Page 7 of Ruthless Savior
“That’s… a lot,” I manage.
"That's the price of doing business with someone who doesn't require a credit check or collateral." His voice is calm, matter-of-fact. "You don't like the terms, you can walk away right now."
Except I can’t. Not really. There are no other avenues for me to get this money. No way for me to make sure my mom gets the treatment and care that she needs.
And he knows it. I can see it in the gleam in his eyes, in the patient way he waits for me to respond, like he’s just waiting for me to catch up. To agree to a loan that will compound until I don’t know how I’ll ever shake it off.
But the alternative is just as unthinkable.
I feel myself nodding before the words come out of my mouth. “Alright,” I manage, my voice thick. “Where do I sign?”
Neil smiles, reaching into a drawer. He slides a contract in front of me. It looks official— legal. I’m sure it would hold up in court—not that a man like him probably uses legal means to collect. I try to read it, but my thoughts are racing too fast for me to really retain any of the words on the pages.
“What happens if I fall behind on payments?” I look up at him. “If I’m late, or if I miss a week?”
“Interest goes up to forty percent on a missed payment. After three missed payments—” A predatory look is in his eyes. “I’m sure we’ll be able to work something out.”
My mouth goes dry. I can only imagine what that means, and I can’t let myself think about it for too long.I won’t miss any,I tell myself.I’ll eat cheap ramen every day for years if I have to. I’ll make sure Mom is taken care of, that she gets well, and I’ll pay it off.
I hold out my hand, and Neil drops a pen into it. I can feel the satisfaction vibrating off of him; another rabbit caught in his snare. When I sign my name, it feels like I’ve signed my death warrant.
Neil turns to his laptop and the screen lights up. “I just need your banking information,” he says as calmly as if we were doing ordinary business. “I’ll get this transferred, and then it’s up to your bank how quickly you can access it—although I’m sure you know that, right?” He smiles at me. “With your fancy finance degree.”
I swallow hard, nodding. “Yeah,” I manage. “Here.” I get my phone out, opening my banking app to get him the information he needs.
Fifteen minutes later, it’s done. I watch the transfer, watch Neil send me thirty thousand dollars with the click of a button, and I know I should feel relief.
But all I feel is a sinking sense of dread.
2
RONAN
Two months later
The rain fallslike bullets on the black umbrellas gathered around Siobhan's grave, each drop hitting with the same finality as the rounds that took her life two days ago. I stand at the edge of the gravesite, watching them lower my wife's casket into the ground, and I don't know what the fuck I'm supposed to feel.
Grief? For a woman who spent all of the eighteen months we were married making my life miserable at every opportunity? Relief? That would make me a bastard, even by my standards. Rage? That one's easier. That one I can work with.
“Son.”
My father's voice cuts through the sound of rain on canvas. Padraigh O'Malley has never been one for sentiment, but there's something in his voice and weathered face today that almost passes for concern. Almost.
"Fine." The word comes out rougher than I intended, scraped raw by too many cigarettes and not enough sleep over the past forty-eight hours. I quit smoking years ago—my one teenagerebellion, and a failed one at that, since my father never gave a shit if I smoked. “I’m fine.”
"She was a good woman." My father looks heavily down at the grave, and I force myself not to snort in response.
Siobhan Connolly—Siobhan O'Malley for the year and a half that she wore my ring—was many things. Beautiful, certainly. Intelligent. Ruthless, when it served her purposes. But good? That's not a word anyone who knew her would use. Definitely not one I would have used.
"She was pregnant." It's the first time I've said it out loud since the coroner confirmed what we'd suspected. "Twelve weeks."
My father's jaw tightens almost imperceptibly. In our world, an heir isn't just family—it’s legacy, it’s power, it's the promise that what we've built won't die with us. And Rocco De Luca took that away, along with everything else.
He places a hand on my shoulder, and it startles me. I think it’s the first genuine gesture of comfort I've ever received from him, and it feels strange. "We'll make them pay for both."
I nod, watching as they begin to shovel dirt over the mahogany casket. Siobhan would have hated this—the rain, the hastily thrown together wake, the flowers that don’t follow any theme or color palette, the priest who clearly didn't know her well enough to make his eulogy sound believable. She would have wanted something grand, something that announced to all of Boston that Siobhan O'Malley had been someone important, someone worthy of remembering.
Instead, we're burying her quickly, quietly, with just enough ceremony to honor her memory and not enough to draw unwanted attention from the feds who are always watching, always waiting for us to slip up. Not enough to make us a target for De Luca, who hasn’t gotten all that he wants yet.
