by Karina Light
Now those are on permanent hiatus. They don’t matter anymore. Nothing does. Nothing will until we get justice. I want nothing more than to annihilate the threat. I can’t bring Aidan back, but I can put an exclamation point behind why no crew should fuck with us in a way that will leave fear running through the veins of enemies for generations.
The streets pass in a blur of gray roads and red brick. Truth be told, I fucking hate the city. I’ve never found peace within it. I miss lawns and uninterrupted blue sky overhead. Smelling grass without a side of pollution. Hearing birds chirp or the glory of silence. The constant car horns and bright lights are more than nauseating.
But the temporary torture is a means to an end. Within the maze of concrete, I’ll find answers. The streets speak louder than any forensic lab. Always have, and always will.
My cell phone rings at a red light in the southeast. I press the answer button on the steering wheel’s command panel as I study the sidewalks; the stretch littered with bottles and loose leaf flyers. “What is it?”
I’m not in the mood for Nolan to try coaxing me into drinking again. We don’t have time to get shit-faced. I don’t know how he and Pop can sit around with beers in hand, even if it takes the edge off. Aidan is dead. Murdered. Destroyed. The pain will still be there when they sober up.
A somber voice floods my car speakers. “I’m sorry, Fal.”
I’d know that throaty brogue anywhere, a unique mix of Philadelphia and Dublin that came from a youth split between cities.
Torin.
My fingers flex on the steering wheel. “Where the fuck are you?”
Torin Byrne is a ghost whose presence haunts the streets since he went underground, leaving the Tully fold entirely. There are flashes of him once in a while. A bloody hit in the papers. Reports of a John Doe pulled from the river, missing body parts. A local politician going down for porn most people would vomit after viewing. I smile when I see them, knowing my long-lost friend is alive and well.
“Where the fuck are you?” he echoes, mockingly.
I keep my eyes on the sidewalk, annoyed that the answers I need will take time to uncover. I want to put a bullet in someone’s head tonight. It’s the only thing that will fill the void in my chest. “Driving.”
“Are you alone?” He throws me off by asking in his native tongue—one only he and I speak. He taught me when we were kids. I haven’t heard or spoken it since he vanished, when he crawled from under Pop’s iron fist to thrive.
“Yes,” I reply, uneasy at his question. I should’ve known he isn’t just calling to offer condolences. Torin is the eyes and ears of the shadows. “The family’s at the house. I couldn’t sit around any longer.”
“Swear on Ma’s life and Aidan’s memory that you’re alone.” Again, he avoids English.
He doesn’t trust me. That hits my chest like a shotgun blast, adding to the damage already inflicted this morning.
We’ve gone into gun fights together. Grown up shoulder to shoulder. I’d give my life for his a hundred times over without hesitation and didn’t doubt for a moment that he’d do the same for me. We might not share blood, but we’re brothers. And he doesn’t trust me.
I stare at the road ahead, willing him into the streetlights. I need to see him. If anyone can help, it’s Torin. He sees a side of the city I’ll never know. The underbelly’s belly. The taint of the beast. And he’s a master at navigating it. “I swear on Ma and the Tully name. What the fuck is going on?”
He exhales roughly into the receiver before speaking, still sticking to his native tongue. “What do you know about Lombardi’s daughter?”
“Nikki?” Odd that he’d bring her up since she was the butt of a joke this morning in Pop’s office. She isn’t exactly everyday conversation. Women and children never are.
“The younger one.”
I turn onto a side street, a tight squeeze with cars lining either side of the road. “He doesn’t flash that one around much. Evelyn or something? What about her?”
I’d seen pictures in the papers years back when Antonio was on trial for murder—one of the many times he got off the hook thanks to his connections. She must’ve been a teenager back then. Maybe fourteen at most. Pretty like her mother with dark hair. Nothing like her poor sister. Christ, that nose.
“Evangelina,” Torin corrects. “She’ll die in the coming days.” He says it so casually, like he’s reciting the local news.
