7. Killian
KILLIAN
There’s a stage. Three chairs facing it, and more behind them, with all the remaining women sitting obediently. My gaze drifts over them until I find Avery, chewing on her lip.
I realise, with some horror, that they are going to attempt to entertain me.
“Killian.” My mother smiles like a snake. I take what’s obviously my seat. Bigger than the rest. My dad gives me a slightly confused look from beside me.
“The rules are simple,” she says. “Dance is the most primal expression of our innermost desires. Irish dance in particular has a long and fine history.”
Oh feck. If they’re all going to do Riverdance, I might shoot myself.
My mam looks at me, and I remind myself that this is the price of almost twenty years of peace. For a mafia family member, I’m lucky. For an Irish mafia family’s only child, it was practically a miracle.
“They’ve had a week to prepare for this dance show,” she tells me. “The style and music are the performer’s choice.” She looks over my shoulder at the women. “And whoever is deemed most talented by Killian will have a one-on-one dinner date with him.”
And I have Avery. I just have to cope with this, until I can have dinner with her. Appease my mother, seduce Avery, grit my teeth through the terrible dancing. This will be fine.
The first woman has chosen, surprise-surprise, Irish dancing.
I watch, wanting to burn out my eyeballs. Next to me, my dad mutters that a machine gun would improve her technique, and I suppress a smile.
The next is Irish dancing too. Better, according to my dad.
Then a blonde. Katy? She’s wearing a tie-robe dress, fishnets, and high heels. The music has a low, thrumming beat. And my stomach sinks as I realise that it’s sexy. A strip tease.
It’s not as though she’s bad, or unattractive. She’s neither. She smiles at me seductively, but my cock is completely uninterested, even as she bares nearly all.
I look away and find my dad studying the ceiling diligently. Mam watches with cool indifference.
There are a few pop song dances, some modern dance. Another attempt at Irish dancing.
Then Avery steps onto the stage, and my interest snaps. I lean forwards. She’s wearing jeans and a white top that risks showing a sliver of navel.
I am very curious to see what she’s going to do.
Then the opening bars of a familiar pop song ring out, and a surprised bark of laughter escapes me.
The Macarena.
She commits. The full, original dance, with the simple choreography and the hip rolls with arms outstretched.
A glance behind me reveals that the other girls are giggling and dancing along seated.
And I’m grinning from ear to ear. The content or meaning or history of the song doesn’t matter.
As Avery dances, it’s pure playful vibes.
We’ve all clapped, and the girls have cheered for each other, but when the music ends, there are hollers and Avery grins back at me as she sashays off the stage.
There are a couple more performances, but when they’re done, I stand and hold out my hand to Avery.
My mother has the roses ready, but I just beckon my girl. “Come to dinner with me.”
And when she takes my hand, smiling shyly, I lead her away.
We go to an Italian restaurant that’s a cliché of dark wood, red-and-white tablecloths, candles in bottles, and not a piece of pineapple in sight. It’s even approved by the Italian contingent of the London Mafia Syndicate.
It would be devastatingly romantic, and my heart definitely thinks it is, except that my parents are listening in from the table next to us.
So it’s all small talk while we order and eat nibbles, until we have pizzas, and I’m fed up of light conversation.
“Tell me things, Avery Morgan. Tell me about yourself.” I want to pick up some hints on what would bring her joy.
She snorts. “You don’t want to know about me.”
“Try me.”
Scrunching her nose, she takes a bite of pizza, and flicks her gaze to my parents. I wouldn’t put it past my mother to have us being filmed too. Avery is right. We need to be careful.
“This is our opportunity to get to know each other, ask questions. Tell me about your job, or your family.”
“Not my family.” She gives an awkward huff of a laugh. “And I don’t have much to say about my job. I’ve only just finished my law degree.”
It’s a neat evasion of the fact I’m her employer, and I nod approvingly. “Law then. Did you like it?”
She takes another bite of pizza, and then a long gulp of her drink. “I did law because it was closest to what I really wanted to do.”
“Which was,” I prompt.
“History.” She gives an embarrassed little shrug. “I know that’s totally nerdy.”
“How is history like law?”
“Well, quite a lot.” She leans forwards, food forgotten. “All the laws are really old. From as far back as the 1200s to 1900s.”
“The 1900s, just think,” I say dryly.
“Even the newest ones were a long time ago. Like from 2000.”
I splutter at that. When did not being young anymore sneak up on me? “The year 2000 isn’t that long ago.”
She tilts her head and gives me a pitying look. “I’m sorry to tell you, it’s—”
“Ten years. It was absolutely no more than ten years ago, I won’t hear any argument on this point,” I grumble.
Her laughter is bright and warm and unexpected. “Okay, agreed. Time stands still on that point. The laws from ‘ten years ago’, or maybe a smidge more, are interesting to me. And I love stories from the past. History books, and historical fiction.”
“Do you know the story of the Farrells, then?” It feels like a test question, and I’m sure it will sound that way. But really, I suspect that if Avery is interested in history, she’ll have looked up my family.
“A bit.” Her dark hair sways as she moves her head from side to side.
“Go on then, tell me.”
I watch her carefully. She’s a smart girl, and I can almost see her brain sifting through what’s best to say. What parts of my scandalous past should she reveal she’s aware of?
“Well, your family came from Ireland in the early 1800s. Cormac Farrell was a ‘navvy’ or ‘navigator’ which is a term for men who dug the canals and built railway lines. Railways and bridges in the case of Archway. The name of this area refers to the railway bridge, which has since been demolished for a more practical, modern one, which seems a pity to me.”
“That was a little before my time, I take no responsibility,” I hold up my hands in mock surrender. Our gazes meet, and there are sparks between us.
