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“Just a well check,” Ronan said, his eyes still on hisphone.
“Glad to hear it. What are you watching?” Declanasked.
“News. Remember that guy Aiden thought was behind Mac’s murder? Back when he first tried to hireus?”
“ConnorFerguson?”
Kate’s brother had been sure Ferguson was behind Mac Walsh’s murder, mostly because the billionaire had tried and failed to buy Mac out. Aiden had been wrong, but like so many of the people MIS came across during their cases, Ferguson would always elicit a ping ofrecognition.
Ronan nodded. “He’s buying up a bunch of blue-chip companies. Funny, isn’t it? Guy makes his billions in bleeding edge tech, then sells it all to go oldschool.”
“New money trying to buy its way into old money. The world is crazy.” Declan got a cup and started brewing a cup of coffee, his eyes falling on a postcard from London. He turned it over to see a couple of sentences scrawled in their youngest brother Finn’s barely legible handwriting. “London. That’s…tame.”
Postcards from Finn were usually from places like Morocco andAlgeria.
Ronan put his phone down. “I thought the samething.’
“It’s been a long time since anybody’s heard from him, right?” Declanasked.
Ronan stood, removing John Thomas’ mostly empty bowl and carrying it to the sink. “I was about to have Clay run a search on him, but I guess he’sgood.”
“Cool.”
Sometimes Declan almost forgot they had a younger brother. Their mother had died of cancer a few years before Erin’s overdose, and the remaining Murphys had handled the twin loss in different ways. Declan had joined his brothers to start MIS in an effort to help other families who deserved justice. Their sister, Nora, had moved to California and joined the FBI, although she’d eventually ended up working for a man in a business not dissimilar toMIS.
Finn had run. The ink had barely been dry on his high school diploma when he’d used his graduation money to buy a backpack and one-way plane ticket to Thailand. Their father had been angry and frustrated. Thomas Murphy was a veteran of the Boston Police Department. At the time Ronan had been with the SEALs and Nick had been following in their dad’s footsteps at BPD, Nora on her way to the FBIAcademy.
An aimless son traveling Asia with nothing but a backpack hadn’t been on their dad’s bingocard.
But Finn had gone anyway, and none of them had seen him since, except for Ronan, once, when he’d been on a mission on the Korean peninsula. According to Ronan, Finn had been hardly recognizable, a beard obscuring most of his face, his frame turned tall andlean.
Every few months, he sent postcards like the one on the counter. Once in a blue moon, they even got a call. But other than that, Finn might as well have been a figment of theirimagination.
“Hey!” Julia entered the kitchen, her dark blonde hair falling in waves around her face. “What are you doinghere?”
“Giving Nick a ride,” Declansaid.
She moved to lift John Thomas out of the high chair. “Let’s get you cleaned up for the doctor, little man.” She looked at Declan. “Can you ask Kate if she’ll bring that lobster salad of hers Saturday? I’ve been dreaming aboutit.”
Declan laughed. “Sure.”
“Great.” Julia looked at Ronan. “Want to leave inten?”
He bent to kiss her. “I’ll beready.”
Declan liked watching them together, liked watching them share responsibility for John Thomas. He’d missed the first six years of Griffin’s life. Watching his brother go through all the stages Declan had missed was a way to experience ithimself.
Becoming a father had changed Ronan, rendering his giant of a brother, a man who had killed other men with his bare hands both in service to his country and in service to MIS, gentler and more thoughtful. It made Declan wonder how things might have been different if he’d been spent his freewheeling years with Griffin instead of trying to forget Kate with bar fights and one-nightstands.
“How are Kate and Griff?” Ronanasked.
Declan thought about Kate, about the way she still roamed the cove by herself, her gaze pulled out to sea, an expression of frustration lighting her mossy eyes. “Good.”
Ronan lifted his eyebrows. “You sure aboutthat?”
Declan sighed. Their business had made them too good at reading people, at cataloging tics and tells. Secrets were impossible. “She’s frustrated. We bothare.”
“We all are,” Ronancorrected.
