by J. J. McAvoy
“Are you going to sit there all day, or are you going to help your wife get some proper rest?” Evelyn called out to me.
Grinning, I stood up, turning back to them. “The moment I move her, she’s going to wake up.”
“Not after the sedative I just gave her,” Evelyn replied, sipping her tea.
My eyes shifted quickly to Cora, watching her chest rise softly, thankfully, as I moved to her. “You drugged my wife?”
“Somebody had to…the way she’s been hovering over me the last few weeks, she was bound to crash sooner or later. Better now before we go back into the heart of darkness,” she said with no remorse as I gently brushed the dark curls of Cora’s face, moving her head onto my shoulder.
“Evelyn,” I inhaled, trying to speak calmly. “Thank you for your concern, but I’d rather you didn’t resort to drugging her.”
“I rather not have churches fall on top of me, but what can you do? Some things are out of your control,” she replied, sipping her tea again. I didn’t want to smile, but I couldn’t help it. It was good having her back to her normal, witty self again.
For the most part, thanks to some of the best doctors, and most expensive, on this planet, you could barely see the scars on her arms and neck anymore. She sat on her own, dressed in black trousers, a stripped blouse, and a gold and green double-breasted jacket.
“Ethan took care of those ingrates,” I told her seriously.
She looked to me, her dark eyes hard and angry. “Then another set of ingrates killed his wife. They hurt my grandson. Now he’s only god knows where.”
“He’ll be back—”
“I know he’ll back. He’s Ethan. He knows his responsibilities. He needs to get himself straight, but I don’t doubt he’ll be back. What I need to be sure about is Wyatt.”
Once again, I remembered that I wasn’t just sitting across from the woman who had raised me since I was a child—my aunt and my mother—but instead the former wife of the Ceann Na Conairte, mother of the Ceann Na Conairte, now grandmother to Ceann Na Conairte. She was as, if not more, attached to our family’s business and empire than anyone else.
“Wyatt was the one who set who fire to our center? He put our people into the hospital?” she asked me for confirmation.
I nodded. “They’re calling him Mahdoc now.”
“Good.” She placed her cup down and lifted her book again, which was ironically Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. “It’s time he became the man his mother said he’d be.”
“What?” Melody never said anything about Wyatt. In fact, she seemed to coddle him, which for Melody, it was odd to see how soft and gentle she was to him. She loved all of her children. But she was always especially attached to Wyatt…it was how everyone knew he was her favorite.
“You didn’t see it?” She glanced to me and seemed honestly shocked.
“See what?”
“Declan, she wasn’t coddling Wyatt. She was weaponizing him.”
“What?” I laughed, holding on to Cora. “You make it seem like she was creating a biological weapon.”
“In a way, she was.” She leaned back, propping her head up on the arm of the couch as she explained. “Slowly, carefully, painstakingly, she was morphing Wyatt, a boy who was going to be dangerous simply by nature for being a Callahan, into someone more dangerous. She pushed Ethan and Dona to be strong mentally and physically, because she knew they were both going to rule. They needed to be able to see all the people trying to hurt them. They needed that foresight. But with Wyatt, she wanted him to forget who our enemies were and who our friends were…forget everything but who he was. While Ethan and Dona always cared about the overall family, Wyatt only cares about Wyatt.”
“So…she made him selfish. That’s what we didn’t need, Evelyn—”
She shook her head. “It’s exactly what we need. They are all selfish. But Wyatt’s selfishness…is like Melody’s selfishness. Ethan and Dona are complex. Wyatt is simple. He will do what is best for him. And what is best for him is having his siblings. His only goal is to defend. Melody knew Ethan would become Ceann Na Conairte. She didn’t want Wyatt to think like him. To want the same things as him. That would only lead to a civil war between brothers. Look at Dona, how close she came. She was trained to think like a queen because…her parents knew their daughter would not remain a Callahan. Dona would leave this family and rule on her own terms. Ethan has Chicago, and therefore has this country. And Dona has her own. But Wyatt…Melody wanted her sons together. One the brain, the other muscle. Separate, they are terrifying. But together…it will be hell on earth for their enemies. Now that someone who he cares about is hurt and his sister is gone, what do you think he’ll do? How do you think he feels?”
