Chapter 27
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
freddie
Leaving Tríona alone in that bed is the hardest thing I've ever done.
She's finally asleep, exhausted by grief and shock, curled up like she's trying to make herself as small as possible. Every instinct I have screams at me to stay with her, to keep watch, to make sure nothing else can hurt her tonight.
But Trace Harrington is still breathing. And as long as he's alive, none of us are safe.
I kiss her forehead gently, careful not to wake her, then slip out of the room. The hallway is quiet except for the sound of voices drifting up from downstairs. Denis coordinating with the undertaker, Malcolm talking to additional security; the business of dealing with death.
Henry's body is gone by the time I reach the entrance hall. The blood's been cleaned up, the Persian rug removed. Like the murder never happened, except for the hole it's torn in all our lives.
"Where is he?" I ask Denis.
"Warehouse. Same place we took Marcus."
"Good. How long have I got?"
"As long as you need. Maverick's keeping him conscious. Alastríona gave him a good whack over the head."
"And the others?"
"Stephen's coordinating with our people, making sure we haven't missed any of Trace's men. Emmanuel's checking security footage, trying to figure out where they are."
"Any word on casualties?"
Denis' face hardens. "Three of our men dead. Two more in hospital. Trace brought a full team."
Three good men dead because a madman wanted revenge for crimes that existed only in his twisted mind. I add them to the list of people Trace will answer for.
"I need to go," I say.
"Freddie." Denis catches my arm as I turn toward the door. "Don't lose yourself in there. Alastríona's going to need you when this is over."
"I know."
"Do you? Because right now you look like a man planning to do things he might not come back from."
He's not wrong. The rage building in my chest is cold, focused, the kind that makes men do terrible things. Trace killed Henry. Terrorized Tríona. Destroyed everything good we've been trying to build.
He deserves everything I'm planning to do to him.
"I'll be fine," I say.
"Will you? Because there's a difference between justice and revenge. One serves the living, the other just feeds the darkness."
"Sometimes they're the same thing."
"And sometimes they're not. Just remember what you've got to lose."
* * *
The warehouse is exactly as we left it after dealing with Jason. Concrete floors, rusted machinery, the kind of place where screams echo but don't carry beyond the walls.
Maverick's waiting for me when I arrive, a cigarette dangling from his lips, and blood on his knuckles. He looks up when I walk in and nods toward the center of the space.
"He's awake. Mostly."
Trace is zip-tied to the same chair we used for Jason, his head lolling to one side, blood crusted in his hair. But his eyes are open, aware, tracking my movement as I approach.
"Freddie Kinnock," he says, voice slurred but coherent. "The thief himself."
"Trace."
"Come to avenge your grandfather-in-law? How touching."
I hit him. Hard enough to snap his head sideways, hard enough to split his lip. Blood spatters on the concrete floor.
"Let's establish some ground rules," I say. "You speak when I ask you a question. You shut the fuck up otherwise."
"Or what? You'll hurt me? I'm already dying, boy. Nothing you do to me matters."
"We'll see about that."
Maverick moves to stand behind Trace's chair and produces a knife from his jacket. The blade gleams under the harsh warehouse lights, sharp enough to cut through bone.
"Where do you want to start?" Maverick asks.
"With the truth. Why the war? Why all this death and destruction?"
"You know why."
"No, I know what you told us. Revenge for Ava's death. But you killed Ava. So why really?"
Trace spits blood and glares at me with eyes that hold too much white. "You wouldn't understand."
"Try me."
"Power. Control. The knowledge that men like your precious Jerry and Henry think they can run the world while better men watch from the sidelines."
"Better men?"
"Smarter men. Men who understand that sentiment is weakness, that family is a liability."
"Men like you?"
"Exactly like me."
I study his face, seeing the madness there but also something else. Calculation. Even now, even beaten and bleeding, he's still playing games.
"Bullshit," I say. "This isn't about power. This is about a broken man who couldn't handle the fact that his wife chose someone else."
"My wife was a whore who—"
Maverick's knife finds the soft flesh between Trace's fingers, sliding in slowly. Trace's scream echoes off the warehouse walls, raw and animalistic.
"Wrong answer," I say. "Try again."
Trace's breathing is ragged, sweat beading on his forehead. But his eyes are still defiant, still holding that manic gleam.
"You want the truth?" he gasps. "Fine. I hated Henry Gallagher from the moment I learned his name."
