“Do you have anything?”
My mother’s sharp tones pull my thoughts away from Evelyn as I stare after her, watching her meekly follow after Hank. What was that sensation that passed between us? Her touch was so gentle, so alien compared to what I deserve. Especially after what I’m putting her through.
Confusion swirls like fog in my gut, so I push it down and stride toward the windows overlooking a city on the cusp of waking up.
“I have the witness who found Brenden.”
“And?” Mom demands. “Do they have anything useful?”
“No,” I sigh. “But I can use them to get us to someone who will have something useful.”
“Good.” She pauses heavily, and her voice is softer when she next speaks. “I called your father. I wanted to let him know about Brenden but he… well, you can imagine. He didn’t know who I was, never mind his own son.”
An older shard of pain embedded in my heart sinks in a little deeper at the thought of my father. In my youth, he was a vibrant and loyal man, but sickness stole him away from us and that pain knows no end. Early-onset dementia quickly spiraled into Alzheimer’s. One morning, I woke up and the man I called my father was just an empty shell, unrecognizable even to my mother who had spent nearly her entire life with him. We made the decision to send him back to Ireland, hoping that being around his childhood scenery would help soothe his soul.
To an extent, we were right. He’s alive and happy. He just doesn’t remember he has a huge family that loves him.
“Perhaps it’s a blessing,” Mom says as my silence drags on. “It would break his heart to know about Brenden.” Her voice cracks, and my heart follows with a sharp pain that lances right through my ribcage. I’m heartbroken, and the shards scatter around my insides with every angry beat of whatever is left.
“Brenden would understand,” I reply tightly. “He knew better than anyone how much of Dad was just a ghost.”
“I want their head, Cormac,” Mom says, and the cracks keep forming in her words. “I want their head on a platter, you understand me? I need—” She cuts herself off and distant sniffling carries through the phone.
I tighten my grip on the device until the plastic begins to crack and the ridges cut painfully into my palm. I share the same fury. It sits like a knot in my chest, tightening with each passing minute that my brother’s killer walks free. I want to soothe my mom, to comfort my siblings, and break the skull of the bastard who is causing such pain to everyone I love.
But I have no idea who it is, so that anger has nowhere to go. I’m going to drown at this rate.
“I need to go and deal with a detective, Ma. But if you need anything, you call me, alright?”
“Be safe,” she says, her voice thick. “I love you.”
“Love you too, Ma.”
After ending the call, I throw on a shirt and take the stairs down to the lobby of my apartment building in an attempt to burn off some of the rage locking up my muscles. It helps for a few minutes as I arrive breathless and find my younger brother and sister, twins Saoirse and Cian, waiting for me.
“Did you sprint down here?” Cian asks with a snort, crossing his thick arms over his broad chest and straining his shirt to the point that the buttons are holding on for dear life.
“Gotta keep in shape, little brother,” I reply, bouncing up to him and ruffling the tight collection of dark curls on top of his head. “Can’t have you beating me.”
“Fuck off.” Cian slaps my hand away. “I’d beat you any day of the week.”
“Time and place,” I challenge.
“Right here.” Cian starts to roll his sleeves up but stops when Saoirse elbows him sharply in the ribs.
“Put your fucking dick away,” she snaps, then she moves closer to me and pulls me into a tight hug. “How’s Ma?”
“About as bad as you can imagine,” I reply, hugging her back with one arm and dragging Cian in under my other. He fights me for half a second and then melts into the hug with a grunt. “She tried to call Dad.”
“And?” Saoirse looks up at me with old hope in her sparkling eyes. It fades the second I shake my head. “Figures,” she mutters.
“What you got for me?” With the intimate moment over, we step back from one another and the sibling bonds melt away, replaced with the bonds of loyalty. Brenden’s death catapulted me into the position of Captain, which had ripple effects on the entire hierarchy. Saoirse is now my underboss and Cian steps into her shoes as a General. In the space of a day, our lives and the entire layout of the Irish Mob changed.
Keeping a lid on her pain, Saoirse purses her lips and places a hand on her hip. “The Italians reached out. Matteo Barati, to be exact.”
“He didn’t send his son?” Cian snorts.
“Rocky’s probably too balls deep in some poor hooker to give a shit about what’s going on here,” Saoirse retorts. “But Matteo offers his sympathies and resources. He claims it’s in his best interests to get this matter resolved as quickly as possible.”
“You think he’s speaking out of guilt?” I ask. Saoirse’s analyses have proven invaluable over the years, so when she shakes her head, I trust her implicitly.
“He didn’t sound guilty. If he was, he would have sent one of his generals to offer sympathies rather than calling himself. I’m not ruling him out, but he’s not at the top of my list.”
“What would he even have to gain?” Cian remarks. “If he’s behind this, the peace treaty he signed with Brenden would go up in smoke. No guns for them, no drugs for us. And only one of those wins a war.”
Cian’s right, but it doesn’t soothe the growing itch under my skin to have a name and face I can pulverize. “One glance at our history and you can see how often someone fucks over something good for some small slight.”
Cian grumbles under his breath. “Fair.” Then he straightens up. “The Russians offered their own condolences in their own weird way. Flowers.” He wrinkles his nose. “I’m not even fully convinced they came from Anastasia.”