Warmth hits my face. Women and children are forbidden, regardless of family. One might use them to lure a target into the open, but they aren’t harmed. Crews are monsters to one another, but we aren’t savages. It’s a rule that all crews follow. “How do you know?”
“I overheard a conversation. Lombardi has his place on lockdown, but she’s not safe there.”
I run a hand over my face. The last thing the streets needs is a warring Lombardi family on top of Aidan’s murder. Blood will inevitably spill over and mix in the melee. But I’m only one man. “I hate to be the asshole here, but I have a dead brother on my hands. I can’t be looking after Lombardi’s…”
“It is your problem. It smells Irish. This was a sloppy street crew, but they had an in somewhere with both families. Something is cooking.”
I flip the heater on as a chill runs through me. “Pop wouldn’t order a hit on a girl, and Antonio wouldn’t kill his own daughter.” I’d never met the man, but Lombardi’s loyalty is known to be as strong as a Tully’s. He’d die to protect his own. Marrying off a daughter is a hell of a lot different from killing one.
“I’m not pointing fingers at exactly who. I don’t have those answers yet. But I need you listening on the inside while I work my leads.”
Glancing at the time on the dashboard, I push aside the weight in my chest. “If someone on the inside wants her gone, she’ll be dead by morning.” It’s terrible, but it’s the truth. And like so many things, it’s out of my control.
“That’s why we act now.”
I grip the wheel, squeezing the leather hard enough to make my knuckles crack. “What am I supposed to do? Barge into Lombardi’s mansion and let him know that someone’s about to kill his kid? I’ll be dead before I reach the front door. The city is on fire with what happened to Aidan. Everyone’s on edge.”
The papers might not have a whiff of his death yet, but the region’s underworld does. Pop spent the afternoon calling patriarchs and leaders from Baltimore to New York between drinks, attempting to connect the dots before the alcohol won.
“We take the girl.”
I laugh, shaking my head. He’d lost it too. Everyone in my fucking life has gone insane. “Right. We sneak into Lombardi’s fortress and steal his daughter. What do we do with her? Put her in a bubble until the dust settles?”
He has a compound outside of the city he keeps stacked with guards. I’d have better luck breaking into a bank vault with a tampon.
“Something like that,” he agrees. “And the work is done.”
My stomach twists. “What do you mean it’s done?”
“I have the girl. Meet me at our spot.” He doesn’t give me a chance to argue, hanging up.
I immediately try to call him back, but the bastard must’ve called from a blocked number. An angry dial tone follows.
“Motherfucker.” I punch the wheel.
Glancing back at the dingy streets, I swallow, taking it all in. The relative peace of the late night hour. Passersby heading to and from the dive bars down the way. The cracked sidewalks carrying secrets of past sins.
Soon they’ll be red.
In one reckless move, Torin Byrne damned us all.
By the old spot, Torin meant Jersey.
More specifically, the middle of fucking nowhere: the Pine Barrens.
The dense forest is almost an hour outside of the city, with miles of desolate greenery offering a buffer against society unless a hiker or camper crosses your path. Sometimes a wayward piney will, but the forest’s redneck inhabitants are scarier to look
at than deal with.
Pop had a few dumping grounds around the area in the past, but we haven’t used them in years. When needed, we call in a crew more than eager for corpses to sell. The obvious bullet wounds don’t raise questions.
Driving along the empty roads, anxiety stirs. Not a single car passes mine as the miles tick by, and only the vehicle’s high beams stand between me and pitch black forest. More pressing, I’m wandering into the wilderness to meet a killer.
Torin doesn’t frighten me, but the thought would make any man a little queasy. I’ve seen the things he’s done. I’ve killed men when necessary, but I’ve never enjoyed it. He seems to get a rush from watching the life slip from a person’s eyes. It makes him uniquely equipped to take care of other people’s problems, however they deem necessary.