I paused, letting it sink in. All the moments I’d witnessed Melody training him alone—slowly explaining things to him, separating him from the rest of the children just to talk—flashed through my mind. “He feels personally offended. They aren’t just Ethan and Dona. They’re HIS siblings. People he loves. This is about him. It may seem like he’s avenging his family. But it’s just his selfishness. They hurt his people. So, he’s going to do anything and everything to make sure those people hurt…hurt worse. Like a kid that has his toy broken, he’s going to get revenge for his own sake.”
“And by default, become Ethan’s soldier, protector, enforcer...the hammer upon everyone’s head… he’s just going to keep hammering until he feels better.”
“And he won’t feel better until his toy is fixed…until Ethan is back to where he wants.”
“Until then, expect chaos.” She sounded proud. “Expect it to last until Ethan is back… When Ethan comes back…no one will ever question him out fear of having to deal with Mahdoc again. Melody’s plan. Wound one son, and unleash the worst in the other.”
She wasn’t just proud…she was gleeful.
In the same sense that Neal had been on the phone.
They both felt it. They felt it in the way animals feel an earthquake or a tsunami coming. The only difference was they didn’t fear it; they weren’t running from it because it felt like home…it felt like the old days. It felt like Liam and Melody…and Sedric were here.
Looking out the window, I could only imagine the terror that would be unleashed soon… Liam, Melody, Sedric…my own father. They were here…the ruthlessness it didn’t end…it was just passed down from one generation to the next, growing stronger and darker.
Wyatt was just now coming into his own.
Which was good for this family and hell on earth for everyone else.
I glanced down at the beauty in my arms for a moment and then back to Evelyn as she lifted her eyes. “You have any more pills left? I have a feeling I might not be sleeping for a while either.”
She laughed, shaking her head at me.
Welcome back to Chicago, Declan…the forecast is as it has always been…windy with a chance of murder.
No sooner had I thought it, my phone rang, and the name on the screen was none other than the new Mahdoc himself.
“Hello, Wyatt.”
FOUR
“Who are you?”
“Angel to some. Devil to others.”
~ Unknown
HELEN
Be ruthless.
That was his answer when I asked him what he was going to do now. For some reason, even though I knew who he was, knew what this family did and would do…I still couldn’t merge the Wyatt I’d always known—goof-ball Wyatt, smart-ass Wyatt, charming Wyatt—with the one who’d spoken on screen. The man who without hesitation set a trap with children and let them burn. I didn’t know that Wyatt. That part of him…I’d never seen it. Was he the Wyatt I’d always known or this new Wyatt? In my mind, I kept asking myself the same three questions.
Who was he?
When did he get to this point?
Where was the old Wyatt?
“Helen?”
Turning off the tablet, tossing it to the side before rising from my desk
, I couldn’t help but feel like a little kid. Breathe, Helen.
“Hi, Mom.” I grinned, meeting her in the middle of my room and hugging her tightly. Feeling her arms around me, the curls of her hair brush against the side of my face, I felt my whole body relax.
“What’s wrong?”
That was short-lived. I tensed back up, pulling back from her. “Nothing!”
Damn it. I didn’t even need to look at her to know that didn’t sound even the least bit truthful.
“Helen?” She called again, lifting my chin so she could look me in the eye. My mother Cora had three ultimate superpowers. “You’re lying to me.”
Yep. The first my dad liked to call her bullshit detector. Which made it even harder for a bad liar, such as myself, to get away with anything. Sighing, I tried to smile again, staring into her dark brown eyes. “Can we let it slide?”
