Chapter 48
Cormac
Apink streak on the horizon greets the golden glow of a morning sun. I’ve been pacing for the last hour. Lost in worry and dread.
“Hey…” Scarlett’s voice from the bed turns me around.
Our bed. A real marriage bed.
“Hey,” I repeat and stop pacing. “I need to go see Ana. She was dragged into that humiliation last night.”
Scarlett pushes out of bed immediately. “One hundred percent. And I’m coming with you.”
My instincts to push her away rear up, and it’s on the tip of my tongue.
No.
I’ve got this.
I don’t need you.
I don’t need anyone.
But that’s not true anymore.
And the feeling that I’m not entirely alone hits me, and it doesn’t knock me over. My chest opens, and the demons are finally leaving.
I nod and say, “Good.”
“And I want to meet your son,” she adds.
My jaw ticks. “I want that, too.”
Before I tell Ana that horrible photos of her from Vegas at the worst time of her life were made public during the gala last night, I make the fragile call to Darragh to explain it to him first.
He’s surprisingly gracious. Maybe because we’re bred from people who don’t blame and scapegoat others to dodge hard truths. What happened, happened. However, Pierce humiliated Ana and me. But it’s not our fault.
Darragh also sounds happy that I’m heading to Astoria and that I’m bringing my wife. She’ll formally meet my son. Christ, this is happening.
When I reach Darragh and Ana’s house, I find the Astoria Bratva is ready for war. Bratoks who report to Sergei fill the wardroom.
I can only imagine how Darragh told Ana what Pierce did. He greets Scarlett and me while in full Daddy mode, taking care of Sophie. She’s got life-threatening allergies, so preparing her meals takes care that Darragh doesn’t trust too many people.
I was one of those people back when we lived in Seattle. And I ruined it.
“Where’s J.P.?” I ask.
“Late morning nap.” Darragh puts a finger on his lips and then looks at Sophie, who’s eating and reading a book.
Scarlett stays close, hand loosely linked with mine, claiming me. Standing by me.
“Darragh’s daughter is from his first marriage,” I whisper. “His ex is a doctor, living overseas now.”
Scarlett nods, and I think about how her head will explode when I explain my other brothers’ marriages and how they came to be. I can give her a brief run-down on Christmas Eve.
“Finished!” Sophie skips to Darragh and hands him her plate. “Uncle Cormac!”
The way she still gets excited to see me and rushes into my arms breaks me into pieces every time. “Hey, munchkin. I want you to meet someone.”
Scarlett stiffens and steps in from the doorway where we were lingering, waiting for Ana. “Hi, Sophie.”
“Who are you?” my niece asks, her nose scrunched.
“This is Scarlett.” I pull at my collar, tempted to say her last name, but I’m not sure Sophie will exactly understand. There are so many O’Rourkes at this point. “She’s my wife.”
Sophie’s face freezes, and she shrieks, “Daddy!”
I didn’t know what I expected from an eight-year-old, but her reaction sets me back on my heels.
Darragh puts down his phone and rushes over. “What?”
“Uncle Cormac got married, and I wasn’t invited to the wedding!” Her high-pitched wail could break glass.
I nearly snort at the reason for her outburst. “Soph, there wasn’t a wedding. Scarlett and I just…”
Yeah, I don’t know how to finish that.
“Hi, Sophie,” Scarlett takes over. “I’ll explain everything. Can I sit with you?”
Darragh and I toss glances at each other.
Sophie nods and marches to the kitchen table and sits. I imagine she’s gotten this from Ana, who listens to people explain their fuck-ups while she decides if they are leaving the house with their head still attached to their body.
“Your uncle and I met a couple of months ago and had a really great date.” Scarlett glances at me with a wink.
I love how she’s sanitizing our sex hookup story for a kid.
“I’m a medical school student. I’m going to be a doctor like your daddy and uncle.”
Sophie’s jaw drops. “Really?”
“Yeah.” Scarlett sits up straighter. “Your uncle and I just started dating. You know boyfriend-girlfriend. We really liked each other a lot, but then I got into trouble, Sophie.”
“What kind of trouble?” she asks, hanging on every word.
Scarlett reaches for an explanation and settles on, “Grownup trouble. But the nice thing is, your uncle said I could live with him. Only, we didn’t want to live together if we weren’t married.”
“Oh,” Sophie processes that. “Okay.”
“We just went to someone who quickly married us. We’ll have a big party soon. Will you be a flower girl for me?”
Hmm, we didn’t discuss this because I intended this marriage to be a short-lived situation.
“That is the best idea.” Sophie jumps from her seat, twirls, then thrusts herself into Scarlett’s arms. “And J.P. can hold the pillow.”
