Sloan O’Malley held her phone, staring at the caller ID while it rang. There was no name next to the number, but there didn’t have to be. She knew who it was. Carrigan. Her thumb hovered over the end call button, but she couldn’t do that any more than she could answer it. Some days she wished she could see things as black and white as her father did. To him, Carrigan had betrayed the family by dodging her forced marriage to Dmitri Romanov and falling in love with James Halloran instead. She did the most unforgivable thing of all—daring to choose a man over her family. To Seamus O’Malley, Carrigan was dead and gone the second she walked out the door. He’d done what passed for mourning for a few days, and then to all appearances, it was business as usual.
Though he hadn’t mentioned marriage where Sloan was concerned.
Six months of waiting for the sword to fall—would she have to take Carrigan’s place to secure an alliance with the Romanovs?—and Sloan was just plain exhausted. But her father hadn’t even breathed the word marriage, to Dmitri or otherwise, and she suspected she had Carrigan to thank for the reprieve.
Sloan set her phone aside, where it finally stopped ringing, and sent her sister to voice mail. They hadn’t talked since she’d walked out of the house, leaving the rest of them to fend for themselves while she pursued her happiness. Sloan was a terrible person for judging her for that, but she couldn’t seem to stop. Maybe if Carrigan’s happiness had been tied up in anyone other than a Halloran it would have been easier to stomach. Maybe.
She still didn’t understand. There were millions of men out there in the world, none of which was responsible—directly or otherwise—for the death of Devlin. Why couldn’t her sister have fallen in love with one of them? That, at least, would be understandable.
Sloan left her phone on her dresser and slipped on her shoes. She had to get out of this house, which had started to feel a whole lot like a tomb. Her siblings were dropping off, one by one. Even those who hadn’t left felt like they had a foot out the door. They’re all going to leave me. Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But it will happen.
Cillian didn’t chafe at the bit of familial responsibility, but he was half the man he used to be. Their father saw it as his growing up, but Sloan knew better. Part of the thing inside him that had been so vital and full of life was withered and dead. How long before the rest of him followed suit?
Keira…She wrapped her arms around herself as she hurried downstairs. She didn’t know Keira anymore. The girl who’d been all sunshine and roses was something else altogether. The last time Sloan tried to talk to her, Keira shoved her. She was a ticking bomb, and it was only a matter of time before she exploded.
And Aiden…He might say and do all the right things, but Sloan could see how much it killed him to see his siblings hurt. It wasn’t enough to push him to make different decisions, but the hurt was there all the same.
She was losing them.
The knowledge weighted her steps and made her head fuzzy. Everywhere she looked was a reminder that things were changing, faster and faster, until it was impossible for her to keep up. She slipped out the back door and inhaled deeply. The cool spring night eased her tension, but only a little.
A figure melted out of the shadows, and she tensed for a minute before she recognized her father’s man, Liam. “I’m going to the church.” She’d meant for the words to come out as a statement, but in reality they were closer to a question. She hated herself a little bit more for being so unforgivably timid.
Liam nodded. “I’ll get the car.”
“No.” The word came out sharper than she intended, and she had to clamp her mouth shut to stem an apology. “I want to walk.”
He hesitated, but finally nodded. “Okay.”
It wasn’t terribly far from the town house to Our Lady of Victories, but she couldn’t remember ever walking it before. It was still early enough in the evening that there was plenty of foot traffic, people going on about their lives, each with their own stories and trials and tribulations. It made her feel small and unimportant, which was strangely comforting. She was just one more person in a crowd, going about her business and focused on her own problems. I’m not that different from any one of these people.
It was a lie. No matter their stories, she doubted these strangers had to deal with things like arranged marriages, or being part of a criminal family enterprise, or a father who had never quite made it out of the Middle Ages.
The feeling of oneness passed, making her feel even emptier than she had before. And significantly more overheated. The worst of the afternoon heat might be past, but that didn’t stop her shirt from sticking to her back as she crossed the street. She tried to stop from wishing for the cool air-conditioning of their town car and failed miserably.
The O’Malleys might preach family before all, but it was to family that they were the cruelest. She wished she could set herself apart from that truth, but that would be a lie. Carrigan had been trying to reach her for months, and Sloan had ignored every single call, secure in her hurt and betrayal.