She frowned, causing small wrinkles to form on her brown skin. And she looked back and forth in my eyes, as if she were reading, before putting both her hands on my cheeks. “Normally, since you asked, I would let it slide, but sweetheart, you look terrified. Did something happen to you? Are you alright? You know you can tell me anything. I won’t be upset—”
“No. I’m fine. I swear,” I said quickly before her imagination got the better of her. Reaching up, I pulled her hands down.
“Okay. I won’t push.” She sounded hurt…which was her second superpower, the guilt trip. It didn’t matter if she was the one in the wrong. Somehow, she’d twist it around and make you feel like you were the one in the wrong. “Oh, I missed you!”
“Mom!” I couldn’t brace for it. Her third superpower, super hugs, had me trapped in her arms for dear life.
“Now that am I back, you and I should go to the spa. Have a girls day. You can speak computer geek to me until the sun comes up.”
I laughed, nodding. “I speak computer nerd, not geek.”
“What’s the difference?” she questioned, finally releasing me from her bear grip, but before I could reply, she just waved me off, going off on her own tangent. “You know, forget it. I’m going to book an appointment now.”
“Book…you aren’t going to just rent out the whole spa?” I mocked.
“Nope.” She grinned from ear to ear, pulling her phone out of her skirt pocket. “How can I show off what an awesome daughter I have if no one else is there?”
“Mom, you’re such a dork—”
“Excuse me, I prefer nerd.” She rolled her neck at me as she mocked me. However, it was short lived as she began to frown.
“What is it?”
“This bloody phone keeps acting up. Can you fix—”
“Can I can fix it? Mom, I’m hurt, don’t you know I’m a genius,” I said with a gasp, my hand over my heart, and took the phone from her.
She snorted. “How can I forget? You and your father remind me every day.”
I couldn’t help but beam with pride as I scrolled through the code on her phone. It took only a few seconds. “Yeah, Mom, it’s just because you forgot to update—”
When I looked up, she was looking through my tablet.
“Mom!” I yelled, reaching over and snatching it out of her hands. “Don’t just go through my stuff!”
Her eyebrow raised, and I closed my mouth quickly. Her eyes focused on the tablet and then back to me, and I hung my head. I was a fucking adult, and yet in this moment I didn’t feel like one…and I didn’t know why.
“Helen.”
“Sorry I snapped, but—”
“Is that what’s scared you?” She cut me off, and when I met her gaze, she nodded to the split feed of Wyatt’s press conference and the deleted footage at the O.S., which was now playing on my tablet. I watched for a moment, but the moment the little girl burned, crying out for her mom as he just sat there, I turned back. “Why are you scared?”
“I’m not scared.”
“You look it.”
“Well, I’m not.” I snapped again. Standing upright, I looked her in the eye and told her the truth. “I’m not scared. It’s just…it’s just…”
“It’s just what?”
She was going to keep pushing!
“It’s Wyatt! He’s…different, and I don’t know how…I don’t think I’ll be able to talk to him the same way now.”
She stared at me for a long time. Slowly, she crossed her arms, which meant I wasn’t going to like whatever she was going to say, but she was going to say it anyway.
“What? Mom.”
“Why do you think you can’t talk to him?” She asked.
Of all the things, I thought she was going to ask that wasn’t it. “He’s like a completely different person—I was wrong about him all this time.”
“Helen, I know you, that you know what this family sometimes needs to do—”
“I know what this family does, Mom. I’m not an idiot, but Wyatt doesn’t do…do this,” I replied, lifting the tablet for her to see again. “If he is violent, he never hurts people who aren’t related to the issue.”
“This is who he’s always been,” she replied softly, looking at me as if I’d just time-traveled and didn’t understand how the world worked.
“Mom, Wyatt tries to be to be good despite the fact that he’s a—”
“Helen, I’m not sure why you think that.”
“Can you stop making it seem like I’m crazy? Wyatt has a temper, he can be like a little kid time sometimes, and sure, he gets in fights. He’s even killed people, I know that. But he’s never gone off the deep end like this.”
Again, she just stared. I sighed, adding, “Look, obviously he’s not the best of people, but between him and his siblings, he’s the most—”
“Violent,” she interrupted me.
