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Forty-Eight
Aidan
"You’re a troublemaker."
She smirked at me on the ride back to my estate. "If you expect me to feel bad, then you’re in for a disappointment."
"I don’t expect you to feel bad about what you did, but how you did it, sure. Why didn’t you come to me?" I grumbled, unsure if she knew how much fucking trouble she’d actually caused.
"Because I’m a grown-ass woman with a voice and a head on my shoulders that can get things done?" She huffed. "What was I supposed to do when someone was being railed at in public by her mother, then starts crying when I break them apart and says that her mom is trying to steal her kid?"
"Bring the situation to me?"
"Why? She said your father was in on it."
"He was," I agreed. “I wasn’t.Anyway, I don’t think he’d take the same stance now."
"‘Think?’ That’d really reassure MaryCat when her kid was being ripped from her arms, wouldn’t it?"
"It’s not like Maddox would have been taken into custody. He’d have stayed with her mom."
"Is that supposed to make it better? She said her mom was only doing it because she didn’t like her choice of partner." I pulled a face which had her declaring, "Aha! That’s why your father doesn’t approve, but you can bet your ass that if my dad knew what you were and who, he’d disapprove as well.
“Maybe if we had a kid, they’d have the right to steal it away from me because they think I’m insane for having a child with a mobster, hmm?"
"Don’t even use that as a hypothetical," I growled, hands tightening on the wheel, my head snapping to the side as I glared at her. "Don’t, Savannah."
Her eyes flared wide but she grunted. "It’s the same thing."
"Anyone or anything tries to break us or our family apart, I will annihilate them." My jaw tensed. "Do you hear me?"
"I hear you, Mr. Neanderthal. Jeez, and you’re the one saying I’m being irrational." She heaved a sigh. "If you feel that way about me, imagine how MaryCat’s man feels about her? He went away on business, and will come back to his family torn apart all because he’s a biker?"
I didn’t like that she could draw similarities between us.
With Inessa, Aela, and Camille, they’d all been raised in the life. They all knew how it worked. Aoife didn’t, now Savannah. But Aoife was alone in the world, an orphan. She’d made the O’Donnellys her family, and last night, I’d seen that Savannah would embrace my side, but she was quite happy with her own too.
Aoife was also happy in her sphere. She was independent enough to want her own business and worked hard to achieve her goals, but she had the heart of a homemaker too. Savannah wasn’t like her. At all.
Aoife, in the same situation today, would undoubtedly have found Finn. As would my other brothers’ wives. Savannah went to her hacker friend first, then confessed second when MaryCat’s mom had kicked up a stink when they couldn’t find her.
She’d put me in a bad position, and didn’t even care about it.
I gritted my teeth at the thought, and knew that unless I explained rationally, she’d do it again and again—that couldn’t happen. Not without making me look weak.
"Okay, I know what you’re saying. You’re also right—"
"I am?" she sputtered. "If you think that, then why on earth are we arguing?"
"Savannah, you’ve studied the mafia enough to know there’s a certain order to the way we do things, for God’s sake. You have to know that going behind my back wasn’t going to look good for me. I understand there’ll be a learning curve, but you can’t just go off the cuff anymore. You have to bring these things to me. I’d have resolved the situation without you involving outsiders."
"Star isn’t an outsider," Savannah pointed out. "She was integral the other night."
"She isn’t bound to help us. She chooses to. There’s a difference." When she didn’t argue, I knew she agreed with me, just didn’t want to say it out loud. "I’ve been meaning to talk with Da about MaryCat since I found out about what they were doing. I’m not sure why he didn’t involve Ma, but he chose not to.
“Anyway, her mom’s a bitch, and I know she’s been biding her time to find ways to take the baby from MaryCat—"
"Why would your father even consider something so horrible as tearing MaryCat away from her child?"