“I forgive you,” she says innocently.
“So generous.”
“I am.” She smiles. “It’s unclear exactly how and when the mafia was formed, but by 1900, Archway was run by the Irish mafia, and Farrells were at the centre of it.”
I nod.
“The extension into Highgate seems to be more recent, under your grandfather,” she continues. “Then later, all the way up to the house that’s now the headquarters, at the edge of Hampstead Heath.”
“That was only a ‘long time ago’,” I comment wryly.
She winces. “Yes. You and your father.”
“Mmm. It was a good time for us.” The memories strike me as I glance over at my dad, who is shamelessly listening in. I can tell by my mother’s expression that she’s already had to stop him interrupting Avery to add nostalgic details and mafia secrets.
I switch my attention back to the young woman who is the future for me, rather than the past. “Impressive. You know a lot.”
She glows with the praise, then a thought goes across her face. “Your mother came to study in London, fell in love, got married to your father. You were born some years later. But one thing I haven’t been able to find out is…” She trails off.
“Go on.” If she’s curious, I’ll tell her.
“You might not want to…”
I wait.
She bites her lip, and my cock throbs at the sight before she blurts out her question. “Why are you called the Devil of Archway?”
Ah.
“You see, the area of London we’re in, it’s called Archway,” I drawl.
Her nervousness transforms, and she gives me a cross look. Like an angry kitten. “The devil bit.”
I take another mouthful and chew slowly. This isn’t a story I really wanted to tell, but it’s inevitable. “It’s from when I was a child, so.”
“But what did you do to deserve it?” She watches me intently.
“What does anyone do?” What’s odd is that for her, I wish I didn’t have that nickname. I wish I’d been better. I wish bringing her close to me didn’t feel so much like salvation for me, and a risk for her.
“There wasn’t…” She tilts her head.
I set down my fork and lean back. I hate this story. It reminds me of who I was once. Helpless. Inexperienced. Unable to protect what I loved. And what I did to change all that. “You really want to know?”
Concern flashes across her face, but she nods.
“There’s a story that I murdered the cat of one of our enemies, and painted the number of the devil over his car, his door, and in his house. And that I left the head on his bed, and the body of his cat in his fridge.”
Her eyes go wide, and this time it’s not momentary fear. It’s disgust and horror.
The old feeling of helplessness rises in me, and even after so many years, I have to squash it.
Remind myself that we dealt with Camden decades ago. That I was the one who manipulated and killed until the conditions were right for a coup from within. And it was me who provided cover for them.
“Did you really do it?” she questions softly.
“You’d be surprised how many people don’t ask that.” They assume the worst of me, and that has saved me from having to do much to enhance and maintain my bloodthirsty reputation. “I think you might be the first one.”
She’s silent. Her big eyes waiting.
I sigh. “I was fourteen. Camden was causing trouble for every mafia in London, and had already shown me—the kid of a lesser mafia, and Irish to boot—who was in charge. It was a painful lesson, and I was angry. I started hanging around Camden, gathering information. And because I was on my own, and an eejit, I befriended this cat. It just strolled right up to me one night, and demanded to be petted.”
She’s clearly confused, but gives a half smile. “The cat distribution system was working?”
“It was a black cat. Skinny.” The memory is bitter-sweet. “Adopted me, it did. Night after night. I began to bring it food, and it would head butt me like I was its own personal vending machine for treats and scritches. I called her Catto. Not very original.”
There’s no happy ending to this story, so Avery just looks at me.
“The kingpin then was pure bad, but also religious. Catholic.” The flame of anger twists through me anew. “I think he thought the cat was a bad omen. Or maybe he’d seen me with it, somehow.”
She shakes her head, as though to deny what comes next.
“One night, Catto was crossing the road to get to me, and his massive Range Rover came along.” I pause. “He accelerated. It was no accident.”
“No,” she breathes.
“Didn’t stop. And when I picked up that warm, soft, bleeding body, I was…” I have to swallow down the emotion. “It didn’t matter that Camden had tortured me, and half the other men in London. Probably most of us deserved it. But that little cat had done nothing wrong. I held her as she died.”
“I’m so sorry.” The pain on Avery’s face is a sweeter reflection of what was in my heart at the time. Where mine turned to vengeance, hers is just sadness.
“I used her blood to paint the devil’s number on every surface I could see.
I was small, and quick. When someone came out of the house to investigate—there were plenty of cameras around the Camden compound—I snuck in, and I left my cat’s body in the fridge.
Her head went on the sofa. I was an eejit, but I didn’t have a death wish. Wasn’t going to get trapped upstairs.”
“That’s…” She’s lost for words. But her poor little heart has been captured.
“Grizzly?” I suggest.
“The weirdest combination of cold-blooded and poetic that I’ve ever heard.” Her eyes dance. There isn’t pity in them—the reason I’ve never told this story to anyone—or horror.
Avery understands me. Why I did something disgusting, and why I’ll do more things that would turn a normal person’s stomach. Why being the Devil of Archway is worthwhile to me.
I have an ache in my chest that I can’t explain.
“Avery…” It’s me that’s left without words this time. I don’t know how to deal with these emotions, and the presence of my parents nearby should make me more cautious. Forty years, and I’ve never felt anything like this.
“What?” She blinks at me.
“I can see myself falling in love with you.” It’s out before I can stop it, as though she’s bringing out the spontaneity in me that usually only shows in blood.
“Because I think a story about a cat is poetic?” she laughs.
“Because you’re you.” Clever, sweet, understanding, and far braver and more than she gives herself credit for. I’m falling for her. Hard.
I think it might already be too late.