Chapter 15 Requiem for the Faithless
Chapter fifteen
Requiem for the Faithless
Róisín
Finn’s office smells like ink and old wood and the kind of quiet that only comes after violence. I sit in the chair opposite his desk, spine straight, hands folded loosely in my lap. There’s blood on my knuckles I haven’t bothered to clean yet. It’s drying. I like the reminder.
The men who spoke too freely are gone. The walls still hum with what they learned. Finn stands at the window, back to me, shoulders broad and immovable. He hasn’t said a word since the door closed. He doesn’t need to. I can feel the shape of the plan settling between us, inevitable as gravity.
“They didn’t mean to kill Ciaran,” I say finally.
Finn turns. His face doesn’t change. That’s how I know I’m right.
“He wasn’t the job,” I continue, my voice steady. “I was.” Silence stretches. “And you,” I add, lifting my eyes to his. “You were meant to die too.”
He nods once. “They wanted the Malloy heir broken,” he says. “And the O’Callaghan line destabilized. Two birds. One chapel.”
My jaw tightens. Not with grief—with clarity.
“My brother stepped in,” I say quietly. “He put himself between me and the bullet.”
Finn’s voice drops. “Aye.”
I look down at my hands. At the faint tremor I refuse to acknowledge. “He wasn’t collateral,” I say. “He was a shield.”
Finn crosses the room in three strides and stops in front of me. He doesn’t touch me yet. He waits. “They used the church because they knew it would draw you,” I continue. “They knew I’d play. They knew you’d come.”
“They knew what we were,” Finn says.
I look up at him then.
“And they thought that made us weak,” I say softly.
Something sharp and pleased flickers in his eyes.
I lean back in the chair, crossing my ankles, the gold at my throat warm against my skin. “So,” I say calmly, “we give them what they expect.”
Finn’s mouth curves—not a smile. A promise.
“The chapel,” he says.
I nod.
“I’ll play,” I say. “Not for mourning. For memory.”
“For bait,” he corrects.
“For revenge,” I reply.
Our gazes lock. No argument. No hesitation. Only alignment. I rise to my feet, already reaching for the violin case resting against the wall.
“Let them come,” I say. “I’m done being hunted.”
Finn steps closer, voice low and lethal. “Aye, love. This time—we finish it.
One hand cups the back of my neck, thumb pressing lightly beneath my ear—grounding, steady. Not possession. Not demand. Choice.
He lowers his mouth to mine and kisses me like a vow.
Slow. Certain. No hunger in it—just promise.
The kind that says I am with you in this, not I will save you from it.
I kiss him back just as deliberately, my fingers curling into the lapels of his jacket, anchoring myself to the weight of him.
When we part, our foreheads rest together.
“They’ll come,” he murmurs.
“I know,” I say.
He pulls back just enough to look at me, eyes dark and resolved. Then he turns, already reaching for his phone.
“Declan,” he says when the line connects. No preamble. No softness. “I need something carried through the house.” He listens, jaw tight. “Aye. Let it slip that Róisín and I will be at the old chapel tonight. Together.” A pause. “No,” he adds calmly. “Not an order. A whisper.”
I move to the desk, leaning against it, watching Finn as he speaks. The man who rules with silence. With timing. With inevitability.
“Let the men talk,” he continues. “Let it sound like a mistake. Like pride. Like grief making us reckless.” Another pause.
“And make sure it spreads,” he finishes.
“Every corridor. Every pub. Every bastard who still thinks the past is unfinished.” He ends the call without ceremony and turns back to me.
“They’ll think it’s their last chance,” he says.
I smile—small, sharp, certain. “Good,” I reply. “I don’t want them careful.”
Finn crosses the room again, his hand settling at my lower back, steady and sure.
“Tonight,” he says quietly, “they come for ghosts.”
I meet his gaze, unflinching. “And find the living.”
Silence settles between us—thick, expectant, loaded with consequence. The trap is set. Finn’s hand stays at my back as if it belongs there. As if it always has.
“Well,” he says lightly, eyes flicking over me with unmistakable appreciation, “if we’re going to be bait, we should at least look tempting.”
I lift a brow. “Is that your professional assessment?”
“Aye,” he replies. “Deadly. Distracting. Impossible to ignore.”
I turn just enough that his hand slides from my back to my hip. Intentional. Familiar. My knife rests loose in my fingers, catching the low light.
“Careful,” I murmur. “You’re flirting with your wife while planning a murder.”
His mouth curves. “Multitasking has always been a strength.”
I step closer, invading his space now, my smile slow and knowing. “Try not to look too pleased when they fall for it.”
