6. Declan
DECLAN
The warehouse on Fishtown smells like old concrete and fresh blood. I've been here for two hours now, and I still can't make my hands stop shaking.
The guy's tied to a chair in the center of the room, head lolling forward, face a mess of split skin and purple bruising. Troy Donnelly. Twenty-six. Insurance adjuster. Ran a red light on Girard Avenue four days ago and destroyed my entire fucking world.
"Jesus, Dec." Stellan leans against the far wall, arms crossed, watching me with that clinical detachment he does so well. "You're going to kill him before we get anything useful."
"Don't care." I slam my fist into Donnelly's jaw again, feeling something crack. Blood sprays across my knuckles. "He doesn't have anything useful to give."
"Then what's the point?"
The point is I need this. Need the solid contact of bone against bone, need the visceral release of violence that's been building in my chest since I watched Zola cry last night.
Since my uncle stood across from me in that sterile hospital hallway and told me she wasn't suitable.
Since Dr. Reeves explained what they'd had to remove to save her life.
I hit him again. And again. My shoulders burn with the repetition but I can't stop.
"Declan." Stellan's voice sharpens. "He's barely conscious."
"Good." I drive my knee into Donnelly's ribs, hear the air wheeze out of him. "He should suffer."
Stellan pushes off the wall, moving closer but staying just out of reach. Smart. He knows better than to get between me and something I'm trying to destroy. "This isn't helping anything."
"Helping wasn't the fucking goal." I grab Donnelly's hair, yanking his head back. His eyes are swollen nearly shut, blood pouring from his nose and mouth. He's making these awful gurgling sounds that should probably bother me more than they do. "The goal was making him hurt."
"Mission accomplished." Stellan watches me with those cold gray eyes. "Now what?"
Now what. Like there's some logical next step to this clusterfuck.
Like I can just stop being angry that some careless piece of shit was texting while driving and crashed into the woman I love.
Like I can forget that Zola's lying in my bed recovering from surgery that stole her future.
Like I can ignore that my uncle wants me to throw her away for political convenience.
I hit Donnelly again, harder this time. His head snaps to the side with a crack that sounds wrong. Too final. His body goes slack in the chair, that gurgling wheeze cutting off into silence.
"Shit." I step back, chest heaving. Blood drips from my knuckles to the concrete floor. I wasn't fucking done. "Shit."
Stellan moves forward, checking for a pulse I already know isn't there. His expression doesn't change. "Well. That's that."
"I didn't mean—" But the denial dies before I finish it. Maybe I did mean to. Maybe some part of me wanted exactly this—to break something beyond repair because everything in my life feels broken and I don't know how to fix any of it.
"It's fine." Stellan straightens, pulling out his phone. "We'll handle it. Won't be the first body we've disappeared."
The casual pragmatism should be comforting. This is our world—violence and consequences and cleaning up messes. We're good at it. Efficient. But right now it just makes me feel hollow.
I stare at Donnelly's corpse, at the blood pooling under the chair, and feel nothing. No satisfaction. No release. Just the same crushing weight that's been sitting on my chest since I got that call from Danny. The same helpless rage that won't stop churning in my gut.
"Talk to me." Stellan pockets his phone, crossing his arms again. "What's actually going on here?"
"Nothing." I turn away from the body, flexing my split knuckles. Everything hurts in that distant way that means I'll feel it properly tomorrow. "Just needed to blow off steam."
"Bullshit." He blocks my path to the door, and there's something almost concerned in his expression.
Almost. Stellan doesn't do concern well but he's trying.
"You've been wound tight since the hospital.
Tighter than usual. And you just beat a man to death with your bare hands, which even for you is excessive. "
"He hit Zola." Like that explains everything. Maybe it does.
"And he paid for it." Stellan tilts his head slightly. "But that's not what this is really about, is it?"
I want to lie. Want to brush him off and walk out and pretend everything's fine like we always do.
But I'm so fucking tired of pretending. Tired of carrying this weight alone while Zola's at home trying not to cry and my uncle's plotting my future and I can't see a way forward that doesn't destroy something.
"Uncle Vittorio didn't just come to check on Zola in the hospital." The words taste bitter. "He came to talk to me."
Stellan's expression goes carefully neutral. "About?"