Pop was a fool not to treat him better. He’s worth the weight of ten men, easily. And he knows it, which is precisely why he got the fuck out of the Tully fold. Bound by blood, I love my family, but I’m not blind to Pop’s shortcomings.
Five years ago, I helped Torin leave, establishing the hideout he’s now holed up in with Lombardi’s kid. The rundown cabin shielded him as he nursed his wounds, a drunken gunshot to the arm after an argument serving as a parting gift from Pop. I didn’t blame him for leaving one damn bit. Time settled the dust on Pop’s end, and he occasionally talks about wanting him back in our orbit, but Torin would never. He has independence, worrying for no one but himself. He’d be a fool to come back.
I kept the secret from everyone, including Nolan. I couldn’t take any chances of him making a drunken slip of the tongue. Or a sober one, like he had about Siobhan to Ma this morning. What I’d done would warrant exile from the family, or worse. I’d gone against my blood.
Shining eyes meet my headlights as a cluster of deer enter the road from a flooded cranberry bog. Slowing to a stop, I watch the family group mosey over the asphalt, only one of them having enough sense to raise its white tail in alarm.
My turn is just ahead, the old farm housing the off-the-grid shelter in the forest behind it. The owner accepted cash to keep quiet, never asking questions or poking around in the years I’ve owned the place.
As the deer shuffle into the brush, I continue on slowly before turning onto the dirt road, traveling a mile down its winding path before stopping. The rest of the way has to be traveled on foot. Only off-road vehicles can navigate its loose sugar sand. Anyone else will end up stranded. My SUV can probably make the trek just fine, but I refuse to risk it. I’m not spending the night out here.
Silencing my phone, I step out into the night air. The underbrush on either side crackles in the breeze as I walk along the uneven road, grateful I opted for boots this morning.
No matter how many times I’ve made the trek in the past, it always spikes my heart rate. Light is nonexistent other than the moon’s glow against the white sand road, leaving the surrounding woods a mystery. Not much in the forest can kill a man other than a rogue black bear, but I still hate the vulnerability.
The walk is bumpier than I remember, with ruts rising and falling into the earth. Good thing I didn’t drive. My city-slicking SUV isn’t made for this shit. It’s been a few years since making the walk last, and I hope it’ll be a few more until I have to do it again. If Torin didn’t have Evangelina fucking Lombardi captive, I would’ve waited until at least morning like a sane person, but he didn’t leave me with another option.
None of what he said on the phone made any sense. The sooner we speak, the better. If someone on our crew is plotting to strike, I need to know to act first and take them out. A war with Lombardi will be the end of us. But if Lombardi is behind what happened to Aidan, we have no other choice. Antonio would pay with his head, regardless of the consequences. Neither possibility sits well in my gut.
A gnarled pine leaning into the road marks that it’s time to head into the woods, but rather than finding just the distinct tree, I come across a dark truck parked beside it. It isn’t anything flashy with its rusted-out bumper, but it screams Torin a mile away. It’s practical, much like him.
I approach carefully and tap on the driver’s side window, trying not to scare the living hell out of him if he’s still inside. That will get my head blown off.
But there wasn’t a response, deadly or otherwise.
I lean in, trying to peer inside, and in the dim moonlight, I see it’s empty, the split vinyl bench seat as barren as the surrounding forest.
Asshole.
He could’ve fucking waited. The next leg of the journey sucks a lot more, particularly at night.
I dip into the trees and onto the narrow trail overgrown with greenbriers. Cursing, I trudge through them, scratching my legs to hell and back on the toothed vines despite my thick jeans.
If Torin has the girl with him, I have no idea how he walked her to the cabin through this shit—especially if she fought him. A few strides in and I’m ready to quit, each sharp barb finding a new sensitive spot to stab. It’s slow-going, and I make a mental note to store a fucking machete in my car.
A half mile down, a faint glow comes from the right. Whatever Torin has inside as a light source is the only thing giving the cabin away through its tiny front window. Chest-high brush has taken over its clearing, making it nearly invisible from the path.