He leans in, voice dropping. “No promises, mo chroí.”
I tap the flat of my blade lightly against his chest, right over his heart. “You like when I’m dangerous.”
“I married you because of it.”
Our eyes hold. Heat. Trust. A shared hunger that has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with choice. Finn presses a brief kiss to my knuckles—courtly, reverent, lethal—then steps back, already turning toward the door.
“Tonight, then,” he says. “One last confession.”
I smile to myself, slipping the knife away.
“Aye,” I answer softly. “Let’s hear them sing.”
The lights dim behind us. The chapel waits.
The engine is the only thing breathing between us. Finn’s hands are on the wheel, knuckles pale where the road curves. No driver. No buffer. Just him, the night, and the choices we’ve already made.
The violin lies across my lap, naked wood and strings catching the dash light. I rest my palm over it—not to steady myself. To remind myself. He doesn’t look at me. Doesn’t need to.
The chapel appears ahead, all broken stone and memory, rising out of the dark like it’s been waiting this whole time. I inhale. He exhales.
And neither of us turns back. WSe pull in slow, deliberate—headlights washing over stone that still remembers blood. Finn kills the engine. For a beat, neither of us moves.
Then he’s out first, smooth, unhurried, already wearing the mask. The man the city knows. The groom. The peacekeeper. He rounds the car and opens my door like it’s any other night, like this chapel hasn’t swallowed our past whole.
I step out smiling. It’s almost funny how easy it is.
His hand slides to my lower back the second I’m upright, fingers warm and proprietary, thumb pressing just enough to remind anyone watching that I belong right here. I loop my arm through his, lean in close, laugh softly like I’ve been whispered something sweet instead of dangerous.
“Easy,” he murmurs under his breath, lips brushing my temple. “They’re watching.”
“I know,” I murmur back, tilting my face up so he can see the smile reach my eyes. “That’s the point.”
We walk together toward the doors, bodies pressed close, our steps perfectly in sync.
His hand drifts—too intimate for public, too practiced to be accidental—fingers skimming my hip, my waist, the small of my back.
I let my own hand slide up his chest, palm flattening over his heart like I’m checking it’s still there.
It is. Fast. Steady. Alive.
The chapel doors groan as we push them open. Candlelight flickers inside, throwing shadows that dance like ghosts along cracked stone. The air smells of dust and old incense and memory.
Finn’s fingers lace through mine. I squeeze. Inside, we play our parts beautifully—soft laughter, murmured words, stolen touches that look like affection but feel like strategy. His mouth dips to my ear, breath warm.
“Smile for me, mo chroí,” he whispers. “Let them think we’re stupid with love.”
I do. And together, hand in hand, we step fully into the chapel.
The chapel hasn’t changed. The roof still gapes open to the Belfast sky, ribs of stone exposed like a body that never healed right. Candle stubs line the altar, wax pooled thick and uneven, some melted down into the cracks where blood once dried.
Where my brother died. Where I learned how to survive.
Finn’s hand finds my lower back the moment the doors shut behind us. Warm. Steady. Possessive without force. I lean into it without thinking, my body remembering before my mind can interfere.
We don’t speak. We never do, not in places like this.
His mouth brushes my temple first, slow and reverent, then my cheek. His thumb lifts my chin, giving me time to pull away. I don’t. Our mouths meet gently—nothing like the hunger in his office, nothing like the fury downstairs. This kiss is unhurried. Familiar. Heavy with memory.
My fingers slide beneath his coat, pressing flat to his chest. He inhales sharply when I step closer, when my knee slips between his legs and I feel the tension coil there.
“Christ,” he murmurs against my mouth. “You do that on purpose.”
I smile. Small. Dangerous. “Aye.”
His hands move—one settling on my hip, the other tracing the length of my spine, stopping just shy of skin. Not touching. Promising. He walks me backward until stone meets my hips, cold and solid, and I gasp into his mouth.
He swallows the sound like it belongs to him.
“You look like you belong here,” he says quietly, his breath warm at my throat. “Like this place was built to watch you sin.”
“It already has,” I whisper.
His fingers slide into my hair, not pulling—just holding. Anchoring. His mouth presses to my pulse, and for a moment the chapel disappears. There is only breath and heat and the echo of ghosts leaning in close.
Then—slowly—he pulls back. Not because he wants to.
Because this matters. I open my eyes. My lips feel swollen.
My pulse thunders. For a heartbeat, I’m wrecked.
Then I reach past him. My fingers close around the violin case resting near the altar.
The shift is immediate. The heat doesn’t vanish—it sharpens. Turns ceremonial.