Chapter 1
The Arrangement
POV:Evie
My father asks me to marry a stranger at four in the afternoon. This feels inconsiderate. Life-altering decisions should at least come with tea and a warning, or possibly a priest.
Outside, rain is being thrown sideways across the windows like it has a personal grievance. Inside, the house has gone quiet in that particular Brennan way, like it’s trying very hard not to eavesdrop and absolutely failing.
That’s the first thing I notice. The house. Not my father or the papers. Not the fact that something is clearly about to go very wrong for me personally.
The silence.
Men stop laughing when something serious is happening here. Doors close softly. Staff become careful, efficient ghosts. Even the pipes behave, which is impressive considering most of the men in this house don’t.
By the time I reach his study, I already know something has shifted. My father stands behind his desk, hands braced on the wood, staring down at papers he doesn’t need to read. Heknows every word; he always does. Seane Brennan doesn’t keep documents because he forgets things. He keeps them because other men do, and because ink is easier to present than memory when someone needs convincing.
“Sit down, Siobhan.”
Ah, my proper name. That’s never a good sign. When things are going well, he uses my anglicized name, Evie. He only calls me Siobhan when he wants me to remember I belong to something larger than myself. Something structured and expensive.
I sit. The leather chair is cold. I place both feet flat, fold my hands neatly in my lap, and arrange my face into something cooperative.
His study smells like peat smoke, old whiskey, ink, and damp wool. There are four men outside the door. I counted them on the way in. Two near the stairs. One in the west corridor. One by the window alcove, pretending to read messages with the intensity of a man who definitely cannot read.
Inside: one door behind me. Two narrow windows to my left. French doors behind my father, leading to the terrace. Locked. Brass key in the third drawer.
I know this room.
That doesn’t make me safe in it.
My father looks up. “There’s been progress with the Italians.”
I wait. He likes silence. Says it makes honest men nervous and dishonest men careless. I’m neither, so I let it sit there between us and do whatever it’s planning to do.
“The Vitale family is willing to formalize the alliance.”
My stomach tightens, but only in a private, dignified way. “The East Coast holdings?”
A flicker of something crosses his face. Approval, maybe. Regret, maybe. With him, the difference is mostly academic.
“Ports, distribution, arbitration rights in three territories. Their northern routes stay open to us. Ours stay open to them. Ships that used to sit waiting will start moving again. Disputes that used to cost bodies will be decided in rooms instead of streets.”
“That sounds less like progress and more like surrender with better stationery,” I reply. “Or insurance. Depends on who’s expected to pay when something goes wrong.”
His mouth almost moves. Almost.
“It sounds like survival.”
There it is.
The word underneath everything.
My father builds walls out of alliances and calls them mercy. He believes bloodshed is a failure of planning. It’s a very elegant philosophy, until you realize sometimes you’re the thing being moved around to prevent the mess.
“How formal?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer quickly enough. Rain taps hard against the glass. The fire shifts in the grate. Somewhere down the hall, someone drops something and immediately regrets existing. Something inside me steps back.