"Why?"
"Because he had everything I wanted. Respect, loyalty, a family that would die for him. Everything I should have had."
"Should have had how?"
Maverick twists the knife slightly. Trace arches against the restraints, another scream tearing from his throat.
"My father built an empire in Boston!" he shouts. "Five families working together, controlling everything that mattered. But your precious Irish friends couldn't leave well enough alone. They were taking over the US. It was only a matter of time before they started to take Boston too."
"We defended ourselves."
"You destroyed everything! Killed my father, scattered the families, turned Boston into a fucking war zone."
The knife moves to his other hand, finding the webbing between thumb and forefinger. This time, Trace tries to bite down on his scream, but it comes out anyway, broken and desperate.
"Your father was trying to expand into our territory," I say, watching blood drip onto the concrete. "What did you expect us to do?"
"Submit. Recognize superior strength when you saw it."
"Or fight back. Which is what we did."
"And look where it got you. Dead friends, dead family—a woman who'll never feel safe again."
I hit him again, this time with enough force to rock the chair. His nose breaks with an audible crack, blood streaming down his face.
"You don't get to talk about her."
"Why not? She's the whole point of this exercise."
"Explain that."
Maverick's had enough of the conversation. His knife finds Trace's shoulder, sliding deep into muscle. Trace's back arches, tendons standing out in his neck as he fights the pain.
"You think this was about Ava?" Trace manages between gasps. "About revenge? This was about proving that Henry Gallagher wasn't untouchable. That his precious family could be taken apart piece by piece."
"And now?"
"Now he's dead. Now his granddaughter knows what it feels like to lose someone she loves. Now all of you understand that your strength was an illusion."
The madness in his voice is getting stronger, his words running together. But underneath it, I can hear the truth. This was never about justice or even revenge. This was about a broken man trying to prove he mattered, that he could hurt people who had what he wanted.
Maverick pulls the knife out of Trace's shoulder and examines the blood on the blade. "How many others?" he asks. "How many people are you planning to kill?"
"All of you. Every last Gallagher, every last Houlihan. I want your entire bloodline wiped from the earth."
"That's not going to happen."
"Isn't it? You think Henry was the only target? You think killing me stops what's coming?"
The knife finds his thigh this time, pushing through muscle until it hits bone. Trace's scream is inhuman, animal, echoing off the warehouse walls like the cry of something being torn apart.
"What's coming?" I ask.
Trace laughs through the pain, the sound completely unhinged now. Blood bubbles at the corners of his mouth. "Insurance policies. Dead man's switches. Men who know what to do if I don't check in regularly."
"What men?"
"Wouldn't you like to know?"
Maverick twists the knife in Trace's leg. The scream that follows makes my teeth ache. It’s raw and broken and desperate.
"What men?" I repeat.
"Men who understand that sometimes you have to burn everything down to build something better."
"Names."
"Go fuck yourself."
This time, Maverick doesn't use the knife. He grabs Trace's broken nose and twists. The sound is wet, crunching, and Trace's resulting shriek is barely human.
"You can't break me," he gasps when the pain subsides enough for speech. "I'm already broken. Have been for years."
"Then why keep fighting?"
"Because it's all I have left. Because if I can't have what I want, I'll make sure no one else can either."
He's completely gone now, I realize. Whatever sanity he had left has snapped under the pressure and pain. We're not interrogating a man anymore; we're torturing a rabid animal.
"The psychiatric hospitals," I say. "They were right about you."
"Were they? Because from where I'm sitting, I'm the only one who sees the world clearly."
"You see enemies that don't exist."
"Do I? You killed my father. You took my wife. You destroyed my family's legacy. Sounds pretty fucking real to me."
"Your wife left you because you're a monster. Your father died because he tried to take what wasn't his. Your family's legacy is blood and madness."
"My family's legacy is power!"
He's screaming now, straining against the restraints so hard the zip ties cut into his wrists. Blood runs down his arms and pools on the floor. The facade of control is completely gone, replaced by pure rage and insanity.
"Power that you pissed away," Maverick says, pulling the knife from Trace's leg and examining the wound. "Power that died with you."
"I'm not dead yet."
"No," I agree. "But you will be."
But even as I say it, something changes in Trace's expression. The madness doesn't leave, but it reshapes itself into something else. Something that looks almost like clarity.