CHAPTER TWO
Aoife
THE TEACUP SHATTERS against the stone fireplace, porcelain exploding into a thousand pieces that scatter across the Persian rug like snow.
"Aoife." My father's voice holds that warning tone, the one that says I'm being unreasonable, dramatic, childish.
I'm none of those things. I'm furious.
"You can't do this." My hands shake as I grip the back of the velvet armchair. The library feels too small suddenly, the walls closing in despite the vaulted ceilings and floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook the western hills of our estate.
"It's already done." Dillon O'Rourke, my father, head of the O'Rourke family, Elder of the West, doesn't even look up from the contract he's reviewing. His reading glasses sit low on his nose, and the afternoon light catches the gray in his dark hair. He looks older than I remember. Tired.
Good. He should be tired after what he's just told me.
"You promised." My voice cracks, and I hate myself for it.
I'm twenty-six years old. I have two degrees, one from Trinity College Dublin and another from the Sorbonne.
I speak four languages fluently. I've spent the last five years learning everything about our family's business, our territory, our allies, and enemies.
I've sat in on strategy meetings, negotiated deals, analyzed financial reports.
And none of it matters.
Because I'm still just a daughter. Still just a bargaining chip.
"I promised I would never force you into something you didn't want," Father says, finally looking up at me. His blue eyes, the same shade as mine, hold something I can't quite read. Regret? Resignation? "But circumstances have changed."
"Circumstances." I laugh, and it sounds harsh even to my own ears. "You mean Alexander Murphy abandoned his throne, and now you need a new way to secure your alliance with the South."
"Watch your tone, Aoife."
"Or what?" I step around the chair, my heels clicking against the hardwood floor as I approach his desk. "You'll what, Father? Marry me off to someone else? Oh wait—you're already doing that."
The contract sits between us. I can see my name printed in neat black letters. Aoife Siobhan O'Rourke. And below it: William Murphy.
William fucking Murphy.
The wild one. The reckless one. The one who nearly died two years ago and has been spiraling ever since. The one everyone whispers about—how he drinks too much, fights too much, cares too little.
That's who my father wants me to marry.
"This isn't personal, Aoife. This is a strategy." Father removes his glasses and rubs the bridge of his nose. "The Russians are moving against us. All of us. The O'Reagans, the Murphys, even us. We need to present a united front, and the only way to do that…"
"Is to sacrifice your daughter." I finish his sentence, my nails digging into my palms. "How noble."
"You think I want this?" His voice rises, and I see a flash of the man who built our family's power.
The man who went from nothing to everything through sheer force of will.
"You think I want to send you into that den of vipers?
The Murphy family is imploding. Their father is dead, murdered by his own son.
Alexander has abandoned them. Jason's been exiled. And William…"
He stops himself, but I know what he was going to say.
"William is a disaster," I finish for him. "A drunk. An addict. A man who can't even keep himself alive, let alone lead a family through a war."
Father's silence is answer enough.
"Then why?" My throat tightens, the words scraping out. I lean forward, my hands flat on his desk to keep them from shaking. "Why would you tie me to a sinking ship?"
"Because it's not sinking." Father stands, matching my posture. We're the same height when I'm in heels. "It's transforming. William Murphy may be volatile, but he's their future. And we need to be part of that future."
"And what am I?" My voice drops to barely above a whisper. "What do I need, Father?"
Something flickers across his face, pain maybe, or guilt, but it's gone before I can name it.
"You need to do your duty to this family." He picks up the contract and holds it out to me. "Just like I did. Just like your mother did. Just like every O'Rourke before you."
I stare at the papers but don't take them.
"Your mother would understand," he says quietly.
"Don't." The word comes out sharp. "Don't you dare use her to justify this."
My mother died when I was fifteen. Cancer, they said, but I knew better. She died from the weight of this life, the constant fear, the violence that lurked beneath every polite conversation, the knowledge that the man she loved could be killed at any moment.
She died from being married to the Mafia.
And now Father wants the same for me.
"You have one day," Father says, setting the contract back on his desk. "One day to prepare yourself. Then we meet the Murphys, and you'll be formally engaged."
"And if I refuse?" I already know the answer, but I ask anyway.
Father's jaw tightens. "You won't refuse."
"You can't force me to marry him."
"No," he agrees. "But I can remind you what's at stake.
" He walks around the desk, and for the first time, I see how much this is costing him, too.
"The Russians have already hit two of our shipments.
