25. Chapter Twenty-Five
Once he was out, Taran drove him back to the pub, and on the way, Liam watched him wincing with each turn of the steering wheel. “Why aren’t you in the fucking hospital?”
“It’s a nasty bruise, I’m telling you, right under my shoulder blade. Hurts like a motherfucker. They gave me pills and when I get home, I’ll take one.”
“I guess it’s not a good idea for you to stay here or for me to go there.”
“Not…not right now. But that doesn’t mean I want this to be over. Liam, my feelings for you, I know you hate talking about this stuff, but…”
“We’re together. I can’t say more than that yet, but…yeah, Taran.”
Taran smiled over at him. “I’ll take that and be patient. But for me, I can say it. Especially now. Liam…I fell for you a while back. Hard.”
“The second you saw me with the cat. You don’t have to tell me.”
“I think that was it, yeah,” he laughed.
“You sure it wasn’t the cat? He’s won over everyone here at the pub.”
Taran reached a hand over and laid it over Liam’s, squeezing tenderly. “There’s something special here. Maybe in this place, you have a family, whether or not you knew you needed one.”
“I came to that conclusion right before you…got shot.”
“Good. I didn’t want to have our first fight be over that.”
“No? What should it be over?”
“Something easily solved so we can get to the makeup sex.”
Liam felt like his world had spun around so much that he wasn’t steady on it any longer, but he didn’t need to be steady. Steady for him was being alone and pushing the rest of humanity away from him. “I…have a family. And I’m gonna go inside and let them know I’m okay, because I actually think they’re worried about me.”
“Yeah. I’m pretty sure they are, being they haven’t stopped blowing up my phone since you were taken away in the police cruiser.”
Liam laughed and said, “I’d better go in then. See you soon. That’s not a question. I will see you soon.”
“You will.”
As soon as he walked into the doors of the pub, everyone rushed him, surrounding him as questions were hollered out and hugs were given, pats on the back, and a tender hand was cupping his cheek that belonged to Tally. “Oh honey, you look terrible. Sit at the table. Let me get you some food.” To Murphy, she ordered, “Get him that top shelf stuff you reserve for yourself.”
“Tally!”
“It’s not like we don’t know about it, Paps,” Mims said as he skipped off to the bar to fetch it.
“Assholes, I swear.”
They all gathered at the tables closest to the bar and Hippy told him, “I never saw a man on fire like you were.”
“I haven’t felt like that in a long time. Since I first went inside. A guy tried to fuck me, and I…stopped that shit fast.”
They all nodded silently except for Abs. “You were scary, but someone messed with your man.”
He opened his mouth to deny that Taran was, in fact, his man , but couldn’t. He’d said it himself. “How am I gonna deal with it? He’s a cop.”
“You deal with it like I deal with Murphy,” Eazy said to him. “We have to trust they are careful, and they know what we’re losing if they take the wrong risks.”
Murphy kissed his husband and said to all of them, “These cartel cops, they’re gonna be a problem. I still like Cosmo’s idea. We endear ourselves to the neighborhood, then the city, then the entirety of Denver. It’ll mean we get bigger and take more risks.”
“Bigger? More guys?”
“No,” Goldie said. “I think Murphy would agree. The more guys, the more problems. We all mesh well, and we have our positives and negatives. What we need to do now is find fences and others to work with who we can trust and who won’t sell out to the BBC.”
Liam spoke up, “My fence is small time, but he might connect us with bigger people, if he gets a cut.”
“But that’s okay,” Eazy said. “That just affirms our wanting to get more money out to the locals, to be…”
“Robin Hoods,” Haze finished. “We’re gonna be Robin Hoods. And why not? All the best anti-heroes in history have started out that way. What we need more than anything, though, is if we gain power, we don’t let it go to our heads.”
“I can keep us in check,” Abs assured. “Me and Daiq.”
Ryan came into the pub, sitting hard on a chair. “My little siblings are finally down for naps. What the hell? Do you give them candy for breakfast? Little Mick was wired for sound, man.”
Eazy laughed and said, “You were still that way when you were thirteen.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Eazy turned to Murphy, and his voice was smooth as he eased his husband’s mind while getting him to say okay to letting Ryan into the mix. “If we keep him safe, shield him like that guy shielded his people…”
Murphy glared at his oldest son and said, “You are behind the scenes! You put one toe out of line and you’re out so fast, your head’ll spin. You got that?”
