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Thirty-Eight
Finn
The silence changedat my words. Went from tense stillness into buzzing curiosity.
I much preferred that.
Paddy cleared his throat after he shot me a grateful look then rattled off, “After all these years, Finn, I still don’t know if I can make sense of it, but things are plenty clearer now. Remember that year when Alan Davidson came to us, Aidan?”
My ears pricked up at that. “Alan Davidson? The president?”
Padraig corrected, “His father. Alan Sr.”
“What is it with the fucking fathers in New York?” Conor muttered. “Junior, Senior… there are millions of other names out there.”
“He’s got a point,” Junior agreed, his lips twitching as he sank back into the chair, one hand curved around a tumbler, the other absentmindedly rubbing his fucked-up knee.
Conor smirked. “You know when you’re called Junior… your mom has probably moaned your name during sex.”
Eoghan groaned. “Jesus, you filthy feck—”
“Takes one to know one,” Conor interrupted, snickering all the while.
“Think I give a shit about first names?” Senior snapped, twisting around to glower at his brother. “You’re dead. So why are you standing here, gracing my office, and drinking my whiskey?”
“Because I need your help, Aidan.”
Senior’s nostrils flared, but he cut through the BS like usual. “You need cash.” Itwasn’ta question.
“Not because I’m broke.”
“Then why?” His nostrils flared and that was the only clue we got about the imminent explosion. “WHY?”he roared, hurling the crystal glass against the wall.
As it shattered into a million shards, whiskey spraying everywhere in a graceful arc, I figured it was a testament to how accustomed we were to his volatility that not a single one of us flinched—not in surprise at his scream nor at the smash of the glass colliding with the brick wall.
Padraig didn’t either, but his pinched features blanched even more. “Because my boy’s been kidnapped, Aidan.”
I wasn’t sure whether that was the right thing to say or the wrong because Senior rasped, “I’ve got a nephew? My sons have a fucking cousin and I didn’t know about it.”
His head rocked back and forth, leaving me wondering if this past Christmas, on top of everything else, was more than my old man could stand.
He already subsisted on the verge of insanity. I felt certain he was shuffling nearer and nearer to the edge until he was dangling above it by his fingertips.
“Da,” Junior rumbled. “Padraig had a reason for what he’s done. You don’t listen to him, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”
“Praise Jesus I won’t be living that much fucking longer if this is how life is going to be—”
At his complaint, Eoghan snarled, “Shut up, Da. You’ll die an old decrepit bastard because only the good die young.”
Senior narrowed his eyes upon his youngest, proving yet again that only Eoghan and Conor could talk to him that way because he merely huffed. With Dec, Brennan, Aidan, and me, he’d have clipped us around the ear.
“Speak, Paddy. Let us know why you betrayed your family, why you lied to us for decades, why you broke your mother’s heart—”
Paddy choked, “I didn’t want to have to do it, Aidan. I didn’t have a goddamn choice.”
“Neither did Ma when her heart stopped beating because both her youngest had died.” Senior tipped his chin up. “You’re the one who has to live with that knowledge, not me.”
Like a lightning bolt meeting a lightning rod, their tempers arced between us until Paddy blurted out, “I saw Elizabeth Ó Cléirigh fucking Michael Byrne in her wedding dress.”