Christ, my heart swells watching this.
“We’ll see how good he’s walking by then,” I say, getting myself together.
“James Patrick has Lachlan’s tree-trunk thighs,” Darragh snorts. “He might be running by then.”
I laugh and consider all the genes that got spread around this family and how they’ll eventually materialize in the next generation.
The O’Rourke Legacy. God help us…
“Soph, go get ready to see Layla. We’re leaving here in a few minutes.” Darragh mentions seeing her new baby cousin.
I hope baby Layla, Lachlan and Katya’s little girl, doesn’t inherit her father’s height and thighs.
Please, God. Just this one favor…
As Sophie dashes from the kitchen, Ana strolls in. I admit, my pulse stops a little seeing her. When I found her in Las Vegas four years ago, she looked like a spoiled Bratva princess would look. Then I turned her into that woman in the horrible photo last night.
My brother brought her back to life. Back to who she really is. And when her father made her underboss of the Bratva, she turned into a powerful and dangerous woman.
Her blonde hair is pulled back, and while she looks like she doesn’t have any makeup, a subtle dusting of powder makes her skin look like porcelain, and dark mascara frames her eyes.
Her steel-gray power suit means she’s in underboss mode. Her Bratva tattoo, visible below her right ear, is an insignia all those loyal to her are branded with.
“We need to talk,” is all she says to me, her face stone, until her eyes turn to Scarlett. “Hello.”
I wind a hand around her waist. “Ana, this is Scarlett. Scarlett O’Rourke, my wife.”
Scarlett releases my hand and stands straighter under Ana’s attention. Alert and respectful.
“I heard.” Ana smiles. “And like my daughter, I look forward to celebrating your wedding.”
With a hand stretched to Ana, Scarlett says, “I would love that. And it’s so great to meet you.”
“Darling, we’re sisters now. We hug.” Ana wraps Scarlett in a hug that brings tears to my eyes.
All women who marry into the family are considered sisters. I have a feeling Scarlett, as an only child, might like that.
Darragh steps forward. “Let’s talk in the office.”
We march that way, Ana first, Darragh right behind her.
I close the door, and Ana takes a seat at her desk. Darragh stands behind her, while Scarlett and I sit in chairs facing them.
We give a briefing of what happened at the award ceremony the night before, and Scarlett slides her phone across the desk, showing a video that is circulating online.
“Send me that link,” Darragh says, taking out his phone. “Balor will have it taken down immediately.”
“Balor is my genius tech hacker brother,” I whisper to Scarlett.
Ana sits back, drumming her fingers on the desk until a moment later, she calls out, “Sergei.”
Her enforcer materializes in the doorway. With wide shoulders, a thick skull, and a square jaw, the man radiates violence like heat.
Scarlett grips my hand. Smart girl. Sergei, who served under Ana’s father’s former enforcer for years, is not known to be unhinged. Just deadly.
Ana grips Darragh’s hand as it rests on her shoulder. “What that man did was not humiliation. It was a strike against my house. Any attempt to damage me makes you an enemy of the Koslov Bratva.”
Darragh nods once with quiet fury.
Ana’s gaze slices to me, hard. “And I’m sorry I was further ammunition against you, Cormac.”
Scarlett clears her throat. “And I’m sorry I brought all of this to your doorstep.”
Her voice is low with shame, and Ana recognizes that immediately.
“No!” She pounds a fist. “That pathetic man-child who could not accept no is responsible. That performance last night was his final mistake.”
Sergei nods. “Bullets or blades, boss?”
Scarlett goes completely still.
“Wait, no.” I shoot from the chair. “You can’t kill Pierce Langston. Especially right after he humiliated us.”
“I am untouchable, no law enforcement—”
“I know that, Ana,” I scoff, looking around this office, knowing what goes on in here.
“That’s fucking apparent. But I still have a career I’m trying to resurrect, and Scarlett will get dragged through it, too.
Dar, you know the wall between what our family does and the medical community. We lived behind that wall.”
“Cormac is right, moya koroleva,” Darragh says, low and respectful to her authority.
The endearment is subtle. Darragh using Russian phrases and possibly leaning more Bratva than Irish Mob these days isn’t exactly the headline. It’s what he called her. Koroleva. Queen. Is Ana’s father stepping down?
Something to sweat over another day…
Ana’s eyes flash up at her husband. “What do you propose? I can’t let this go unaddressed.”
Scarlett blurts before I can speak, “I’ll talk to Pierce.
With you, Ana. And your…forces.” She glances at Sergei.
“Just talk. Death is too easy for him. We order him to publicly apologize and admit that the photos and the narrative were all fabricated. Being branded a liar will hurt him more. I promise. I know this man.”