“Yeah, Dad, I swear! I’ll be here. No one will even notice me!”
Liam smiled and gave his blessing. Not that it was needed. “It’s good to bring him in, Murphy. Scary, but he can learn from you the right way. I knew guys born into families who did stuff like us, and they took off and made their own crews and got screwed every time.”
As Ryan sat up proudly, he assured his father, “I’ll learn from the best.”
Hippy laughed and said, “And…well, we’re all the best. I think I’ll finally come in a lot handier now, though.”
“You will. I want us all to have vests like the fed did, and I want all of us trained with weapons. That starts tomorrow, Hippy. On everything from knives to rocket launchers, if we have them.”
“We don’t have rocket launchers,” Mims said.
“We could. I know where there’s a stash,” Hippy said, winking over at Mims.
Abs took out his phone and started swiping the screen. “I’m beefing up security around here, too.”
“I was gonna tell you to do just that,” Murphy sighed. “My kids, besides this big one, have nothing to do with this shit. They’re protected.”
“They can’t protect themselves,” Liam said, and for the first time since his mother killed his siblings, he realized it to be true. The guilt of not protecting them waned enough for him to take a breath without pain. “We, the adults…we gotta do it.”
Tally had been quietly sipping Murphy’s good whiskey while she listened to the men come up with what she likely thought they should have been doing all along. When Liam, however, said that about the kids, she saw it. “You looked like something came to you just then, Cosmo. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, Tally. Yeah, it did.”
It settled in his chest for days, that realization. He saw Taran on and off, but more off because of the threat. Taran had to go to Washington with his partner and they were arguing to get more men in Denver to help.
That likely wouldn’t happen. Budgets were stretched thin, and so were the law enforcement officers that weren’t in some terrible cartel.
When he finally returned and spent an hour railing on his superiors, Liam told him that he had help, when and where he needed it. “We’re not feds, but we’re better in a lot of ways. We don’t have to follow laws or report to committees.”
“I just cannot believe there are more important things.”
“That’s because you’re in the middle of this. I’m sure a fed in Oklahoma is concerned about what is going on in Oklahoma and so on. It’s a big country with a lot of fucked up people in it. The feds can only be stretched so far.”
Taran sat beside Liam on the bed, petting Daiq. “This cat is addictive.”
“Isn’t he? You can’t stand not to pet him!”
Daiq was purring happily as Taran pet him and Liam laughed, kissed him, and then they heard a light tapping on the door.
Abs stuck his head inside the door and said, “Hey. Murphy wanted to give us an update on that building.”
“I’ll be right down.”
“Both of you,” Abs said. “The fed guy, too. Murphy’s got a grand idea, he said, and he’ll need the fed’s input. His words.”
Liam took his hand and led him out of the room and laughed a little when Taran kept peering back at Daiq. “Will he be okay?”
“Are you kidding me? It is the cat. You fell for the cat.”
“Well! He’s so…sweet. And you’re really not.”
He could admit that.
In the basement, they sat around the table, Ryan and Tally there, too, while Eazy watched the little kids. “Well, my boys, this is the deal. I have three subcontractors to do the work on the building, and the bank pre-approved the loan.” Everyone first sighed then hollered in joy as they heard the news. It was the first step to beating the BBC.
“Hold on, folks! This is not all of it.”
For once, they all were quiet. Tally was smiling, however, and that gave Liam a lot of hope. She knew everything before any of them did.
“The building has to come up in value. Now, that won’t be hard. The place is a fucking dump. Talk about a slumlord for an owner, and he wants top dollar for it. I can pay it, but I don’t want to, so…”
Taran spoke next and Murphy seemed to wait for it. “There are a lot of laws against slumlords, city, state, and federal.”
“I was hoping you’d say that. If he…I don’t know, gets an idea he might get hit with an investigation, we could buy it cheaper and raise the value quickly.”
“Done.”
Liam reached for and grabbed Taran’s hand.
