Page 106 of Dylan
“Aye, she is the true heiress. The McDougal clan belongs to her. The will names her as Lennox’s successor.
“That was Grandda Ian’s big fuck ya to Oland. He may have been dying from cancer, but everything was in place for us. I promised him we would see it through. The Alliance comes to life from Ciara’s inheritance and succession.”
“Oland had her mother and father killed in hopes he’d get to her too,” I breathe in the knowledge as the pieces finally lock in.
“Aye. Theo Young was supposed to kill her and her brother, not raise them as his own. However, once he learned of their inheritance from their mother and father, he kept them and forged documents to steal their money.
“Our dear oul grandda accounted for everything except me. I started the rumor that ya were in the will. Ciara would only gain it all after an arranged marriage to ya. Instead of killing Theo Young for his disobedience, Oland paid him to keep her away from us, especially ya, until he could figure out how to use ya to gain control of the estate.
“That brought us the time we needed to find the true will that somehow disappeared after O’Shea’s death. Lennox had placed it in O’Shea’s wife’s possession right before he died from a heart attack. Queeny handed it over to Orla Murphy for safekeeping once Donald and Angus turned up dead.”
“And ya didn’t tell me all of this. Ya gave me half of the truth because ya knew I would find and kill that son of a bitch.” I seethe.
“Aye, we didn’t have the will until today. Theo Young has played a bigger part in all of this for a while. We couldn’t wipe him off the board until we were sure he hadn’t found the will himself to manipulate the situation.
“We hadn’t known the full story of why Oland chose him and allowed him to live for so long. What we did know was that he had already tried to bargain with empty hands. As for Ciara, he hasn’t counted his losses yet.
“He believes he still has options. There’s been a lot of back-and-forth; the McDougal clan has kept him thinking they don’t care for her safety, although they’ve warned us to keep her safe.
“They wouldn’t allow her to take her rightful place without the will or the original Alliance argument. Ciara’s surviving uncles aren’t against her taking over if the will says so.
“They plan to honor the Alliance as well. They just want proof. Ken has kept things going in her absence. Orla was a fierce woman herself, and she was adamant that they all honor their father’s wishes.
“I get the feeling she didn’t know what all was hidden in the black box she had in her possession. However, she trusted me to keep Raven, Ciara, and Deja safe from all of this,” Logan replies.
“Ya knew, ya fucking knew what they meant to us. Why not tell us?” Cole says, sounding lost.
“The only people who knew were those who needed to know. We didn’t want to place them in more danger. Oland had been trying to find a way to get to them and hurt them.
“He needed control of them or their assets. He didn’t care if that meant dead or alive. I fucking fell in love with her. He killed Raven because she was the least valuable to him and because I’ve always defied him and it would fucking gut me.”
“Ya motherfucker, ya let me believe this was all my fault,” Brooklyn growls.
“It is. Ya fucking hothead,” Logan snarls. “She’s dead because ya took things into yer own hands.”
“Fuck ya.” Brooklyn takes a swing at Logan, and all hell breaks loose.
It’s like two lions are fighting in the middle of my mother’s living room. They tumble onto the coffee table and smash it, glass shattering all around them. My mother comes running into the room, yelling and looking frantic.
That’s when I notice Ciara standing there with her arms wrapped around her middle as tears stream down her face. Grunting and growling fill the air as Logan and Cole continue torumble. However, I can’t tear my eyes away from Ciara as she looks back at me with so much pain in her eyes; I feel sick.
“Stop this. Ye stop this right now,” Mom shouts.
That seems to break the stare off between us. Ciara turns and runs from the house. How much did she just hear? I’m hot on her heels. I have to catch her and explain.
CHAPTER 38
Breathe
Ciara
“Ciara, Ciara. Baby, wait.”I can still hear Dylan calling after me as I ran from his family’s home.
However, I moved too fast for him to catch me. I was able to get to his truck and grab the key I know he keeps in the hidden lockbox behind the back plate.
I took off without having a clue where I planned to go. Ciarán is with Taegan today. He won a bet between them, and she owed him lunch and a new game.
She was supposed to drop him off at the house after. I’ll have to text her to bring him to me when I figure out what I plan on doing. I heard everything.