“What?”
“Out of all your cousins, Wyatt is the most violent, Helen. I’m not sure why you have rose-colored glasses on when it comes to him. Or how you missed who he is, but you need come to grips quickly. Whatever he, your father, and uncle are planning, that,” she pointed to the tablet in my hands, “is just phase one.”
“Of all the things Ethan and Dona have done, why would you say that Wyatt is the most—”
“Do you remember when your biological father took you away from us?” she asked it, and it was as if she’d slapped me across the face.
Nodding, I whispered back, “I was eleven.”
“You were gone for two weeks,” she whispered, her hands balling into fists. “But it felt like two years to me. It left like he gutted me. And your father, your aunt and uncle, they kept telling me to wait. Your father swore upon his life that he’d you bring you back, but they just wanted to get you back without causing a scene—”
“I know—”
“No! You don’t know. Because they didn’t get their way. Wyatt, at twelve, brought you back himself.”
“What?”
CORA – AGE 38
“We need to wait?” I asked softly, glancing over each and every one of their faces around the living room until I finally looked to Declan, my dear husband, who sat on the edge of the sofa, by the fireplace, his knuckles white, his face blank.
I didn’t need blank. I needed determined.
“Cora, we need to be careful,” Evelyn said as reached out to me, but I smacked her hand away.
“Careful?” I repeated, feeling ready to wring her neck. “She’s my daughter. Some nobody has TAKEN MY FUCKING DAUGHTER!”
“He’s not a nobody,” Melody said as she tucked her hair behind her ear, and took the glass Liam offered her, rubbing the side of her head. Apparently, her highness had a fucking headache.
Liam leaned over the back of her, adding, “He’s a sitting senator, civil rights attorney, and activist—”
“I DON’T FUCKING CARE!” I hollered. “He’s not a Callahan! Therefore, he is a nobody! Or have the rules changed now because it’s my daughter? Because she’s not really Declan’s daughter?”
“Don’t you fucking dare! SHE IS MY DAUGH
TER!” Declan finally chose to come back to life.
“PROVE IT…FIGHT FOR HER!” I screamed back.
“What do you think I’m trying to do, Cora!”
“I don’t know, Declan,” I hurled back at him. “From where I’m standing, it looks like you’re letting someone steal our daughter! The daughter we raised…the daughter we fed, and clothed and loved! The daughter who is…everything to me! You all can destroy cities; you can bring ground men to their knees. Within minutes, you have the FBI, CIA, Chicago PD, and every other goddamn acronym at your fingertips, and yet for some reason, it’s hard for you to figure out a way to bring back our daughter!”
“And what do you think will happen if we used one of those acronyms to get her back? Huh, Cora?” he hollered back.
“I don’t—”
“You should care!” he cut me off. “If we go to the FBI, CIA, Chicago PD, or anyone else, people will know they’re in our pockets. If we look bad…if people find out how corrupt we really are, we could lose Helen forever! If we kill him, not only will we kill our daughter’s biological father, and she could hate us, we would be the first suspects. Once again, we could lose Helen forever! I swear on everything that I am, everything that I own, I swear even on you…I will bring our daughter home, but we can’t just snatch her, Cora. Give me time!”
I shook my head and backed away from him, glancing to Liam and Melody, who just stared between us. “If it were Donatella, she’d already be back.”
“It could never be Donatella because her biological father is right here,” Melody replied, her words all but ripping out any shed of…dignity I had left.
“Liam,” Declan sneered. “Shut your wife up before I have to. I will not allow her to speak to my wife like that.”
“Let her say whatever the fuck she wants because until my daughter come back, you don’t have a fucking wife!” I muttered, fighting back the pain in my throat.
“Cora.” Declan’s eyes focused on mine. He stepped closer, but I backed away.
Running my hand through my hair, I blinked the tears out of my eyes. “Why is it whenever I need you, Declan, you’re fucking useless?”