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Chapter One
Ruby
I sit across from the man who killed my father, the man who also happens to be my uncle.
I find it difficult to feel any familial affection for Aaron McCarthy. He grunts as he lights his cigar, running a hand through his mop of gray hair, with a few clinging reds still holding on.
His office – my father’s old office – is large and spacious. My dad furnished it elegantly, but Aaron has gutted it and turned it into an idiot’s idea of what it’s like to be rich, with golden furniture, plush rugs that don’t match and framed signed prints on the walls, all of which clash.
It’s an open secret in the Irish mob that three years ago Aaron conspired with the Cartel to take out my dad, Johnny. I’ve heard the guards whispering about it. I know that most of them disagree with how he went about gaining control of the mob, but with the Cartel’s manpower behind him, none of them can do anything about it.
I was sixteen when my dad mysteriously died of a heart attack at dinner.
He was my best friend as well as my dad, as sad as that sounds.
I’ve never been good at making friends, and my connection to the mob has made it even more difficult.
I’m the princess of the Irish mafia.
People are wary around me, never letting their guard down, knowing that if they make the wrong joke and my family finds out, there will be hell to pay.
My uncle runs the house like a dictatorship.
I know if I speak first it’s going to put him in a bad mood, so I wait with my hands in my lap, even as pulsing rage moves through me.
It’s preemptive rage, as I get ready for him to tell me no, the same way he always tells me no if it doesn’t involve something he wants.
But I have to try.
My writing became the most important thing in my life after Dad died.
Finally, he sighs and rests his elbow on the table. “You wanted to see me?”
I almost laugh in his face. I’ve been sitting here for at least a minute, waiting for him to get his power play over with.
Of course, I’m here to see him.
But I don’t let any of my anger cloud my expression, instead work to make myself smile as widely as I can muster.
“Yes, uncle. I’d like to ask your permission for something.”
I’m nineteen years old. I shouldn’t need his blessing for anything.
But, while he’s never come right out and said it, I’m a prisoner here.
All the doors are locked and the walls around the estate are guarded. When Dad was alive I could come and go as I pleased, but now whenever I try to leave the estate, the guards dream up some reason why I can’t…
Later, they promise. Come back later.
But it’s always the same answer.
If I want to leave the estate, guards have to follow me, keeping a watchful eye on me to make sure I don’t say the wrong thing.
That was never a danger before when I was in high school. Fear of my uncle kept me silent.
But ever since graduation I’ve come to realize what a true prison this place is. I wish I could turn back time and tell a teacher about the predicament I was in, but that’s the past. It’s over. I can’t change it.
I have to focus on the now.
“My permission?”
He sucks on his cigar, eyes glimmeringly with an evil glint. I can’t believe I never saw that when I was a kid, but Dad blinded me to all the nastiness of this life. His love made it easy to close my eyes to how messed up a lot of these mobsters are.
“Yes.” I stare into his eyes, annoyed at how similar their pale green is to Dad’s, to mine. “I’ve finished my book and I’d like access to the internet so I can submit it to potential publishers.”
I have to ask, to give him the chance to say yes, before I move to the next step of my plan.
Uncle Aaron narrows his eyes at me. His lips twitch with the shadow of a smile. It’s not a real smile. I don’t think Aaron is capable of true human emotion. It’s more the way a bully amusedly smirks at his victim.
“Oh?” He flicks some ash onto Dad’s table. I fight the urge to wipe it away. “And what is this book about?”
The book is about the Irish mob and how it works from the inside, a thriller novel about a female detective who infiltrates it and becomes embroiled in a romance with a hostage.
I’ve drawn on my own experience and long years spent eavesdropping on the guards.
But I know if I tell Aaron the truth, he’ll never let me submit it anywhere.
