Page 51 of Irish Daddies
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DECLAN
Rian,still wrecked, sits on the couch like a fucking lump on a log, his face in his hands, his hair messed up from dragging his dirty hands through it. “He used her to start a war with the Valacchis.”
Kellan leans forward, elbows on knees, voice trembling. “No, he doesn’t care about that. He wanted her to die, and he wanted someone else to kill her. He knows the Valacchis will make it painful. We can’t let him do this. She was supposed to be safe.”
“Safe? She’s here because we abducted her,” I remind him, cold and blunt.
He doesn’t respond. The room falls quiet except for the tick of the old clock on the mantel. It’s loud in the silence.
Kellan mutters, mostly to himself, “We turned her into one of us. We’re no different than him, are we?” The puppy dog look on his face kills me.
“You knew what this was,” I tell him with a sneer, cracking open a beer and pouring it into a glass. I add a shot over it until itfroths over. “Why are you acting so surprised now?” I look over at Rian with open contempt. “Either of you?”
I don’t say the rest of it.I should be the one surprised. I thought Da told meeverything, and he lied to me and used me.
“How can you say that? I never planned for her to do anything but stand there. She’s tasted violence, and now it’s all over her like a contagion,” Shéaghdha spits out bitterly, his index finger pointing at me like I dipped her in it, like it was me that put that gun in her hand.
“You were right there with me, egging her on. You didn’t mind so much then,” I point out, taking a swig of my drink and wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. I point the glass at him.
“I was trying to help,” Shéaghdha mumbles, looking at me but without any resolve.
I slam my drink down and spit back, “You always want us to think of you as just as much a man as any of us, but you can never handle the fallout.”
“Declan, stop. Everyone feels bad, but you don’t have to take it out on us,” Rian comes to Shéaghdha’s aid, looking up wearily from his hands.
“I don’t feel bad,” I tell him, staring into his eyes. I hate when they get like this, when they’re more self-pity than man. They wanted Caroline to do something big to prove to ourathairthat she would. Now that the bad man has been bad, they want to take it back. That’s not the way of the world.
“Not even that Da lied to us? That she shot someone so important that we can’t even save her?” Rian asks, trying to get me to admit to feeling the same way he does. That’s all either ofthem ever want. They need me to be as meek as them. They can’t stand the reality that I’m just not like them and never will be. Killing your own mother will do that to a person.
Ilikedseeing Caroline stick up for herself. Ilikedknowing what she was capable of. It turned me on to see her breathing hard, face red, staring into the face of a screaming man who had threatened her kids. I don’t feelbadthat Dalied to us, because he won’t get away with it. I deal with my problems.
“Speak for yourself,” I retort, pushing my sleeves up. “I can save her from anything.”
“Oh, can you?” Rian asks sarcastically, crossing an ankle over his knee and holding his leg, letting it shake lightly and lifting his eyebrows at me.
He’s challenging me. He thinks I’m kidding. I would crush every Valacchi between two fingers if they tried to hurt her. Especially now that she’s starting to impress me.
“Yes, I can.”
“How are you going to do that?” he asks, leaning against the back of the couch, antagonizing me with his casualness.
The front door opens with a loud bang, and Caroline stands in the doorway like she owns the fucking place. Her chin is high, arms crossed, hair messy. She’s breathing heavily, the twins in her arms like paperwork, their thumbs tucked into their mouths, their cheeks sweaty and stuck to her as they sleep gently. When she has them, she’s a mother above all, above a torturer, above a captive, above a mafia member to-be.
“You’re back,” Shéaghdha breathes, turning his entire body to her.
“You knew,” she replies stonily. An accusation. Simple. No one answers. “You all knew.” Despite the intensity of her words, she sways back and forth, patting the twins’ backs. We could be talking about anything—the mail, the trash route. In another life, we are.
I chug my beer and watch my brothers try to defend themselves.
Rian shakes his head too fast. I can feel him unraveling as he stands from the couch, just short of begging. He keeps opening his mouth and closing it again. I know that look. It’s the face of a man watching his future walk away in real time. “No. Caroline, please, I didn’t know. I swear to God?—”
“You can’t,” she cuts in, sharp as a blade, “swear to a God you don’t believe in.”
“We believe in God,” I cut in, my eyes narrowing.
She looks at me with utter disgust dripping from every pore. “What’s it matter what youbelieve? Everything about you is unholy.”
