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“I want him dead, Lorcan.”
He drags his eyes away from his precious daughter, long enough to look at me quizzically. Then there’s movement from the path. We both turn to look at what it is and see Lottie hovering awkwardly. She flashes us a shy smile, then turns her attention to Valentina. Immediately, Valentina wobbles to her feet and stretches out her arms. Lottie looks at me again, seeking confirmation, and I nod. She strides over and sinks to her knees. Lorcan and I watch for a few more moments as she picks a snapdragon and tickles Valentina’s button nose with it. She bursts out laughing and signals for her to do it again.
Lorcan is the first to cut through the silence on this side of the glass. “That’s who Abruzzo wants, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“And you don’t want him to have her, do you?”
“He’ll have to kill me before he takes her from me.”
My response is loaded with venom. Lorcan looks at me, amused. “Jesus, kid. Looks like you do have a heart.”
I shake my head. “Only for her,” I say quietly. Now, Valentina is watching Lottie in fascination as she weaves a few snapdragon stalks together. “And I fucking hate it. I want to rip it out of my chest and stomp on it.”
He grunts out a laugh. “You’re not as emotionless as you think you are, kid. It’s not that you can’t feel it’s that you’re scared to.”
“I’m not scared,” I snap back, eyes never leaving Lottie. “It’s more of an inconvenience.”
Lorcan’s voice softens. “It’s okay to feel, I promise you. I struggled with it too, at first. But you know what I learned?” A mischievous smile spreads across his lips and he says, “You can be cruel and be in love at the same time. They don’t cancel each other out.” He leans over and slaps my knee. “Maybe you should see a therapist or some shit.”
I laugh, a genuine laugh that makes Lorcan arch an eyebrow. I don’t bother explaining why it’s funny.
After a few moments of silence, Lorcan drags a knuckle over his jaw and says, “Fine. We’ll kill him and capture his next in command. Know who that is?”
I vaguely recall a man with a shaved head at his warehouse, barking orders at other workers. “I think so.”
“All right. Philly has to be covered somehow, so we’ll kill Abruzzo and see if his next-in-command wants to play by the rules.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
Lorcan’s mouth forms a tight line. “We’ll be stretched thin, covering Philly and South Jersey by ourselves, but we’ll make it work.”
We rise to our feet and shake hands. “I’ll see you tomorrow, kid,” he says with a twinkle in his eye. He turns to look out the glass. Lottie is placing a crown, fashioned from snapdragons in several bright colors, on Valentina’s head. She gurgles and claps her chubby hands together. The ice around my heart thaws a little more.
“Looks like we both have reasons to live now, kid.”
Cillian
The car ride is long and silent.
Her legs are restless, shaking under my hand on her thigh. I bite back the urge to do a U-turn in the middle of the road and take her back to the safety of the Garden. I hate having her out here, in the real world, exposing her to bad things.
To bad people.
But I’m not the kind of man that runs from problems, and I know, despite the nerves, Dahlia is sick of running too.
I trace small circles on her thigh with my thumb, my way of showing her, wordlessly, that I’m here. Eventually, she places her hand on top of mine and squeezes it. We glance at each other and she offers me a small smile. It doesn’t reach her eyes and I don’t expect it to.
A few miles from the factory, I slow the Tesla to a stop.
“You’re going to have to be tied up.”
Dahlia stares out of the windshield, swallowing the lump in her throat. “Won’t be the first time,” she mutters, holding her trembling wrists together and presenting them to me.
“But it’ll be the last,” I growl back.
Last night was the first time I slept with Dahlia in my arms. I stared up at the ceiling fan for hours, making silent vows to myself. Silent vows to her. One being that when this shit is all over, I’ll hunt down her ex-husband and kill him for everything he’s put her through.
