CHAPTER 1
CALLUM
“Death is nothing at all,” the priest recited from his book of blessings. “I have only slipped away to the next room.”
The brevity of the words settled deep, and I sucked in air through my nose, trying to ride out the crippling pain. My eyes lowered, and I stared at the elm coffin already nestled in the cold, hard ground, and that was the moment it sank in.
Lorcan O’Shea, my beloved athair, was gone.
Tears pricked the back of my eyes, and I bowed my head.
Da was the life and soul of the party, a man who sang “Oh Danny Boy” with so much deep-rooted emotion that he’d bring a tear to the most jaded of eyes. My aul fella laughed hard, loved harder, and had an evil temper. He’d ruled me, my two brothers, and my sister, Aislynn, with an iron fist.
I respected him and was terrified of him in equal measure. Da threw a mean right hook and beat my ass raw on more than one occasion. He was the definition of old school, and I admired him so fucking much that his passing left a hole not only in the family but also in my soul.
Da taught me everything—how to drive and how to chat up a lady, and he even showed me how to knock a man out with that mean right hook of his.
But now he was gone.
Christ.
Da was fucking gone.
The cemetery was packed with friends and, unfortunately, family. Even his cousins from New York had turned up to pay their respects.
A ball of emotion hit my throat, and I bowed my head in time to catch the priest throwing a handful of dirt on top of his coffin.
“Maureen, it’s time,” Father Michael prompted. His sad expression swept over me and my siblings. “Boys. Aislynn.”
My arm tightened around my mam’s shoulders, and I squeezed every ounce of support I could muster through my fingers and into her flesh. “You ready, Mam?” I whispered.
“No,” she croaked. “I can’t.”
I tightened my arm around her. “It’s time. Da would want you to stand strong.”
With a sob, she buried her face in my chest and wept into my shirt.
Every tear that touched me burned with my mam’s sorrow and pain. Maureen O’Shea had lost half of her soul, and I felt that loss in my flesh and bones.
Mam’s sniffles eventually died down, and she threw a single white rose onto Da’s coffin. Then I watched my two brothers and my sister toss their identical flowers after Mam’s.
Clenching my jaw, I threw my rose, watching it land on top of the others.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
The priest began to wind down the service, but his words didn’t penetrate. All I could hear was the rushing in my ears, along with my inner voice telling me that I was head of the family now. It was my job to protect Ma and my siblings.
No more shirking responsibility. It was time to get serious.
I rubbed my burning heart.
Fuck.
The priest’s words floated through the cold air. “The O’Shea family would like to invite everybody back to their bar to raise a glass for Lorcan. All are welcome.”
A murmur buzzed through the crowd, and it began to disperse. My stare fell on my cousins, Liam and Niall, who threw me chin lifts before turning and following everybody toward the church.
A weird feeling slid through my gut.
“This’ll cost us,” Donny muttered from beside me.
“You and T get your asses back to the bar,” I ordered. “Put the food out ready, and get the drinks lined up.”
Donny’s eyes swept over the crowd, buzzing with the promise of free booze and grub. “These vultures look thirsty.”
“Donovan O’Shea, shut your big mouth,” Mam hissed. “People want to pay their respects.”
He leaned forward and gave Mam a peck on her cheek. “Yeah, and they also want free booze.”
Aislynn rolled her red-rimmed eyes. “Can’t you eejits for once just do as Mammy asks?”
Tadhg snorted humorously.
“We run a bar,” Mam threw back. “If we can’t feed and water people after they’ve stood out in the cold watching your athair get buried, we’re no hosts to speak of.
Your da will strike you both down where you stand”—she did the sign of the cross with her finger from forehead to chest, then shoulder to shoulder—“God rest his soul.”
I jerked my chin at my brothers. “Do as Mam says and get back to the bar. The entire town will be turning up for Da’s wake; we don’t want ‘em to find the doors locked.”
Donovan’s worried gaze rested on Ma. “You sure you don’t want us to stay with you?”
She reached up and touched his face. “I’d feel better if my boys looked after the bar. It would put my mind at rest.”
“On it, Ma,” Tadhg murmured, leaning down and kissing Ma’s cheek.
Donny gave her a one-armed hug, then clapped my shoulder before following T, who was already making his way to the car.
Ma’s gaze followed them, and she sighed. “They’re little bastards, but I love them.”
I took her hand and squeezed gently. “We’re all little bastards, Ma, but we’re gonna see you right.”
