Chapter 31 Jax
Jax
Brad called at seven in the morning, which in Brad-time meant it was the middle of the night and he hadn't slept.
"The ESPN piece goes live in two hours," he said without preamble. "I need you to know that Twitter is already—"
"Brad."
"—going feral about the Ballybeg thing, and I've gotten three calls from Irish news outlets who want—"
"Brad."
"—access to the village, and one very angry call from your father, and one very confused call from the shoe guys, they want to know if there's anything that's going to—"
"Brad. Breathe."
A pause. "I'm breathing."
"Good. Send the Irish news outlets to Dee. She can decide who gets in and who doesn't. She knows her people better than I do."
Another pause, longer this time. "You trust her to vet the media?”
"Yes. And it's her village."
Silence on the line. Brad had been my manager for six years, and in that time I'd watched him develop a particular kind of silence for moments when he'd decided that arguing with me was more trouble than accepting reality. This was that silence.
"Fine," he said. "I'll send them to her. But, Jax—"
"I know," I cut him off. "Thank you."
I set the phone down and looked out the window of the pub. The hills were doing what the hills of Ballybeg always did at this hour—looking like they'd been painted by someone who'd overdone the green and didn't care about the feedback.
The sun was making its grudging Irish appearance, all pale and noncommittal, but it was there.
Today was going to be epic, one way or the other.
It started ordinarily enough.
I went into the pub, had Ronan's full Irish, and watched Dee argue with a delivery driver about the provenance of some smoked salmon that she'd apparently seen through immediately.
She was magnificent. The produce man left looking like he needed a lie-down.
"Morning." She dropped into the stool across from me.
"You're frightening," I told her.
"Thank you." She poured herself a coffee. "Brad texted me. Three news outlets?"
"Your call," I said. I meant it.
She looked at me steadily for a moment—that way she had, like she was taking a measurement she'd take several times before trusting. Then she nodded. "Local first. Irish independent. No tabloids." She pulled her laptop toward her. "I'll handle it."
I watched her start typing and thought, not for the first time, that Dee Gallagher was going to handle it all just fine.
The call came at half eleven. My phone, not the pub's.
I didn't recognize the number, but the voice on the other end was smooth in the way that expensive lawyers are smooth—practiced, frictionless, designed to make you feel like this was all very reasonable.
"Mr. Caldwell. My name is Fergus Hartley. I'm calling on behalf of Shamrock Global Ventures. We understand you've been making some rather significant property purchases in the Ballybeg area."
"I have," I agreed pleasantly.
"We'd very much like to discuss the situation in person. I happen to be in the area. I believe you're familiar with The Banshee's Rest?"
Behind the bar, Dee was watching me. She'd figured out, from the way I'd gone still, that this was not a social call.
"I know it," I said. "Come on in."
Hartley arrived thirty minutes later with Cillian O'Farrell at his shoulder like an expensive shadow.
Cillian, to his credit, walked into the pub with the confidence of a man who hadn't been ejected from it multiple times. To his detriment, everyone in the pub clocked him immediately, and the temperature in the room went down several degrees.
"Dee," Cillian said, smooth as ever.
Dee looked through him.
I stood and extended a hand to Hartley. "Jax Caldwell." I pointed to Dee, who was behind the bar. “And that is my girlfriend, Deirdre Gallagher, also the owner of this fine establishment.”
“Girlfriend?” Cillian demanded, going pale.
The Shamrock Ventures man spoke over Cillian. "Fergus Hartley." His handshake was the kind you practiced. "Thank you for seeing us."
"Let's get on with it." I gestured to the table in the corner.
Dee stayed behind the bar. I winked at her. She shook her head, smiling.
We all sat down. Me on one side. Fergus and the gobshite on the other.
The pub had gone quiet. It didn't look like it had gone quiet—people were still drinking, Saoirse was still moving between tables—but every person in The Banshee's Rest was now paying close attention to the table in the corner.
This was the thing about Ballybeg. It had the best-camouflaged collective attention of any group of people I'd ever encountered.
Fergus laid it out efficiently. They'd noted my property acquisitions.
They'd run the numbers. I'd purchased enough land and helped enough local owners hold their ground that the resort project was now, in their assessment, "significantly complicated.
" He used that phrase twice. Significantly complicated.
I loved it!
"We'd like to propose a compromise," he offered.
Across the bar, I saw Mickey come in.
He'd gotten some kind of signal—from Paddy, probably, who probably got a call from one of the Liams. Mickey sat down with Liam and Liam, looking like a man who just fancied a pint.
"What kind of compromise?" I asked.
Fergus opened his briefcase. "Shamrock Global Ventures is prepared to buy back what you have purchased for, let’s say, a twenty percent stake in a boutique property—a hundred rooms, a nine-hole course, minimal infrastructure.
We believe this could be positioned as complementary to the existing village rather than in competition with it. "
It was bullshit. This was a bribe. They wanted me on their side. They had the county council already. And who the fuck called a hundred-room property boutique?
