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My suspicion deepened. “What kind of protection detail, Tommy?”
He huffed out a breath and looked me right in the eye. “An arranged marriage to one of the guys.”
I laughed in his face. “No.”
“It’ll be somebody high up enough to where the Italians won’t dare mess with you. We need to send the message that you’re one of us.”
“I’m flattered, but the answer is still no. I’ll just move. I’ve done it before, I can do it again.”
Tommy leaned forward and grabbed my wrist, his hold gentle yet firm. “They’ll find you, Cassidy. They’ll find you, and they’ll silence you. They’re not going to take a chance on it, especially after your little performance down at the police station this afternoon. Look—I’m not suggesting you get cozy with the guy.”
“I should hope not. Who is it?”
“Connor McTiernan, Callum’s nephew from Ireland. You probably don’t remember him. He’s a little intense, but he’s a good guy. I wouldn’t have suggested it if he weren’t.”
“Oh, so this isyourhair-brained scheme.” I snorted a laugh. “Yeah, that’s going to be a hard no from me, big brother. I’m well acquainted with Connor McTiernan’s knuckle-dragging personality. We had a little run-in down at the hospital yesterday, in case you hadn’t heard.”
Tommy’s face darkened. “I hadn’t. What happened?”
“He didn’t touch me, if that’s what you’re thinking. Connor likes to boss people around, and let’s just say I didn’t take kindly to it.”
Tommy sighed, stood, and walked into the kitchen. He paused at the counter for a minute, looking around the tiny, spartan apartment with the dying plant in the corner. Went to the fridge, pulled out the milk, and made a face at the expiration date. Sniffed it and poured the milk anyway, topping off my abandoned coffee cup. No cream, no sugar, just the way I liked it. Somehow, after all these years, he still remembered.
I leaned back and took a good look at my brother. The cropped fauxhawk was new. The tattoos creeped farther down his arms and up his throat than they used to. More scars. Tommy had always been larger than life, but those huge shoulders held the weight of the world, now, a mass I imagined he didn’t let many people see. His eyes were the same, though, looking at me with a mixture of exasperation, impatience, and something softer underneath.
It was as he set my coffee mug down, turning the handle towards me, that I realized that I had actually missed my brother.
I motioned to the telltale bruising along his left cheekbone. “Do I want to know how you got that?”
“Fighting.” Tommy shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal.
My lips twitched into a humorless grin. “You haven’t changed at all, have you.”
“Neither have you.”
I didn’t know whether to take that as a compliment or a condemnation. “Tommy, I—"
“Dad’s dying.” Tommy sat down across from me. “He’ll deny it when you see him, but it’s true.”
A disgusting mixture of shock, pain, and vindication twisted in my gut. “Why are you telling me this?”
“I’m not trying to be dramatic here. I’m really not. But maybe this thing could be a blessing in disguise, a chance to hash things out before it’s too late.” He rapped his knuckles on the table and weighed my expression carefully. “It’s cancer, Cass. The pancreas, whatever the hell that things is. Dad was diagnosed a couple months ago, but they caught it late. Treatment’s not working. The docs say he’s got a few months left in him, a year at best. I know you’ve had your differences, but it would be good if you could make your peace with each other. Mom wouldn’t have wanted it like this.”
“Don’t talk about her.”
Tommy’s gaze pierced straight though me. As much as I hated my father, the thought of losing him…I didn’t know what I felt. Everything was so jumbled up, my head still ached, and I unaccountably felt like I was on the verge of tears.
“I know this seems like a lot, Cassidy,” he began, “but Connor can protect you.Wecan protect you. The marriage will be real for appearances sake, so it’ll look like you’re one of us, but that’s as far as it will go. Nothing in the bedroom, and nothing you’re not comfortable with. And once the coast is clear and the Italians move on to the next new shiny thing, we’ll get it annulled.”
“I don’t know, Tommy.” I picked at the design on my mug. The truth was, I still felt shaken from the night before, which was probably why I was even humoring this conversation. I must have hit my head harder than I thought.
“I’ll pay off your student loans.”
“What?” I couldn’t have heard that right.
“I will pay off your student loans, get you a fresh start after all this is over. Whatever it takes, Cassidy.” Tommy leaned forward. “I need you to do this thing.”
“I…” I couldn’t push the wordnoout of my mouth. It seemed that in the wake of a near-death experience, a dying father, and a blank check staring me in the face, I was willing to go against all my morals and principles. I’d utterly failed at proving to myself that I’d put the past behind me. And now, with my life hanging in the balance and the ghosts of my past come back to haunt me, I was still staring at the same mountain of debt and the weight of an unfinished residency.
