Rachel #2
“You can kill anyone you please,” Rex interrupted, earning himself another bite of my nails into his thigh. “Why get my men involved?”
Ignoring him, Aidan turned his focus on Nyx. “I heard about your antics years ago.”
“I know. I remember one of your sons telling me you were aware of my kills.”
“A righteous cause is something to be celebrated, not denigrated.” He drummed his fingers against the table. “It pains me to say it, but I’m an old man, and hunting is a young man’s sport. But that doesn’t mean I can’t get my revenge and make my mark as well—”
“Why not just contact Nyx through the regular channels? Why go outside the bonds of our alliance, dammit? He’s a man with a kid on the way, O’Donnelly. You’re not just fucking around with his life here.”
“I’m not fucking around with anything. The kind of hunger your man has doesn’t abate, Rex. You have to know that. You’ve been feeding him kills for decades now.
“I understand your anger, but I don’t appreciate being interrupted,” he intoned grimly. “This had to happen outside of the regular channels.”
“Why?”
“Because this is my key to heaven and it has to be free from the taint of the Five Points.”
Whatever the hell I’d expected him to say, it wasn’t that.
Harlow, apparently as stunned as me, blurted out, “You think the path to heaven is by killing pedophiles?”
Obviously, we were both on board the same ‘Is he fucking crazy?’ train.
“‘My God is vengeful against his foes; he rages against his enemies. The Lord is very patient but great in power; the Lord punishes. His way is in whirlwind and storm; clouds are the dust of his feet.’”
Harlow swallowed. “Nahum 1: 2-8.”
Aidan nodded. “He’ll appreciate that my penance is, shall we say, active.” Sitting up, he leaned into the table. “And in turn, so will yours be. A righteous kill. ‘And thine eye shall not pity; but life shall go for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.’”
I cast Rex a look, saw his glower had morphed into an expression of confusion. I couldn’t blame him. The gossip about O’Donnelly Sr. being nuttier than a Froot Loop was clearly accurate.
“I will provide you with names. I will provide you with a secure location to avenge the victims in our past. The rest is down to you.”
Nyx remarked, “I made promises—”
“And I won’t ask you to break them. As your man says, you have a woman and a child on the way. I knew that already, and that was partly why I started things how I did. I wanted you to know that you’re safe. Under my protection, you’re untouchable.”
“No one is untouchable,” I warned.
Aidan’s smile was patronizing. “Shall we have another round of ‘Show there aren’t any. Look, I shouldn’t even be here, and I only am because Nyx is…
” I sucked in a breath. Blew it out. Accepted the truth for what it was.
“He’s my brother. We’re family, and I don’t take kindly to my brother getting his ass landed in jail because you’re on a crusade. ”
Aidan’s eyes glittered. “Are you going to tell me that you’re okay with a sitting congressman being a pedophile?”
“How do you know he is? What proof did you find?”
“Photos in his driveway.”
“His driveway?” I repeated with a frown.
Nyx cleared his throat. “I think he means hard drive.”
I glowered at him because he sounded like he was on the brink of laughing.
Nothing about this was fucking funny.
“And you, or whoever found the photos, just happened to fall upon that hard drive?”
“No. My son deals with that side of things and, admittedly, he went looking at my direction. But not for anything that’s your business.”
“How do you know he didn’t plant them?”
“There’s a reason I want these bastards to pay. My boy survived—” His nostrils flared. “My boy was—”
“Raped,” Nyx said gruffly when Aidan appeared to struggle with the ability to phrase the unthinkable.
I knew how that felt.
“Yes. The bastard’s dead, long gone, but this need inside me to make him pay won’t die. I need to do something. I have to. I can’t just stand by while other kiddies are hurt. Not when I can do something about it.”
“You didn’t think about exposing the congressman to the world?” I groused.
“For him to rot in jail? On my taxes?” Aidan derided. “I don’t think so.”
“As if you pay any taxes anyway,” I said with a sniff.
That glitter made another appearance in his eyes. “You’ve got guts, Rachel Laker.”
“We established that at the precinct that night,” I countered, unimpressed.
“That we did,” he grumbled. “My assurance is my faith. Something that’s been knocked by the truth—my boy was raped by a priest.” His mouth tightened.
“For seven decades, I’ve committed a sin, confessed, and been absolved.
I don’t have that path open to me anymore.
My faith has to change, and this is the way I want to do it.
“You are allies. I have no desire to break ties, not when we make a lot of money together. But this is separate to that.”
“I believe him.”
I scowled at Nyx. “You believed him the last time. You know, when he trapped you?”
“He didn’t trap me. He showed me what he’s capable of.”
“That should scare you, not impress you.”
Aidan’s focus was glued to Nyx’s. “She’s right.”
“Nothing scares me, aside from the idea of my woman raising my kid without me around.”
And I didn’t think that was because Giulia was as batty as Aidan—in her own particular way.
“I’ve been blessed with six sons,” Aidan confessed gruffly, “and I’ve been further blessed to be around for every achievement and every failure. I’m not about to take that from you.”
Harlow was frowning. “God won’t absolve you of your sins if you take this path—”
“That’s your belief, son, but that’s not mine.” Aidan’s mouth set in firm lines. “You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t feel the need for vengeance.”
“I do, but I’m willing to burn in hell for it.”
Harlow’s raw words had Aidan straightening in his seat. “That kind of bravery shouldn’t go to waste.”
“Why do I feel like I’m talking to myself?” I muttered under my breath.
I didn’t expect an answer but I got one anyway. “They’re all as crazy as each other.”
Shooting Rex a look, I sighed. “This is going to happen whether we like it or not, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.” His expression was as bewildered as I felt sure mine was, but there was a measure of calm buried in his gaze, a calm that told me he’d sign off on this even if he thought it was insane. “If it’s any consolation, I don’t think he’ll fuck them over.”
“That’s no consolation. ‘Think’ won’t keep them out of jail.”
But Nyx, Harlow, and Aidan were already deep in a discussion I had no desire to hear.
“Thank you for coming, Rach,” Rex said. “Thank you for trying.”
“I had to.”
“You meant it, didn’t you?”
I arched a brow at him. “Which part?”
“About him being your brother.”
“Oh. That part.” I swallowed. “Yes. I meant it.”
His lips quirked up in a grin. “Glad you finally figured that one out. For someone so smart—”
“I’d watch how you finish that sentence, Rex.”
That grin only widened, and even though this meeting was a mess, even though I’d heard more scripture now than I had in, well, ever, and even though I’d likely be defending Nyx and Harlow on counts of murder and vigilantism at some point in the future, that grin somehow made it all bearable.
Together.
That was what that grin said.
Together.
I wasn’t alone anymore, and neither was he.
Nyx, and Harlow now, weren’t just Rex’s burden to bear; they were mine too.
Not much consolation, but I was the one who wanted his brand, and he was the one who didn’t know if I could cope with what it represented.
This had to be a step down that path, didn’t it?