“Okay, good. Now, just because we’re not exactly playing fair with that turd, it doesn’t mean we’ll take a lot of shortcuts on raising the value of the building. We need to have it pay for itself, though. I’m thinking rent controlled for those that live there now, but if an apartment becomes available, it’s going to be more than the current prices. Maybe not that much, but still. We have got to get this before some big corporation grabs it. If someone else gets it, all those people lose their homes and with the prices today everywhere else, they’ll likely add to the homeless population.”
“Whatever we have to do,” Abs said.
“Well, we’re gonna do a lot of the work to make it better. I must have real plumbers, electricians and such for code, but we can clean, paint, lay carpet and flooring. We raise some money, too, for those tenants that are staying. I’d like to maybe make their places nicer, and it would also raise the value. Wins all around.”
“Why don’t we do a charity night?” Goldie suggested. “We bring in a lot of tips, but we could, I don’t know, offer to match donations with our tips, and you could match us, maybe.”
“That’s a great idea,” Mims said, slapping the table with both hands like a bongo. “We could do an extra special night.”
“I could get a band, maybe, so we’re not the only entertainment,” Hippy offered. “And, no, not blues. I can find a popular band.”
“Get on it. Get on all of it. I have some pull with the bank because of this place. They saw my business spring from the little neighborhood bar it had been to this club that’s packed each weekend. This is on all of us, however.”
Tally nodded to her brother, and he waved her on. “What Murphy wants to know is this. You six boys, if you’d want ownership of the building, once it’s paid off. So that you all have something else, something substantial.”
“I know, a rundown apartment building doesn’t sound like much of a perk,” Murphy said, but Mims stopped him.
“Paps, really? You’d do that?”
“He’s been talking about giving you boys more for a long time now. With this, well, he’s finally able to.”
Liam felt like he was being included in something he hadn’t yet earned. Taran seemed to sense it, and once they were back in the bedroom, he addressed it. “You’re the new guy.”
“Well, yeah! I shouldn’t be getting the same perks as everyone else!”
“But you are and not one person in that room looked at you like you shouldn’t get the same as them. In fact, weren’t you the one that wanted to give back to the neighborhood?”
“Don’t fucking pull that out on me.”
“It’s true, Liam. And yeah, you’re a part of them now. Shit, I am!”
Liam didn’t know what to do with himself, so he plucked Daiq off the bed and carried him out of his room, finding Abs in the common area. “Take him, please.”
“You okay?”
“No, Abs. I’m…I’m a fucking mess.”
“Yeah, me and Goldie figured. Go be with your guy. I’ve got this baby.”
Liam went back into the bedroom, feeling nuts, feeling like the rage he’d felt that day two weeks before would take him again, and instead of loving Taran, he’d hurt him. But then, he knew he could do both.
He rushed to Taran and grabbed his face, kissing him harder than he ever had, and, taking the cue, Taran unbuttoned his pants.
Liam, like he’d been described, was a man on fire, but there was much more than rage there. At that moment, he was so intensely in love, so happy, that he did not know how to handle it.
Remembering the last time he’d been genuinely happy was difficult. It was so long ago, and that happiness was inside a much different Liam.
He pushed Taran back on the bed and yanked off his pants, watching Taran pushing his briefs down his hips. He didn’t have words for the man. No thoughts would penetrate that didn’t hurt or strike terror in his heart.
Instead of thinking, he dove into the instincts that were in every human, from the time when words and emotions were secondary to actions. A base human, helpless to the elements but in control over themselves.
As he greased his cock, Taran pulled him down, biting his lip, seeming to sense what mood he was in and running with it. Taran winced as Liam pushed inside of him, smiling through it too, huffing through parted lips.
Grunting, Liam pounded inside of him and, like blocks were falling into place, building him a home, everything felt as if it came together so easily. A home was surrounding him, family, friends, safety, and he was so frightened, but there was another emotion.
Freedom.
For all those days and nights he’d been alone purposely, he was trapped in his own head and heart. Jailed long before he’d been inside a prison. That hate and fear had had him trapped.
The people at the pub, in such a short time, had freed him. And the man under him, clawing viciously at his back while Liam banged into him, had freed him.
Liam was free to love again. That was the freedom he felt in that moment, and he loved Taran. He knew it, Taran knew it, all his new family knew it. Taran belonged to him and, for the first time in forever, he belonged to a man.