They've killed five of our men. They're coordinating with someone inside Ireland, someone who knows our movements, our weaknesses.
If we don't unite with the Murphys and the O'Reagans, they will pick us off one by one. "
"Then unite," I argue. "Form an alliance. You don't need a marriage for that."
"Yes, we do." Father's voice is firm. "Because alliances break. Promises are forgotten. But family, blood, and marriage, that's permanent. That's unbreakable."
I want to argue that marriages break, too. That vows are just words. But I know what he really means.
Once I'm married to William Murphy, the O'Rourkes and Murphys are bound together. An attack on one is an attack on both. It's insurance. Protection.
It's smart strategy.
I hate that I can see the logic in it.
"What about Reilan?" I ask, grasping for any alternative. My brother has always been Father's right hand. "He could…"
"Reilan has his own role to play." Father's tone suggests that topic is closed. "This falls to you, Aoife. I'm sorry, but it does."
He leaves me standing in the library, surrounded by broken porcelain and the ruins of my future.
I don't go to my room. Instead, I walk through the estate, past the sitting rooms and parlors filled with antiques my father collected to project old money, past landscapes and still lifes that give the house a history it doesn't really have.
Past the kitchen where staff prepare dinner.
Past the security stationed at every door.
I end up in the gardens.
The O'Rourke estate sits on two hundred acres of land in County Galway. The house itself is eighteenth-century, all stone and history and ghosts. But the gardens are mine. I designed them when I was nineteen, fresh from university, desperate for something I could contrdol.
Roses line the pathways. Lavender fills the air with its scent. A fountain sits in the center, water trickling over smooth stones in an endless loop.
It's peaceful here. Safe.
I sit on the edge of the fountain and let myself feel everything I'd been holding back in Father's office.
Fear. Anger. Grief.
And underneath it all, a terrible, aching sense of inevitability.
I always knew this might happen. In our world, daughters are currency. We're traded for alliances, married for strategy, used to cement power. I watched it happen to girls I grew up with. Watched them disappear into marriages they didn't want, to men they didn't love.
I told myself I'd be different. Smarter. Strong enough to avoid that fate.
I was wrong.
"I thought I'd find you here."
I don't turn around. I know my brother's voice.
Reilan O'Rourke is five years older than me, and we've always been close. Where Father is all hard edges and strategy, Reilan has a softer side, though he hides it well. He has to. Soft men don't survive in our world.
"Did Father send you?" I ask as he sits beside me.
"No." Reilan's shoulder brushes mine. "I came because I knew you'd be upset."
"Upset." I laugh without humor. "That's one word for it."
"I tried to talk him out of it," Reilan admits quietly. "Told him there had to be another way. But the Elders agreed. They think this is our best move."
The Elders. The council of old men who really run the O'Rourke family. Father might be the face of our power, but the Elders make the decisions.
And apparently, they've decided I'm expendable.
"What's he like?" I ask. "William Murphy. What's he really like?"
Reilan is quiet for a long moment. "Complicated."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I have." He picks up a pebble and tosses it into the fountain. "I've met him a few times. At meetings, negotiations. He's volatile. Impulsive. But he's not stupid. And he's fiercely loyal to his family, even when they don't deserve it."
"So he's a mess," I state what Reilan won't say.
"He's grieving." Reilan's response surprises me. "His father's dead. Alex confessed to the murder and left. Jason's been exiled. The family's falling apart, and William's been handed control he never asked for." He looks at me. "Wouldn't you be a mess too?"
I want to argue, but he's right. If our father died tomorrow, if Reilan was exiled, if I was suddenly responsible for our entire family's survival.
I'd probably break too.
"That doesn't change what this is," I say quietly. "I'm being sold."
"You're being asked to save our family." Reilan's hand covers mine. "There's a difference."
"Is there?"
He doesn't answer. Because we both know there isn't.
We sit in silence, watching the water flow over stones, and I let myself imagine a different life. One where I wasn't born an O'Rourke. Where I could choose my own path, love who I wanted, be something other than a strategic asset.
But that life doesn't exist.
This is the one I have.
"What if I can't do it?" I whisper. "What if I marry him and I can't...what if I'm not strong enough?"
Reilan's arm wraps around my shoulders, pulling me close. "Aoife, you're the strongest person I know. If anyone can survive the Murphy family, it's you."
Survive. Not thrive. Not be happy. Just survive.
That's what my life has become.
I have one day to prepare myself for a life I don't want with a man I don't know.
One day until I become Mrs. William Murphy.
The thought makes my stomach turn.