Page 17 of Iron Cross

“I’m sorry, would you like him to step out?” I crossed my arms and lifted my brow. Cillian babbled happily, his spit-covered fist in his teething mouth.

“Does he need to be changed?” Blink sniffed loudly, following my gaze to my son. “When does he stop defecating in his pants?”

“He’s two years old.” I rolled my eyes.

“That means nothing to me, Picasso.” He looked over his shoulder at my son again, before leaning back in his seat and staring out the windshield. “I was able to house train a dog when it was three months old. Why’s this one taking years?”

He always suspected that my son shit himself because of his overly sensitive nose - orparanoidnose. Diapers freaked him out. But I knew for a fact that my son was an evening pooper. He was as regular as clockwork, as long as we laid off the yogurt.

Blink was safe… for now.

I looked at my friend - at this point, probably my only friend - and colleague with amusement. “One day, you’re going to fall head over heels, and you’re going to end up with a dozen fat babies.”

“Why would you curse me like that?” His lip and nose curled in disgust, and I laughed. “And why didn’t you leavethat,” he nodded toward my son, “at home?”

“They tend to frown on leaving your kid home alone, to go have a meeting with a random man in the middle of the day,” I deadpanned. “What do you want me to do? Crate him?”

Blink pursed his lips as if he expected me to doexactlythat.

“This is hardly a secure meeting.” His grumbling had become expected, now.

After three years, his irritation at my motherhood was just another gaping wound that would not heal.

I didn’t blame him. He was frustrated. So was I.

As much as I worked, and as hard as I worked, selling art online or in the fucking kiosk under the stupid bridge didn’t bring in the top dollars like Gallery Four. I couldn’t make it better because I had to stay hidden from the long arm of the Irish mob. Green Fields Enterprises was everywhere, all the time, and the best way to stay safe was to stay small.

Which was fine by me. But hardly useful if I needed to fund international operations.

“You think my two year old is going to tell secrets to his Tickle-Me-Elmo?” I said, vaguely getting agitated by this old song and dance. “Do you suspect Elmo of being a Russian spy?”

Blink snorted, as he stared ahead through the windshield.

“Can he speak?”

“Not in sentences,” I said, though I knew my son understood far more than he let on. Children saw everything. They knew everything. His curious black eyes always observed the world around him with a beautiful curiosity that I tried to encourage.

I didn’t know how I would deal with keeping my job from him as he grew up.

What would my kid think, always seeing me in back rooms, meeting with strange people? Listening to a radio at odd hours of night, waiting for an encrypted message? What normal life could I possibly give him? And was that life better than the one he’d have if he was raised as the son of the most powerful man in New York City?

“And how long will the meetings continue this way?” His exasperation felt like spiderwebs on my skin. “How long before he starts telling his little school friends that his Mummy meets with a strange man in a car?”

“Strange is right,” I grumbled, crossing my arms.

As if I hadn’t worried about that inevitability every day.

“I’m serious, Picasso!”

“I am, too, Blink!” I said in a whisper-shout. “I cannot touch my own bank accounts because it’ll alert Eoghan to where I am. The salary you give me is a pittance, and you’ve stuck me in this fucking shithole one-horse-town!”

“There’s more than one horse,” he mumbled, looking around.

He was right, strictly speaking. The single crossroads with barely named businesses was just a hub for the great ranches and farms in the surrounding area. It wasn’t unusual to see horses walking down main street as horse enthusiasts exercised their steeds.

We were about to have the conversation we’d avoided for years.

“We need more, Picasso,” he said, shaking his head. “We are so close to cleaning up Boston, and the Triangle Trade is almost gone! We need…”

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