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I clench my fists. “Fuck Boston all the way to hell.”

“Aye.”

“And Esposito?”

“Esposito walked in holding a drive with every man on it who was paid to put you where you were, and what he got for it. He wasn't parting with it for nothing. So we traded. We paid.”

“I see.”

“We'll have a meeting with everyone tomorrow,” Seamus says. “You'll get the rest of it then. Tonight, we celebrate.”

Declan drives down the streets of Ballyhock. I take in the familiar green-blue of the Irish Sea, the worn awning over the Lickety Split ice cream shoppe. The smell of garlic and tomatoes from D'Agostino's.

I don't let myself feel any of it, not yet. There'll be time for that later.

“The real Valentina never made it here,” Declan says. “Boston had her the whole time their girl was playing her part. Once we found the imposter out, they cut her loose and sold the real one on.”

“Sold her,” I say. “Sold her where?”

Seamus turns in his seat to look at me properly for the first time since the prison gate. “There's a network. No flag, no family name on it—brokers, is what Declan's contact calls them. They don't care who they're selling to, so long as someone's buying.”

“It’s a fucking auction, isn’t it?”

“Aye. Word is they took her off Boston's hands for a price, and now they're moving her through an auction circuit. Private. Invitation only. Buyers from half a dozen countries.”

I make myself sit with that. I let my rage simmer.

“And you're telling me this now,” I say, “in a fuckin' car, the same hour I walked out a gate.”

“Because the auction's in a matter of days,” Declan says. “And the intel on it is what got you out early. Esposito traded for it. Called in markers he's been sitting on for years to get the date, the location, and a man placed inside who can get a McCarthy a seat.”

“A seat?”

“A bidding number, Tor.”

I look between the two of them. My brother. My cousin. Both of them watching me the way you watch a dog you're not sure has decided whether to bite.

And it all slides into place.

“You want me to buy her.”

“We want you to win her,” Seamus says. “There's a difference, and it matters. But to the men running that auction, to every other bidder in that room, she's a lot. And lots go to the highest bidder. You're fresh out of Mountjoy, and we need the most dangerous-looking criminal in Ireland sitting in that chair because if it's not us, it's someone worse, and we don't get a second pass at this.”

Fire races through my veins, old and familiar. Someone's been selling women like they’re fucking lot numbers, and men in suits have been raising bids for the privilege. Could’ve been my goddamn sisters.

“Who's running it?”

“Don't know yet,” Declan says. “Could be Boston's people still skimming a cut. Could be nobody we've ever heard of. Doesn't matter who's selling. Matters who's buying, and that's you.”

“And after?” My voice comes out hard. “Say I win the bid. Say I walk her out. Then what—we ring up Lorenzo Esposito and tell him we've got his girl?”

Seamus and Declan trade a look I don't like.

“Not yet,” Seamus says.

“Not yet,” I repeat.

“We don't know who tipped Boston to where she'd be. We don't know who's been feeding the auction network buyer lists, security routes, and the lot. Could be outside the family entirely. Could be inside the Esposito house. Esposito’s got two sons. Until we know more, telling him his daughter's alive is handing whoever did this a second chance to finish the job.”