Olcan (Boston Bear Brothers 2)

James nodded and looked toward Hannah. She shrugged and sat down on a nearby chair, looking utterly bored with the whole situation.

“Listen, we really don’t have a lot of time to look for someone. My schedule has been moved up and Hannah is eager to go with me so that she can get a few days of relaxation in before the work begins. She’s my best asset when it comes to winning over customers,” he laughed. “I’m perfectly happy for you to start today on Liam’s recommendation. We don’t leave until Friday, but that will give you a couple of days to get the hang of things around here before we go. How do you feel about that?”

“I, um, don’t know what to say. Aye. I can do that. I just need to fetch me things is all.”

“Sounds good to me. Hannah, do you have anything to add?”

“No. I’m fine with it if you are. We’ll cover all the particulars after Niamh has had a chance to get her things.”

“Well, thank you,” Niamh replied, completely baffled by how easy this had been. They’d not even asked her to meet their child or anything. It seemed a bit weird, but what choice did she have but to accept? “I’ll get a cab and be back in about an hour or so, if that works for the both of you.”

“Perfect,” he roared, already walking out of the room.

Niamh said her goodbyes to them, texting a cab from outside and returning to the Greyhound station to retrieve her suitcase. She should have brought it with her, after all, and saved herself a trip. She was still a bit shocked by how easy that had been, but she wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. She called the hotel and canceled her reservation there before calling to let him know that she had gotten the job and was moving into the house.

“Good work, Niamh. Don’t let us down,” he told her, his voice more a warning than anything else.

She ended the call and stepped into the cab that approached, sighing loudly as she sat down in the back seat and it pulled away from the curb of her new, albeit temporary, home in the South Boston suburbs. This was nothing like she expected it to be, but there were far fewer desirable places to be and considerably fewer situations she could find herself in. Instead, she would be living in a lovely home for now with only limited responsibilities.

She couldn’t help but feel some anxiety over the whole thing as she returned to the house. She was in a strange country, and the people who had sent her had a lot riding on her presence. If she fucked up, it wouldn’t be some unfortunate failure where she’d get fired or dismissed. The stakes for failing at this were far direr and she simply couldn’t afford them.

Even thinking about it send her heart flip-flopping about her chest and she had to try to calm herself before she started having an anxiety attack. Though that had been a rare thing in her earlier days, the recent months had found them happening with increasing frequency. She forced herself to calm down, not wanting to look clammy and freaked out when she returned.

Instead, she focused on something smaller. One day at a time was her best option for getting through this. Though she had an unbelievably detailed list regarding how to pull this whole thing off, she was still not certain as to how it would work out, and the more she thought about it, the more anxious she became.CHAPTER TWOOlcan

“SHE NEEDS A BREAK FROM all of this,” Fergus was saying, but Olcan was hardly listening. He was watching an unfamiliar woman wrestle with the large English Mastiff that belonged to his neighbors across the street. She was stacked like a brick house, her long black hair tied up in a messy bun that made him want to unleash it and watch it fall across her shoulders.

Sweat beaded up across her brow and clung to the rounded globes visible above her low cut tank top as she bent over to clean up the business he’d done in the front yard and tried to coax him back into the house. Olcan stood behind the mirrored glass front windows of his house that afforded him privacy in the daytime and watched her with growing interest, not only because of her looks, but because she was a stranger in his neighborhood.

“Who’s the lass?” Fergus asked, catching him off guard. He’d not heard his brother move up behind him until he was leaning downward to get a better angle on what was so riveting outside the window.

“Don’t know. That is what I was just wondering,” Olcan replied.

“I bet you were,” Fergus laughed. “Did you hear a word I just said?”