouth, they were smeared with blood.
“Sorry. Are you okay?” she asked, lifting the phone from her mouth. That’s when I saw the necklace around her neck. The platinum Russian rings. My name engraved into the top overlapping one. Marking her as mine.
“Yeah.” I heard his voice through the receiver, his pain-filled eyes eating up the sight of her like it was candy. “It was my own fault. I was too close, trying to read. Is that an important call? It’s just that I have that bio test I need to make up next period, and you promised to help me study.”
“Right, sorry.” She put the phone closer to her mouth, her shoulders drooped in disappointment. “Ryan, I have to go. I’m helping Brent study. I’ll call you back after school, okay?”
Swallowing a curse, I cleared my throat. “Okay, baby. We’ll talk soon.” My eyes were glued to her face. “I love you.”
“I love you too,” she murmured softly, her eyes seeming to glow on the screen. “Bye, Ryan.”
“Bye, my heart.”