I lean against the railing of the balcony in the executive suite, watching the Atlantic churn. I hate this weather. It’s unpredictable. In Vegas, the heat is honest. It wants to kill you, and it tells you so to your face. Here, you don’t know what you’re getting.
“Sir.”
I don’t turn around. I knew the voice. Kieran. He’s been with the Syndicate since he was eighteen, and he’s one of the few men I trust to watch my back when I’m three thousand miles away from the Mojave.
“The O’Sheas are late,” I say in a monotone voice. “It’s been twenty minutes. I don’t like being the one waiting, Kieran.”
“Traffic on the coast road, apparently,” Kieran mutters, stepping up beside me, his hands folded in front of his suit. “But they’re confirmed. Five minutes out. Neutral ground, just like you wanted. They won't bring more than three men inside.”
I grunt. The meeting is a formality, really. A ‘handshake’ to ensure the transition of the Dublin-to-Vegas pipeline remains smooth. I moved the core of the operation to Nevada years ago—displacement is the best form of security. If your enemies have to buy a plane ticket to find you, they usually just stay home.
“Where’s Maeve?” I ask.
“The little mistress is in the garden. She wanted to look for fairies or some such things,” Kieran says, his tone softening just a fraction. Everyone in the organization has a soft spot for my daughter and why not? The little girl is filled with happiness and sunshine, things my men and I don’t see much of.
“Check on her. Now. I don’t want my daughter anywhere near the lobby when the O’Sheas arrive. They’re snakes, even for Irishmen.”
Kieran nods and retreats into the room. I stay on the balcony for a moment longer, lighting a cigarette. The smoke is immediately snatched away by the wind and I grunt in annoyance.
This meeting better be worth coming here or there’ll be hell to raise.
I am thirty-eight years old, and most days, I feel a hundred. I’ve spent two decades building a kingdom out of blood and dirt, and the only thing I have to show for it is a massive bank account and a five-year-old girl I’d use my life to protect.
Surprise is a luxury I haven’t been able to afford since the night Elara’s blood flowed on my floor and dripped down my hands. Since then, I’ve lived only by the numbers. Logic. Protocol.
Then Kieran’s voice comes over the comms in my ear, and the logic shatters immediately.
“Boss! We’ve got a problem. M-Maeve… she wandered off!”
Fuck… no.
I’m moving before he finishes the sentence. I ignore the elevator and hit the stairs, my boots thudding against the carpet as my hand already reaches for the holster at the small of my back.
“How?” I snarl into the mic.
“Since the minder fell ill, she’s been running amok. I’ve searched, but she’s not in the garden. We’re tracking the GPS on her coat now…. We found her! She’s on the cliff path!”
The cliff path.The one with the crumbling edges and the two-hundred-foot drop.
By the time I burst out of the resort’s side entrance, I’m no longer in business mode. I don’t care about the O’Sheas. I don’t care about the meeting. I just need to find my daughter right now.
I see the flash of yellow first. Maeve’s raincoat.
She isn’t alone.
There’s a woman with her. She’s crouched in the grass, her back to me. Even from this distance, I can see she’s a mess. She’s wearing a silk dress that’s torn at the hem, and her hair is a wild, dark nest of curls being whipped about by the wind.
What the fuck?
I’m thinking about snapping my gun to her head and asking what the fuck she’s doing with my daughter, but I force myself to slow my pace as I approach, signaling my two guards to hang back. My heart is still beating hard, a rare, uncomfortablesensation that makes me feel things I really don’t need right now.
I reach them just as the girl begins to talk to my daughter.
“The flower isn’t worth falling into the ocean for,” the girl says. Her voice is surprisingly steady, despite the way her hands are trembling.
Maeve finally sees me, and it takes all I have in me not to turn into a caveman and snatch my daughter from this stranger.
“Dada!!” My daughter grins, and finally, I can’t take it anymore, so I scoop Maeve up. The weight of her in my arms usually calms me, but right now, it just heightens the rage vibrating in my marrow. My eyes are locked on the stranger.