Because she should have chosen us. Not a Halloran.
There it was—the truth, petty and ugly. Once upon a time, Sloan had prided herself on her sensitivity and her willingness to listen and be the sole person who gave her various family members a shoulder to lean on. She wasn’t sure when that had changed—maybe with Devlin’s death, maybe even before that—but she was just as much part of the problem now as her father was.
The realization made her stomach lurch.
Needing to escape her own head, she focused back on the people around her. For all that Boston was famed for being a walking city, her family made a point of taking a car everywhere they needed to go. She’d never considered how elitist that act was, but as she stretched out her strides and walked down the sidewalk, she was faced with a startling truth—she’d missed out on a lot by taking those car rides. Maybe I’m not as much of an odd duck within the family as I thought. Maybe I fit in all too well. If that wasn’t depressing, she didn’t know what was.
Our Lady of Victories sat nestled on Isabella, just like it had for over a hundred years. There were countless buildings like that around the city—places that could trace their roots back to the 1700s. There were people like that, too, their family lines something they bragged about as if it actually meant something. It was the one area where the O’Malleys failed miserably. They hadn’t come over on the Mayflower or been part of the first settlers who’d carved this city out of the so-called savage land around it.
As a result, the O’Malleys would always be “new money.” And that wasn’t even taking into account their criminal connections. No, if her mother had once dreamed of being the belle of upper society, those dreams had turned to dust over the years. She’d adapted well enough. What was that old saying? I’d rather rule in hell than serve in heaven. A life view her mother clung to.
Sloan strode up the steps and through the massive front door. At this time of night, the church was almost deserted. There was an older woman in the first row, but that was it. Sloan gave her a wide berth. She didn’t want to talk to anyone tonight. She just wanted some kind of peace.
Ironic that she was looking for it here, of all places. Sloan had never felt a higher calling. She sank onto the pew three rows back and looked at the massive stained-glass window behind the altar. It was dark now, but with the morning light streaming through, it was one of the most beautiful things she’d ever seen. She’d spent countless hours over the years tracing the patterns with her gaze while Father Joe gave his sermons. There was something comforting in always knowing what to expect, what the next motion would be. Mass was one of the few times in her life where she didn’t feel like she was spinning wildly out of control.
Since Father Joe often preached about giving up control to God and having faith in His processes, she was failing on multiple levels with her lack of trust. She sighed. What am I going to do?
“Sloan?”
She tensed for a long moment before she recognized the man who strode from the back of the church. Teague. “What are you doing here?” Ever since her brother had married Callie Sheridan, he spent all his time with her. Which is normal. It would be weird if he kept hanging around the house with a wife at home and a neighboring territory to run. But logic had no place in her head apparently, because every day he didn’t show up at the O’Malley town house felt like another betrayal to her.
“Same thing you are, I’d bet.” He sat next to her. “Sometimes it’s nice to come here and just be. Mass is fine, but it’s not quite the same thing.”
“I suppose.” She knew she sounded sharp, but couldn’t help it. It was too great a coincidence that he was here now, at the same time she was, and she’d stopped believing in coincidences a long time ago.
He smiled. “And Liam called me.”
She turned around to glare at the man, but he was nowhere to be seen. Not surprising. There were more shadows than light in the sanctuary right now. He could be anywhere. She shivered. “Why?”
“Because I asked him to.”
Now she turned in her seat to face him. “What’s going on?” He wasn’t there just so he could see her—he could come home any day of the week for that. That meant he had something he wanted to talk to her about that he couldn’t do in the O’Malley home.
“Relax.” He draped his arms over the back of the pew, looking for all the world like he was just in there for a friendly chat.
So why was her heart trying to beat its way out of her chest? She’d never feared her brothers before—though Aiden made her a little nervous these days—but the tang of bitterness on the back of her tongue was hard to ignore. “What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything.” He drummed his fingers on the dark wood. “Have you given any thoughts to your future?”
She simultaneously wanted to laugh and cry. “What future? You know better than anyone that I don’t have a choice. Father hasn’t moved on any marriage prospects, but no doubt he has a little niche he’d like to shove me into when it suits his purposes.”