“Doubt it,” Saoirse replies. “Anastasia took over what, four months ago? The entire Remizova clan has been in uproar ever since her father died, and it’s no secret they hate having a woman in charge. Someone’s probably trying to undermine her by sending flowers because that’s what a woman would do.” Saoirse dramatically rolls her eyes. “As if Anastasia isn’t as fierce as they come.”
“Undermine her enough to kill?” I ask.
Saoirse meets my gaze. “Maybe.”
“Keep an eye on them.”
“Understood.”
“We do have a more immediate problem,” Cian remarks. “We can’t get into the crime scene. This new detective has the place sealed off and patrolled like crazy. None of them are ours, or Italian, so unless you know of a ghost that can get us in there, I have no idea how we can get in and find out what the fuck Brenden was even doing there.”
That is a pressing problem. There are too many unknowns around Brenden’s death like why the fuck he was even in that shitty motel in the first place. A look at the crime scene would give us a chance to check for anything he might have hidden before he died. I step away from my siblings, forcing myself to pace as my fingers seek comfort in the lighter buried in my pocket.
“The girl,” I say eventually. “She works there. I bet she can get in.”
“Really?” Cian snorts. “You want to entrust another thing to a fucking stranger?”
“What else do you want me to do, Cian?” I spin around, anger crawling up my spine like a rabid snake. “We don’t have the cops, we don’t have the crime scene. All we have is a fucking cleaner and a dead brother, so tell me, Cian, what brilliant plan do you have to get us in there, huh? Do you want to shoot your way in? Because more cop eyes on us right now would be fucking brilliant.”
“I don’t fucking know,” Cian snaps back, his voice rising. “I’m not the fucking Captain. It’s your job to guide us, but doing it on the back of some stranger?”
“Hey!” Saoirse steps between us, her eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. “One more word out of you and I’ll rip your balls off, you understand?” She glares at her twin, pointing one sharp, manicured finger at him. “And you.” Her angry eyes whip around to me. “I know you’re itching for a reason to explode, but Cian is right. You’re the Captain now, so rein it the fuck in, will you? I’m not some fucking mediator.”
Cian and I glare at one another for a few heated minutes until sense and Saoirse’s words finally sink in. She’s right, annoyingly so. The urge to lash out is so strong that I’m latching onto the slightest hint of discourse, hoping it will let me pound some flesh. But my brother doesn’t deserve it. He’s in as much pain as I am.
A silent apology passes between the two of us and Cian steps away, rubbing at the back of his neck.
“If Ma were here, she’d slap the both of you,” Saoirse mutters.
I clasp her shoulder and squeeze. “I’m sorry.”
“Fucking emotional men,” she grumbles, then she flashes me a sad smile. “It’s fine.”
Before I can say more, the elevator doors hiss softly and Hank strides out with Evelyn by his side. She’s changed into a pair of blue jeans and a light green shirt that strains slightly over her chest and is open enough to give a tantalizing flash of skin just below her neck.
My eyes linger for a second, but Evelyn is too nervous to notice my wandering eye. Her own gaze darts back and forth between the three of us while she twists her hands together and chews on her lower lip.
“Boss.” Hank greets me with a nod. “Satisfied?”
I follow the tilt of his head to Evelyn and nod. Having her turn up at the police station in the same clothes would have raised too many questions. She looks a little rough with messy hair and dark circles under her eyes, but she looks the part and that’s all that matters.
“Hungry?” I ask as Evelyn stops nearest me, likely because I’m the only one out of the three of us whom she’s spoken to.
Evelyn shakes her head.
“Right,” Cian snaps, and he abruptly approaches Evelyn. “It’s so fucking simple that a monkey could do it. You see this?” He pulls a tiny black square from his pocket and holds it in the palm of his hand. “You need to get this onto her desk near her computer. Stick it in a drawer or in a pen or something, as long as it’s near her computer, alright?”
With wide eyes, Evelyn nods so quickly that her hair bounces about her face.
“And this one.” He pulls out an even smaller one. “You need to get this on her person.”
“I—” Evelyn squeaks. “Her person?”
“Yes,” Cian sighs, visibly irritated. “On her person. How else the fuck do you want me to say it?”
The moment he roughly grasps her wrist, my spine jumps and I wrestle down the urge to shove his hand away from her. I’ve no idea where such a territorial urge came from, but it takes all my strength to remain still as Cian shoves the bugs into her hand.
“On her person. In her pocket, in her bag, hell, fucking kiss her and shove it down her throat for all I care.” Cian snaps his hand away and grumbles something under his breath about uselessness. “Don’t fuck it up.”
Following that, he strides away with Saoirse and slams his way out of the building. His anger is justified and I don’t hold it against him, but it irritates me the way he spoke to Evelyn when she’s clearly shaken to the core.
However, why I even care remains a mystery to me. She’s just a maid. The last person to see my brother. Other than that, she doesn’t matter.
“Wow.” Evelyn puffs out her cheeks. “No pressure.” Her words are soft, as if she’s talking to herself, so I don’t respond as I lead her out of the building to the car parked outside. As Hank opens the door for her, I catch her firmly by the forearm and stop her from climbing in.
“It feels like a lot,” I say as she turns those wide, doe-like eyes on me. “But you do this and one more thing for me, and then you are free to go.”
“You won’t kill me?” she asks, tilting her head slightly in a way that reminds me of a curious puppy.
“No,” I reply honestly. “As long as you don’t fuck this up.”