Curling his hands under Taran’s shoulders, he slowed his thrusts to kiss the man deep, letting himself get lost in the man. The fear that still hung on him was the fear of losing any of them.
If Taran had died on the street from that shot, if they’d have gotten caught and taken from each other, if, if, if, there were too many ifs. The day by day was where he decided he needed to live. The day to day of being in love with not only one man, but an entire pub of people.
The next day, after Taran left, Liam asked Murphy if he could borrow the SUV, and something about his face or voice made Murphy hand over the keys wordlessly.
He drove to the cemetery where his mother and siblings were buried.
One other time in his life, he’d been there, the day they were laid to rest in the ground. Liam had sat on the chair next to a blubbering father while not losing a tear from his eye. He’d been in shock. Everyone said it, but Liam knew better.
He wasn’t in shock. He was angry. His life, in one day, had changed so drastically, his playmates, his confidants, witnesses to his life, they were gone.
The way he’d felt the day he found them all dead, that was shock. In the five days it took for the autopsies and funeral arrangements, those had turned that shock into an anger that held him for the rest of his life.
It took a pub filled with men who welcomed him to finally ease that anger, and it was time to forgive his mother as he’d so recently forgiven himself.
Parking near the aisle where they lay in a row, a mother and her ducklings, small, rectangular stones set in the grass.
Debra MacManus. She was the first in the row, but he passed by her to see his older brother, Sean Jacob MacManus. “Hey, Johnny,” Liam said to his brother. They’d always called him Johnny. “Long time, I know. You’d have kicked my ass for it if you were here, but…you’re not.”
Mellie Leigh MacManus, his older sister. “Mels, hey. Love you.”
Faye Debra MacManus, his younger sister, who’d had long blond curls and big blue eyes, always laughing, smiling, was next. If he’d have been home that day, he’d have been between Mels and Faye. “Faye, little one. I know you’re smiling still, keeping everyone happy, wherever you guys are.”
Thomas Michael MacManus, the baby of the family. “Tommy. I’ve been most sorry for you, I guess, that…that as your big brother, I wasn’t there to save you. The others, they could have run, I guess. That’s how my mind worked, but you couldn’t have. But…but if you could have been saved, Johnny or Mels would have saved you. I can’t feel guilty anymore. I couldn’t have done anything except die with you all.”
He stood and walked along the row, back and forth, talking to all of them.
“I felt guilt, and I was pissed off, and…I’m sorry. I am sorry that I wasn’t there too. That’s what was really on my shoulders, but it didn’t occur to me until recently. I couldn’t have stopped her. But…but I could have died with the rest of you and maybe that is why I was so upset. I’m okay now, though. Not completely, but I’m getting there.”
Finally, standing before his mother’s stone, Liam sighed and felt tears finally come. “Mom, I, uh, forgive you, I guess. Not completely or anything, but I get it. I know why it happened, and that you weren’t in your right mind. I know, okay? I still,” he started, but his throat threatened to close. “I still love you, okay?”
With his legs no longer able to hold him, he fell to the ground and sobbed quietly by himself in the cemetery.
When he stopped crying and could stand, he did, and he nodded to all of them. “I’ll try to come more. I’ll…I’ll come more.”
The pub was hopping when he got back, and when he went inside, he saw it wasn’t with the customers, it was with the entire family. Mick and Katie were dancing on the bar as a pop song played on the jukebox, Eazy and Murphy alongside them. Abs grabbed him and dragged him over to a box where Daiq was purring up at Mims.
“What is all this?”
“We do this all the time. We’ve just been busy. But we’re having a family day!”
Mims nodded hard and said, “You’re stuck with us now, even Paps, who can’t dance at all.”
Murphy hollered, “I heard that, you turd!” Tally walked over to him and handed him a drink. “You’ll need this when they bring out the karaoke machine.”
“Thanks.”
As Goldie took Katie off the bar and swung her around, dancing, and Hippy did the same with Little Mick, Big Mick and Ryan brought out trays with small bowls of chili and Haze started pouring sodas and beers into glasses. “Time to eat,” Ryan yelled. “Enough with the dancing!”
Liam sat at the table with them, all jabbering at one another, all of them smiling and he felt his own smile, wide and strange on his face.
Whatever was about to happen in his life, he finally wouldn’t be alone.