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An Seiceadóir.
The Executioner.
Seamus is dead, of course. Definitively so. Ares killed him after he’d kidnapped Neve, exacting his vengeance. And that’s something I saw with my own eyes: Seamus, his eyes staring wide and unblinkingly up at the sky, face white, surrounded by his blood, with a gaping hole in his chest.
But while The Executioner himself may be dead, what happened the other night, or more specifically what that little psycho who knifed me said after she did it, confirms a nagging, lingering feeling I’ve had for months.
That Seamus was only the tip of the iceberg. That he didn’t work alone, as everyone assumed he did.
Years ago, when my half-brother Declan made the deal with the FBI, it was a last-ditch resort. For decades, Seamus had been the absolute top, most vicious and prolific hired killer the Irish mafia had ever known. I mean, this was a man who was literally kicked out of the Irish Republican Army during the Troubles for “cruel and barbaric conduct”.
You have to be on a whole other level to be deemed too extreme by the fuckingIRA. And eventually, the extremism Seamus brought with him to the States when he was working as a killer for hire became too much.
Seamus didn’t just go after his targets. He, unsanctioned, went after their families as well—their wives, even their fuckingchildren—in barbarous ways. A religious fanatic, Seamus had a mantra of “bleeding the innocent to wash away the sins of the wicked.”
I mean that quite literally. Seamus’modus operatiinvolved fuckingcrucifyingthe families of his targets, and literally bleeding them out.
For years, this habit was overlooked by the Council of Clans, due to his connection to the Kildare name by way of my half-brother Declan, who was a product of my father’s improprieties with a woman named Sheila O’Conor.
As in, Seamus O’Conor’ssister.
Translated: my half-brother was Seamus’s nephew.
But at a certain point, even given the family connection, enough was enough. Add in the fact that Seamus was not even discreetly trying to build his own empire, and the Council finally put their foot down. That’s when Declan made his deal, and Seamus was thrown into ADX Florence supermax prison.
And then a few months ago, he was killed.
But.
After hearing those words from the little psycho’s lips the other night, I’m not positive his would-be empire diedwith him. And the stitches still in my side would like to know for sure.
I need to know what’s out there in the shadows. I need to know if there’s still danger lurking around the corner, waiting to try and hurt my family again. And the three men currently stumbling their way back to their garage-slash-chop-shop—or at least the one unlocking the door—are going to tell me that.
I mean, maybe they won’t.
But that would be averymessy mistake on their part.
Because I already fuckingknowthe knife she used on me came from Aaron, a small-time stolen car broker and arms seller. I know because he’s a fucking egotistical dumbass and has a habit of etching this stupid symbol—an “A” for Aaron, with an overlaid upside-down second “A”, for Armstrong, his last name—into the weapons he sometimes sells.
I mean the dumb fuck sells illegal arms, and literallywrites his name on them.
Whatever happens to him tonight is fucking mercy.
I wait until all three of them have lurched inside before I surge out of the shadows. My foot hits the door right by the knob, slamming it inward, sending it cracking into Aaron’s face.
He squeals like a stuck pig, clutching his smashed, bleeding face as he topples backward onto the grimy floor. His two buddies stare at me with looks of panic, fear, and utter disbelief, instantly sobering. Then they’re rushing me.
The monster in me flexes and rises up, grinning.
Smelling the blood in the water even before I strike.
The first one gets my fist to his throat, followed by an elbow across the face. He gurgles, going down hard as the blood streams beautifully from his nose. Idiot number two pulls a knife, and I smile icily.
I was hoping they’d be this stupid.
The snapping sound of his wrist echoes almost as loudly through the room as his scream when I yank his arm to the side. In one motion, I’ve knocked his legs out from under him, whipping him around to face his buddies, and brought the blade of his own knife up to his throat.
Aaron’s eyes go wide as he tries to drag himself up from the ground.
