18. Declan
DECLAN
I awaken as if born into the world. I remember nothing and feel everything. A hot, searing pain seems to rip open my chest. Above me, Caroline is unbuttoning my shirt. I swat at her hands, but I can hardly move them. It hurts to even breathe. “Let me help,” she murmurs over me. “You’re bleeding.”
I manage to look down. So I am.
Haloed in the sunlight, her blonde hair shines. Blood is spread across her nose. She looks like the angel of death, and I gasp when her fingers swipe my chest. The pain is unbearable and spreading, and my breaths feel thin.
Beyond her, Rian is sitting under a tree trunk, drinking water and looking dazed, his eyes gazing over the empty span of dirt in front of us. “I think the helicopter could land here,” he tells Kellan, who nods in response, a cell phone in his hand.
Caroline untucks my shirt, her hands so close to my dick that if I had any function left, I’d be stiff right now. She must see me twitch because a small smirk bites into her cheek. She rips the bottom of my shirt until she has a ribbon of fabric and barks at Rian, “I need your water!”
Who is she to talk to us like that? I try to sit up, but she pushes me back down, and the slight pressure of her hand knocks the wind out of me.
Rian pads over and takes a lingering chug of the water before passing it to her open palm. Why are they treating her like this? We could have been killed. I want to say it, but my mouth is dry and won’t cooperate.
Caroline pours the water onto me, and when I glance down, I see an open wound that starts on my sternum and spreads down to my ribs.
She pushes part of the fabric into my cut and sticks the rest of it to my skin with water.
Sweat ignites at my forehead at the sudden pain, and I start to lose the small amount of consciousness I have.
She pours water onto her hand and slips her hand behind my neck.
There’s sudden relief in her touch, and I feel something resembling gratitude toward her as I crawl back toward consciousness.
I’ve never cared for anyone’s wounds. I’ve never had anyone care for mine.
Usually, in my line of work, a wound precedes death.
Rian takes the water bottle back and crouches down near me.
The right side of his face is badly bruised, and his eye is nearly hidden in the folds of a purple welt.
“Right, you’ll be okay. Here’s the deal, deartháir .
She’s had all this time to call the police while we were stuck upside down and unable to move, and she didn’t.
She’s taken care of me, and she’s taken care of you now too. She won’t tell anyone what she saw.”
Caroline adds, “I’ll even testify for you.”
“We’re going to get a helicopter to come get us, and she’s going to come with us while we convince our father. She’s still a prisoner until she testifies, but…she wants to live, and we’re going to let her.”
I try to sit up, and Caroline’s hand snakes under my back to help me up. I growl at Rian, “We don’t have that choice.”
“Yes, Declan, we do. And it’s our only choice.”
“And why’s that? Because she helped you out of a car wreck? Women are weak like that. They can’t face death. Don’t be pathetic.”
“Because my children belong to one of you,” Caroline says simply, her hand still on my back, keeping me steady.
The world seems to freeze. My eyes lock on hers even through the pain in my chest and side. Seeing the look on my face, she adds, “That makes me a part of your little mafia family, doesn’t it?”
“What did you say?” I whisper.
She meets my gaze, unflinching. “You heard me. My children belong to one of you.”
That’s not the part I meant. I’ve known all this time.
I was the only son my father told about the boys.
He said I was the only one with the guts to kill them, and at the time, I thought it made sense.
They were evidence. Proof of a night in which someone was killed, someone the FBI was sniffing after.
But Caroline’s words echo in my mind. Part of our mafia family. She’s right. What if my father wanted them gone not because they’re evidence but because they’re heirs?
Rian stiffens beside me. “I saw them, Declan. They really do look like us.”
Kellan finally speaks, his voice low. “One has my birthmark.”
My stomach lurches. “You’re saying one of us knocked her up? Years ago?”
“They’re three,” Caroline says. “Do the math.”
I let out a bitter laugh and wince at the pain in my chest. “Why didn’t you try to contact us? Let us help?”
Her laugh shocks me, ripping through me. It’s genuine and bitter at the same time. She gestures to our surroundings—the wreck, the blood, the guns. “I didn’t want this for them. But they deserve more than what you’re planning, so if I have to sell my soul to keep them and me safe, I will.”
There’s a long silence. Even the birds have gone quiet.
Rian rubs his face and mutters, “We’re in it now.”
“We always were,” Kellan replies.
I shake my head. “This is insane.”
“No,” Caroline says, standing up straighter. “What’s insane is killing the mother of your kids just to keep a secret. You all had a choice. I didn’t.”
I glare up at her, but I don’t have the strength to argue. My chest aches too much. My pride even more.
She kneels beside me again and whispers, “Let me live. Let me keep them safe. I’ll keep your secrets. All of them.”
I close my eyes. Maybe it’s the blood loss or the quiet conviction in her voice, but I want to give her my secrets to keep.
Maybe it’s her fingers still on my back, holding me while she breaks me.
Caroline is special. Children that are hers and ours would be special.
And she’s right. They’re family. She’s family. Tied to the Crowley clan by DNA, by violence, and by blood.