“And how do you feel about that?”
“It doesn’t matter how I feel about it, does it? There’re no other options.”
He was silent for a long time, silent and still. Finally he said, “What if there were other options?”
Fear unlike anything she’d ever known rose up and clawed at her throat. It was so easy for him to offer her options, and to talk about defying their father when he’d danced to Seamus O’Malley’s tune. Despite his big talk while they were growing up, when push came to shove, he jumped when their father said jump. He hadn’t taken any risks. He had done exactly as their father wanted and married Callie Sheridan.
And now he was asking her to…what? She shoved to her feet. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to hear it. I’m not going to stick my neck out to make his guilt at leaving me behind more bearable.
But what if she did?
The thought brought her up short. She’d spent her entire life being tossed from one wave to the next, with about as much control as a rowboat in a hurricane. All she had to do was look around to see her siblings taking control of their futures in whatever way they could. Even if it was destructive, they were doing something, which was more than she could say for herself.
Sloan made herself sit back down and turn to face him, even though every muscle shook with the effort to keep still. “What other options?”
“What if…” He hesitated, searching her face. “What if I could get you out—really get you out? You could have that little house in a small town like you’ve always dreamed of. You could leave the politics and danger and Boston behind.”
It was almost too much to comprehend. She swallowed hard, a different kind of fear rising inside her. She might hate so much about her life now, but she knew the ins and outs and the risks down to the tiniest detail. To leave that all behind meant opening herself up to the greater unknown, which was scarier than she could have dreamed.
If I stay here, it’s only a matter of time before our father recovers from how things played out with Carrigan and tries to push me into an advantageous marriage. When he did, she’d say yes. She always said yes. It would be the beginning of the end for her. She wasn’t naive enough to believe otherwise.
So she took a deep breath and forced herself to nod. “Yes.”
“Yes?” Teague looked like he was almost afraid to hope that he’d heard her right.
She nodded again, her voice so low it was barely a whisper. “Yes. Get me out.”
*
“That everything?” Olivia finished balancing out the till and stuck the extra money into the appropriate zippered bag. It had been a good night. The businessmen bought enough alcohol to rival any frat boys, and they’d tipped well beyond that. She peeked out the back office to find Benji wiping down the last of the tables. Technically he should be the one closing the till, but he said he’d rather do just about any other job in the pub. Since she didn’t mind the tedium in the least, she’d pretty much been doing this particular job since she started here.
The problem was that tonight the tedium had been her enemy. It gave her entirely too much time to think, which was the last thing she needed right now.
Benji stood up and wiped his brow. “Yeah, I got the rest of this covered. Your tips are on the bar.”
“Thanks.” She shouldered her purse and skirted around the boxes that would need to be taken out back. A quick count of the cash had her frowning. “Benji—”
“I don’t want to hear it.” He glared, though it was about as menacing as a teddy bear. She’d seen him muscle grown-ass men out of the pub more than once over the last six months without breaking a sweat, but his moods didn’t faze her. She knew all about being pissy to force people to keep their distance, and normally she respected his space when he turned that expression on her.
But the last few days had pushed her tolerance almost to the breaking level. “Benji, this is nearly double what I actually earned tonight. Those guys tipped well, but not this well.” She made her hands unclench from around the cash and set it back onto the bar. “I’m not looking for charity.” Someday she might have to get the hell out of town without a word to anyone, and she’d hate feeling like she left the scales unbalanced behind her. Benji was too nice for her to take advantage of.
“Listen here, Olivia, because I’m only going to say this once. Are you listening?”
She sighed. “Yeah.”
“You bust your ass. You’re the hardest worker in this place, including myself. Now, I’m a firm believer that a good work ethic should be rewarded, and that’s what I’m doing as your boss. It’s not a handout, and don’t you dare insult me by saying it is. I reward hard work in the way I see fit, and this is how I see fit. Got it?”
She swallowed past her suddenly dry throat—and the insane urge to hug the big man. “I got it.”
“Good. I don’t want to hear any of this nonsense again.” He started to turn away. “Do you need a ride?”
“No, I got it.” There was another half hour before she had to be down at Charles Station to catch the last red line home. She managed a smile. “Thanks, though. For everything.”