"Succession. Leadership. The usual." I run my bloody hand through my hair, not caring that it probably looks insane. "And about requirements for taking over. Strategic marriages. Beneficial alliances."
"Ah." Just that. Like he already knew where this was going.
"He said Zola's not suitable." The words burn coming out. "No family connections, no standing. And now that she can't have children—" I can't finish that sentence. Can't repeat what my uncle said about mistresses and bastards and moving on from this situation.
"So you told him to fuck off." Not a question. He knows about the ring I've been hiding and the way I've been feeling.
"I told him you could have the title." I meet his eyes, see something flicker there that might be surprise. "We'll run things together. You handle the politics, I handle everything else. Nothing really changes except the name on the paperwork."
Stellan stares at me for a long moment. Then he shakes his head slowly. "I don't want the fucking title, Dec."
"Then get over it." The snarl comes out sharper than I intend. "Because that's the only way I can be with Zola. You step up or I lose her. Those are the options."
"There have to be other—"
"There aren't." I cut him off. "You know how this works. You know what Uncle Vittorio expects. I either marry someone useful or I step aside. Simple as that."
"It's not simple." Stellan's jaw tightens, frustration bleeding through his usual control. "I don't want a wife either. Or kids. The whole domestic situation—it's not for me."
"You sleep around enough." I'm being cruel now but I can't stop. "You'll accidentally produce an heir eventually."
"I'm not a fucking idiot." He scoffs. "I'm careful. Always."
"Then be less careful!" The words explode out of me, too loud in the empty warehouse. "Figure it out! Because I don't know what else to do and you're not helping!"
Stellan throws his hands up, that careful control finally cracking. "What the hell do you expect me to do, Declan? I can't just magic up a solution to this!"
The outburst echoes off the concrete walls, hanging between us like smoke.
I stare at my brother—my brilliant, calculating, emotionally detached brother—and feel something break inside my chest. Something that's been holding me together since I walked into that hospital room and saw Zola hooked up to machines.
I hunch forward, bracing my hands on my knees, trying to breathe through the pressure crushing my ribcage. Blood drips from my knuckles onto my shoes. The warehouse spins slightly, or maybe that's just me.
"I don't know what to do." The admission comes out rough, barely above a whisper. "I don't know how to fix this. Any of it." And it's destroying me.
I'm a fixer. It's what I do. I can manage any problem—but not this time.
I feel rather than see Stellan move closer. He doesn't touch me—we're not those kinds of brothers—but his presence is solid beside me. Grounding.
"The hospital bills are destroying her." I keep talking because if I stop I might actually shatter.
"She lost her job. She's going to have to sit out next semester because she can't afford tuition.
Every day she's in more pain and trying to hide it because she doesn't want to seem weak.
And underneath all of that she's grieving something she didn't even know she wanted until it was gone. "
My voice cracks on the last word. I straighten up, swiping at my face with the back of my hand, leaving bloody streaks I don't care about.
"And I can't help her." That's the worst part. The thing that's eating me alive. "She won't take money from me. Won't let me fix the bills or pay for school or do anything that makes her feel dependent. She thinks she's burdening me. That she's costing me too much."
"You told her about Uncle Vittorio." Stellan says it flat, statement not question.
"She pushed." I meet his eyes. "She knew something was wrong. I couldn't lie to her."
"So now she knows you're giving up everything for her."
"I'm not giving up everything." The denial sounds hollow even to me. "Just the title. The official position. That's all."
"That's everything you've been working toward since you were fifteen." Stellan's voice goes quiet. "That's your entire future, Dec. And we both know it."
I do know it. Know exactly what I'm sacrificing and why it matters.
But Zola matters more. She's always mattered more.
From the moment she looked at me across that community center gym three years ago, unimpressed and sharp-tongued and so fucking beautiful it hurt, I was gone. Everything else is just details.
"I'll do anything to keep her." The words come out raw. Honest in a way I'm not usually capable of. "Whatever it takes. I don't care what it costs."
Stellan exhales slowly, running a hand through his dark hair. He looks tired suddenly, older than twenty-one. "We don't have to figure this out today."
"But—"
"We don't," he repeats, firmer this time. "This is complicated. Political. There might be angles we're not seeing yet. Give it time."