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“We need to keep them all apart until Declan’s better. Until he can keep a handle on things, because Da is enough to make her run,” Brennan warned. “You know how fucked up he gets sometimes, and with almost losing Declan and then learning about Seamus—fuck, it was a cute thing for her to name him after Grandda, but that’s only going to mess with his head all the more.” He rubbed a hand over his brow, and I could sense his fatigue from all the way over here.
Barely refraining from yawning, I decided I was tired too. It wasn’t something I often allowed myself to feel because I had too much shit going on, too many plates to spin to sleep, but as I saw my brother’s exhaustion, I allowed myself to feel it as well.
Things had been hectic since Dec had been brought into surgical care here, and it wasn’t going to lighten up now that we had family to protect.
From family.
Jesus.
I rubbed my eyes. “Ma’s going to be just as bad. She’ll want to meet him.”
“It’s fucked up for Seamus to meet his grandparents before he meets his da,” Finn stated, crossing his arms over his chest.
I nodded. “Agreed.”
We fell silent, each of us lost to our own thoughts, then Aidan broke it. “I can’t believe Hoskins fucked us over like that,” he rasped, referencing the fucker who’d sided with an Italian sharpshooter, taken out Rogan, a trusted soldier, and had tried to get to our nephew and brother’s woman.
“He’s dead now,” I pointed out, my tone a tad more gleeful than was appropriate. Especially as the crew we’d shipped after him had been told to be heavy-handed. Messages had to be sent, after all, and they had to make shockwaves reverberate around the Points. “No use overthinking it.”
“Always been your trouble,” he retorted. “You knock something off your to-do list and that’s it. There’s a reason he did what he did.”
“Money, probably. You know theFamigliapay well. It’s the only reason they have any foot soldiers on the streets right now,” Finn remarked.
“Conor’s right. The cunt is dead, and we have other shit to worry about.” Brennan sighed. “Now the threat is contained, I’ll go and get Seamus and Aela in the morning. Shit should be wrapped up with the cops by then, and the house will have been processed. If there’s a problem, I’ll get French on it and make sure everything’s tied up neatly. I’ll bring them to Declan’s, but the folks can’t find out about it.”
“Only way you can make sure that happens is if you go alone.”
Brennan shrugged at Finn’s comment. “That was my intention anyway.”
I hummed under my breath. “I’ll come along for the ride.”
It was time to meet this nephew who had the fam in chaos, and as chaos was my forte, I was excited about meeting him. I just hoped the kid wasn’t a prick, but I didn’t put out much hope because every teen boy at fourteen was one of those.
* * *
DECLAN
“Aela.”
A sharp intake of air was my first clue that she recognized my voice, and to be completely frank,Ididn’t recognize my fucking voice, so how the hell she did was a miracle.
Still, I wasn’t about to question a miracle, not when this entire situation felt very miraculous.
Like I was in the middle of a very lucid dream that I wasn’t sure I wanted to wake up from.
The cardiac arrest, the feeling like death warmed over, sure, that could be a nightmare. I’d be very happy to wake up from that and not have to piss in a bag, but the stuff with Aela? With Seamus? I was glad that was happening.
Life changing, and in a way that was positive. In a way that was usually anathema of how lives changed in my world.
“Declan?”
Her voice was husky, shaky, and even though I hadn’t spoken to her in years, I was instantly transported back to the days when her voice had been husky and shaky from need, from love, and not just nerves.
I missed those days so fucking badly… more than I knew, more than I thought I did.
“Yeah. It’s me.” I cleared my throat after I fell silent, and when she didn’t say a word, Conor muttered, “My minutes aren’t for wasting.”
I scowled at him. “You gotta be shitting me. Your minutes aren’t for wasting? Get me my own goddamn phone and I’ll waste my own minutes. You cheapskate fucker.” Millions in the bank and he was whining on about minutes when he had an unlimited fucking plan!