She glanced up at me, her eyes shimmering with tears. “I’ll miss him.”
“Me too, Mam,” I croaked. “Things won’t be the same.”
“We’ll be okay, right?” she asked, her tone almost pleading. “We’ve got the bar, and your da would have looked after us, wouldn’t he?”
My gut settled.
If I was sure about one thing in this life, it was that my aul fella would always look after us.
He was a good husband and father. He loved his family and always worked hard to give us what we needed.
Since I was a boy, my da had drummed it into me that family came first; then, after I committed to a wife, she came first. He proved it every day of his life by loving my ma the way he did.
My gaze drifted toward the church. “We better go say our thanks to the people for coming.”
Ma sniffed. “I hate this.”
“Me too,” I agreed. “We just need to get today over and done.” My hand dropped from her shoulder, and I crooked my elbow. “C’mon. Let’s make Da proud.”
Mam slipped her hand through my arm, straightening her shoulders, and together, we began to walk toward the church, where all our friends and neighbors waited.
Hambleton was a small, semi-rural town in southern Wyoming, situated just north of the Colorado border, adjacent to the Utah state line. It was a community with old-fashioned values, where you could leave your doors unlocked, and your shit wouldn’t get thieved.
Da moved us here from New York when T was still a baby. He wanted a slower pace of life and to raise us in a place where we weren’t in danger of getting shot in a drive-by or recruited by a gang—ironically, the gang being his cousins—our second cousins—who were Irish Mob.
My aul fella’s ancestors were part of an old New York street gang, who were rivals to the Bowery Boys back in the 1830s. Over time, some of those gangs evolved into organized crime syndicates. Although my da was connected through blood, he always kept his distance.
The day we left New York, I finally saw Da relax for the first time. He had enough capital to open the bar and never looked back. Although he was never part of the New York ‘family business,’ he was always in danger of being pulled in against his will, so leaving it behind was a relief.
Our bar was successful. Although we’d never be millionaires, we did okay and led a good life.
My brothers left town as soon as they turned eighteen: Donovan to join the Army and Tadhg to race stock cars.
Donny was back now and in negotiations to buy the gym in town, whereas T was only home for the funeral.
My sister, Aislynn, the youngest of us, was living in Colorado, where she’d graduated with honors and was interning for an architectural firm in Boulder.
All my siblings flew the nest, but I’d stayed to learn everything about the bar from Da and eventually took over when he retired. My life was here, and it had been a charmed one until a week ago.
Suddenly, I didn’t feel so charmed anymore. In fact, I felt like somebody had punched a hole through my chest.
“Your da got a good turnout,” Mam murmured, pulling my stare back to the scene at the church, where people milled around, talking to the priest, who we’d called in to conduct Da’s service.
Catholic clergymen weren’t in abundance in small-town America, so Father O’Malley, our family priest, had kindly flown in from New York to lay Da to rest.
The townsfolk treated him like a rock star. The church in Hambleton was the hub of the community, so Father O’Malley was akin to royalty in their eyes, and he was lapping it up.
The man speaking to him at that moment was one I respected almost as much as Da.
John Stone—formally known as Dagger—was the ex-president of the Speed Demons, the local motorcycle club. John had been buds with my da since the day we moved here, and they’d stayed friends ever since.
The Speed Demons MC and my bar, The Lucky Shamrock, were copacetic.
If the club had a big party and needed booze or bartenders, we’d supply them.
My brothers and I frequented their parties, and they frequented ours.
We supported each other, and our relationship remained solid throughout the years because I was good buds with Bowie, John’s middle boy.
John and his wife Elise had turned up to pay their respects, along with his sons and their wives. Abe Decker had also come, another ex-Speed Demon who had taken over as Mayor of Hambleton a few years before, after the last one was exposed as a criminal.
Hambleton may have been a small town, but some city-type bullshit had gone down.
John’s assessing stare fell on me, and he dipped his chin respectfully before his gaze slid to Mam. “Maureen, sweetheart. I’m sorry for your loss.”
Elise stepped forward to take her hand. “If there’s anything we can do, please don’t hesitate to call.”
Mam’s fingers tightened on my arm. “Thank you for coming. My boys are rallying, so I’m good.”
John nodded. “Lorcan will be missed.”
“Yeah,” she agreed softly. “He surely will.” Her chest compressed with the deep, emotional sigh she released. “Will you come back to the bar and raise a glass for my husband?”