Pushing through the foliage, I find the porch’s weathered steps; the boards coated in moss and squeaking at the slightest bit of pressure. The front door opens before I reach the top stair, Torin’s head popping out of the dimly lit building with an irritated sneer.
“Took you long enough, you cunt.”
He’s barely changed in the time we’ve been apart. Still tall and wiry, a frame made for sleuthing. His sable eyes are just as dark, though his once buzzed hair has grown into a tousle of brown, the edges on end as if he’s raked his hands through the strands.
“I came straight here,” I shoot back. “We don’t all move through the bowels of the night with ease.”
He grins, pulling me in for a hug. “You’ve grown into such a beautiful man,” he teases, batting his eyelashes. “Soon you’ll be making little gun-toting babes with a neighborhood whore.”
Clapping my hand on his back, I groan. “Shut it. You sound like Ma.”
Stepping into the cabin, his face falls in concern. “How is she?”
Ma was a second mother to him growing up, his own back in Dublin passing when he was a toddler. He ended up in the old neighborhood with his father, and when we met as kids, we became fast friends. His father offed himself a few years after, and as an orphan with no one else, he moved in with us once Ma did some scrambling at the courthouse.
I shake my head, silently answering his question. Not only do I not have the words to express how broken she is over Aidan, but I don’t want to give any identifying information away in front of Lombardi’s daughter. If I want a snowball’s chance in hell at surviving what Torin has thrust my way, that means keeping her entirely in the dark.
His nearly onyx eyes meet mine with a sigh. “I’m sorry. Had I heard a thing, you know I would’ve stopped it.”
I know it better than I know my own name. That’s why I had to come. If Torin didn’t hear a peep, things aren’t looking good for a quick resolution. Or a pleasant one. This has the potential to get more than messy.
I nod, moving into the main living area, which is unoccupied other than the dusty bare bone furnishings. “Where is she?”
He gestures toward the bathroom. “She got a little mouthy, so I let her have another slumber party.”
I quirk a brow. “In the bathroom?”
He shrugs. “I like to leave them where they fall, you know? She looked snug.”
Fall? Fuck. We’ll pay for that. We’ll pay for every mark on the girl.
I cross my arms. “You can’t hurt her…”
Grunting, he shuts the cabin’s front door behind me. “Relax. She doesn’t have a scratch on her. From me, at least. There’s a handprint on her face. N
o clue how it got there.”
I pull a stray sprig of thorns from my jacket sleeve and move to toss it in the empty fireplace. “Where did you find her?”
Snatching Lombardi’s baby girl couldn’t have been easy. After he caught wind of what happened to Aidan, he probably had her rolling around with an army of bodyguards. Unless the slippery son of a bitch had something to do with the hit and knew she wasn't in danger. But the latter seems inconceivable. He has nothing to gain with Aidan dead. He knows Pop’s temper. He met with him this morning, for Christ’s sake.
“Drinking at Minerva’s,” he replies. “Don’t worry. Her friend was too busy getting fucked in a bathroom stall to notice. No one saw me slip out the back, either. It was a quiet operation.”
Shit.
“Minerva’s? That place has cameras out the ass.” The club is also Italian-owned, complicating matters. If Lombardi even guesses that Irish blood is behind his daughter’s kidnapping, he’ll show up with guns blazing at every Tully establishment.
He grins. “Had cameras out the ass. Give me more credit than that, Fally.”
He has a valid point. He isn’t an idiot. Growing up, Torin’s plans always had plans. “What are you doing with her?”
Straightening, he glances at the bathroom door. “I figured you’d stow her away here for a few days. Maybe weeks. It all depends on the plot being sniffed out.”
“Wait, me?” I cough out. “Oh, no, Tor. No fucking way. I can’t have any part in…”
“Do you want to know who slaughtered your brother or not?” he asks, his voice clipped as he looks back at me with fire in his eyes. “Like it or not, this is the hand life dealt us. I want this motherfucker dead just as much as you do. If someone kills her, it makes that a lot harder.”