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Donnacha appears in the doorway. He snaps off a pair of bloody rubber gloves and chucks them on the floor. “I got somethin’ to say.”
Antoin drags his eyes from Viktor’s slumped body and nods to the makeshift office at the end of the hall. Once inside, I click the door shut and sit on an upturned bucket. My body is heavy with too much torturing and not enough whiskey.
“I’ll make this quick,” Donnacha says, wiping his brow with the hem of his T-shirt. “I’ve got Bratnov’s accountant’s son next door. I think we need outside help.”
My jaw sets but he raises his hand. “Trust me, Lorc. You know I hate admitting defeat as much as you do.”
I lean against the cold concrete and pin him with a hard stare. “You have ten seconds to convince me that this is a good idea.”
“Igor Bratnov has disappeared off the face of the goddamn earth. He’s plotting, Lorc.”
“No shit.”
“But we have no ideawhathe’s plotting.” He thrusts a bloodied thumb towards the wall, the one that separates us and an unconscious Viktor. “You know that fucker ain’t talking. Those Russian’s have loyalty made from steel. They have a hive mentality—Igor will bury his son six feet under if it’s for the greater good.”
“Your ten seconds are up.”
“Lorcan,” Donnacha says, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Please.” My lips harden into a thin line; he takes it as his cue to continue with his stupid fucking plan. “Our men are dropping like flies. We’ve lost three cousins today alone.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, grinding my molars together. Right now, I don’t even want to know who. One I play poker with every Thursday? One that taught me how to skim stones on our family holidays to Martha’s Vineyard?
“We might win this war, Lorcan, but we’ll have no men left to show for it,” he says, lowering his tone into something resembling pity. “We need allies. New ones. There’s a fuck ton of families across the country that want nothing more than to see Bratnov hung, drawn, and quartered. It’s what your father would do.”
It’s what your father would do.
Fuck, I wish to every god in the fucking sky right now that my father was still alive. He’d know exactly what to do. I squeeze my eyes shut, imagine him standing in the corner of the office, like he always used to do. He’d watch us talk from the shadows, let us conjure up ideas and plans, before stepping out into the light and laying down the law.
His plans were always calm, calculated and well thought out. The second they left his lips, they were always the obvious way. Any far-fetched plan my brothers and I would bounce between the walls suddenly sounded ridiculous.
What would Donal Quinn do?
I turn to my other cousin. He’s leaning against the wall, not having said a word. “I want the East Coast, Antoin,” I say slowly and steadily, lifting my eyes to his. His jaw ticks. “I want to dominate every square mile and I won’t compromise on that.”
“Lorcan—”
“Silence,” I growl. “We’ll form an alliance, but not with any of the families on the East Coast, or with any that have business interest here either.”
Antoin strokes the stubble around his jaw and says, “I don’t think we should work with any other family.”
“I’ve got contacts, cuz,” Donnacha snaps, pinning me with a dark stare. “Loyal ones. Know at least two families that hate the Bratnov’s as much as we do. The Mexicans in South Texas and the Regazzis on the West Coast.”
My mouth curls into a sneer. “I’d rather drag my balls over hot coals than work with the Italians.”
“They’re not the same, man. Your father had a good relationship with Alessandro.”
I think back to the funeral, visualizing Alessandro Regazzi’s amongst the mourners. “He’s always publicly condemned the Delfinofamigliafor what they’ve done.”
The idea rolls around my tired brain and I find myself nodding. It’s rare for two families of the same nationality to go against each other. Even if they run different operations, there’s usually a relationship there, or at the very least, an unspoken understanding, that they won’t fuck with each other or their territory.
I’ve only ever heard of it twice. Once with us against the West Coast Irish, led by Marcus Fucking Murphy, and now with the Italian’s.
“Get them here. I want a face-to-face meeting atGatsby’s, Saturday night.”
Antoin raises an eyebrow and says, “That’s in two days.”
“We can’t wait,” I bite back. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in the middle of a fucking war. Get them there, or don’t.” I add with a threatening undertone, “Your funeral if it’s the latter.”
He bites his tongue, swallowing the violent retort that I can see is bubbling in his throat. “I’ll sort it.”