“Don’t go getting all mushy on me.” He jerked his chin at the boxes. “Take those out back before you lock up.”
This was more like the Benji she was used to. She’d never have thought it when she walked in here, determined to argue her way into a job, and saw the hulking owner behind the bar nearly making some poor guy piss his pants in fear, but she really liked working here with him. She grabbed the boxes and headed out back. Attachments are dangerous, and you damn well know it. Yeah, she did. Any relationship she formed was one that could be used against her if Dmitri ever decided to come calling.
Which is exactly what he’s apparently decided to do.
It was enough to make her want to pack Hadley and their few important items and catch the first train out of town. I can’t live my life in fear. Though some days, it seemed the smartest thing to do. If she kept moving, maybe she could outrun the shadow of his influence. The only thing that stopped her was the fact that it was no kind of life for Hadley. Her daughter was barely fourteen months old, and Olivia could see the strain their abrupt move from NYC had caused her, even though she’d been eight months old at the time. She wouldn’t do that any more than necessary.
The money…
He should be goddamn pleased that she didn’t want it. She grabbed a box cutter and started collapsing the boxes, putting a little more violence into it than strictly necessary. Dmitri didn’t want her to have the money his father had put aside for her any more than she wanted to have it. But if he didn’t get her to take it and return to the Romanov fold, he’d be going against Andrei’s dying wishes. As Andrei had been so fond of saying when he was alive, a man didn’t get by in their kind of life without having his own code of honor. While that didn’t require him to be faithful to his wife or keep him from murdering the opposition or delving into the kind of illegal things that kept Olivia up at night, it did mean that his word was something he’d never break.
And that code was one Dmitri had inherited from their father.
So far Dmitri hadn’t moved to force the issue, but if Sergei showing up last night was any indication, it was only a matter of time before he truly insisted she return to the family.
The boxes thoroughly demolished, she stuck the box cutter into her back pocket and gathered up the cardboard. It would take all of fifteen minutes to get rid of these and finish closing up, and then she’d be headed home to cuddle her daughter. Shutting a door between themselves and the rest of the world sounded like heaven right now.
But when she took the boxes into the back alley, she froze. There were three men in the alley. Couldn’t they find another damn place to do a drug deal? She started to back into the pub, but raised voices caught her attention. Two of them backed the third into the brick wall, their stance aggressive and reeking of promised pain. Go back inside, Olivia. This isn’t your fight. Just call 911 and lock the damn door.
One of the men punched the third, sending him spinning to the ground. She gripped the doorframe, torn between the need to run and the need to intervene. The second man stepped forward, his intention to kick the guy while he was down in every line of his body. Damn it. A boot could do fatal damage to the soft parts of a stomach. “Stop!”
“Stay out of this, bitch.”
I wish I could. But she was already moving, ducking back through the door to grab the shotgun Benji kept hidden in the gap between counters. The first night she’d closed alone, he’d shown it to her and walked her through using it until he was satisfied she wouldn’t shoot her foot off trying to defend herself. She could have told him that she was no stranger to using guns, but it was just easier to go along with it.
Olivia walked through the door, cracked the barrel to make sure it was loaded, and snapped it shut in a sound that only a fool wouldn’t recognize. She lifted it, bracing the stock against her shoulder so it wouldn’t knock her on her ass if she had to pull the trigger. “I said stop.”
The two standing men exchanged a look, clearly weighing their options. She waited, though the shotgun was already getting heavy, the stock slick in her clammy hands. Are they O’Malley men collecting payment? A part of her didn’t want to believe it. The rest of her knew exactly how families like that—like the Romanovs—functioned. She widened her stance, ready to do whatever it took to get them away from the guy on the ground. “I already called 911. They should be here any second.”
The man on the left cursed long and hard and turned to the one on the ground. “Don’t think that we’ll forget Ricky, you piece of shit.” Then he grabbed the other guy’s arm and hauled him away.
Olivia waited for them to turn the corner…and then waited another twenty seconds to make sure they weren’t going to change their minds. Only when the coast was a hundred percent clear did she rush to the fallen man’s side. “Are you okay?”
“Aw, sweetheart, I didn’t know you cared.”
Cillian.