I looked at him for a long moment. Then I looked at Cillian, who was doing his careful best to appear relaxed.
"Darlin’ Dee, could you come here for a minute?”
Fergus’s expression flickered—just briefly—because that wasn't what he'd expected. He'd expected me to make this decision. He'd come to talk to the celebrity with the cheque book, not the woman who ran the pub.
His fault. I told the guy she was my girlfriend. He just wasn’t listening.
Dee walked up to me, and I took her hand in mine. She peered at the documents with the same expression she'd given the salmon delivery driver.
“Well, Jax, you’ll be getting a twenty percent stake in a twenty-five million euros project.” She looked at me, batting her eyelashes. “How much is that? I don’t have a head for numbers.”
“That would be five million euros,” Saoirse deadpanned as she placed a pint in front of one of the Liams with a thump.
Dee nodded appreciatively. “Nice! But”—she huffed, her hands now on her waist—" considering how much money you have, five million isn’t really gonna rock your boat, is it?”
Cillian gasped.
I smothered a grin.
Fergus did not look impressed as he added, “Jax, the five would be on top of us buying back all the land from you, and we can discuss your compensation for that as well.”
Before I could tell him no dice, Dee raised a finger in the air as she studied the documents Fergus had spread out on the table. "Where would this property be built?” she asked pleasantly.
"We'd work with the county to identify the least disruptive site," Fergus said.
"The hill field at the north end of the Brennan land?” she asked.
Fergus’s face gave nothing away, but Cillian's did. The man was a walking disaster who should not be bought when making a deal—he was an emotional neon sign. Now, Dee, was perfection with her eyelash flutters, and I don’t know my math act.
"The Brennan land," Dee continued, her voice level, "backs onto the nesting grounds for a protected species.
A white-tailed eagle pair has been nesting there for nine years.
Any construction within a certain radius requires a protected species impact assessment, a consultation period, and likely an An Bord Pleanála review on top of the county process.
" She paused. "How's your timeline looking, Mr. Hartley? "
The silence in the pub was absolute.
Fergus looked at Dee for the first time as if he were finally seeing her. "You're well informed."
"I'm from here, Mr. Hartley.”
Cillian leaned forward. "Dee, don't let pride—"
"Cillian," I said.
He looked at me.
"Shut the feck up."
He went red in the face.
I turned back to Fergus. "Here's the thing.
I appreciate you coming in person. I do.
And I understand that from where you're sitting, this looks like stubbornness.
But I've been here long enough to understand what Ballybeg is, and it's not a site.
It's not a footprint. It's not a phase of a development plan.
" I leaned forward. "Shamrock Global will find a better return on its investment somewhere that wants what you're selling. Ballybeg isn't that place."
"You're walking away from a very significant return yourself," Fergus reminded me carefully.
"Like my girlfriend here said, I’ve got a lot of money.”
Cillian made a choking sound, which I enjoyed hearing.
Yeah, asshole, I’m richer than you, better looking than you, and my dick is bigger, I can guarantee it.
Fergus gave me a measured look. “Mr. Gilbert Hampton sends you his regards.”
As threats went, his was effective. Big Gil wasn’t walking away. I didn’t need Fergus to tell me that.
The bell had rung, and this wasn’t going to be a friendly spar.
The silence stretched.
Then, from somewhere near the bar, Liam Murphy's voice bellowed, I'd like another Smitticks when you get a moment, love."
Fergus closed his briefcase. He was a professional; he knew when a room had gone against him. He shook my hand, nodded to Dee—with more respect than he'd arrived with, I noticed—and left.
Cillian lingered a moment longer. He looked at Dee with anger. “You sleeping with him now?”
"Aye," Dee agreed pleasantly. "Feck off, Cillian."
Before he could say something, I stood in front of Dee and looked down my nose at her ex.
Hey, guess what, I was taller than him. By two to three inches.
“I really want to rearrange your face, O’Farrell, so I’d listen to Dee and leave before I run out of patience,” I said, smiling brightly.
The man wasn’t entirely stupid because he left, huffing and puffing like a toddler.
The pub exploded.
Not chaos—Ballybeg chaos, which was its own thing.
Cheers and pint-raising and Seamus pounding the table, and Paddy appearing from nowhere (I had no idea when he'd slipped in) with his hand on my shoulder saying "that's the lad, that's the lad," and Mrs. Nolan telling anyone who'd listen that she'd known from the start that the Yank was the right sort.
Dee stood beside me in the middle of it.
I leaned down close to her ear. "You knew about the eagles."
She cocked an eyebrow. "Yank, I know everything about Ballybeg.”
I wrapped an arm around her and dropped a kiss on her hair.
“What was that about Gilbert…Whatsisname?” she asked.
I squeezed her arm. “That was a warning. Fergus will go back and regroup. The county vote is still coming."