AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter Eighteen
Finn
One of thereasons I was so mad?
I knew Aoife was right.
I hadn’t confessed, and I had a lot weighing me down.
Irony being, of course, that I hadn’t really thought I believed in this bullshit. But, in a crisis, it looked like I did.
Samuel was silent on the drive over to St Patrick’s. Normally he liked to chat. Tell me about his missus and the herb garden he tended on his rooftop, of all things. I didn’t mind. It was like white noise after a while, and because I’d trained myself to, I picked up on what he said even if I was focused on something else.
Every man appreciated being listened to. It was the personal touch. It created camaraderie and loyalty—Samuel, though he knew of the consequences, would never betray me anyway because I cared.
I knew when his wife, Miranda’s birthday was, knew his daughter Ciara was studying at Columbia University and that Aidan was helping him pay for most of it. Not just because he was a nice guy, but because Ciara was pre-law and was as deep in with the Five Points as her brothers were, and fully intended on serving with us after graduation. I knew his sons were all under Brennan’s watch, and I knew which ones were heading for promotion and which would stay as runners.
The personal touch.
So for him to be quiet was a testament to his reading of my mood.
It was just before three, and the streets were marginally less crazy than usual. As always, Samuel provided a smooth ride as he drove me and my turbulent thoughts to church.
I swore my frame of mind was almost a physical entity beside me, and it was wearing on me.
The guilt.
Fuck.
It was ripping me to shreds.
My chest felt constrained, all the damn time. When I looked at Aoife, when I glanced over to the sofa she’d taken to sitting on in my study—where she currently wasn’t and where she most definitely should be. Because of me.
When I was heating up soup my housekeeper made for her, I felt so bad because Aoife loved cooking and couldn’t cook at the minute. Because of me.
When I climbed into bed at night and I couldn’t pull her into my arms because she was so fucking delicate right now. Because of me.
The journey blurred at some point as I thought about what I was going to say, what Ineededto say to clear my brain, and when Samuel parked the car, I jolted to awareness and saw that we’d arrived.
“Thanks,” I told him gruffly and climbed out to face the building where my worst nightmare had played out.
The front facade of the ancient building was pockmarked now. Bullets had sprayed into the stonework, and I knew Aidan was funding the work that was needed to restore the mess.
As I walked down the cobbled path, the gravestones on either side of me were a reminder that I might have been here this week, burying Aoife.
The pain that caused me could only be matched by the fucked-up guilt I’d endured as a kid.
It was a weird time for those memories to surface, but it was like ‘let’s hate on Finn’ week, and all the shit I’d done was just piling on top of me.
Scrubbing a hand through my hair, I stepped under the stone arch into the building proper.
Most churches were closed this time of day, but Aidan funded this one so that his men could drop in for confessional any time their schedules would allow.
A man who’d confessed had a clean soul and could meet his Maker earnestly, was his philosophy, one I’d thought to be bullshit until now.
I gnawed on my bottom lip as I wondered if I was about to turn into some religious zealot. Then, I realized I blasphemed too much to ever be that, and there was no way in fuck I wasn’t going to do dirty and despicable things to Aoife the minute she was back on her feet… things that were definitely not approved of in the Bible.
So, yeah. I needed to purge this shit from my soul and move on.
