Chapter Six
Caity
I looked around my father’s office. The file cabinets I hadn’t yet gone through.
The bookshelves lined with books that could hold secrets.
I couldn’t help but feel this room held more secrets than it should.
I’d been in here for a week, going through my father’s desk.
The information I’d given to Brian weighed heavily on my heart, but the alternative was harder to grasp.
I didn’t know what it would do to my brother when he learned the truth. I just didn’t want him to learn it from me. In fact, I didn’t ever want him to know that I knew.
I stared at the multiple stacks of files on the desk. One stack was negligible. Contracts and forms about the house. Receipts for work done and items bought. All superficial information that wasn’t important to anyone but the occupants.
Which was only me. Maddie still wouldn’t speak to me.
Cian hadn’t been back since he’d seen me with Brian.
He suspected something, but he’d left it alone.
I was confident Brian would never tell him anything.
Brian dealt only with Sal. He said he had enough of his own men to keep corralled, and that unless Sal needed him to step in, he wouldn’t.
The second stack of folders was work-related.
I would hand those over to Sal. I still didn’t understand why he’d left this office untouched all these years.
Surely, he’d needed the information to run the many businesses.
There were bank account statements, personnel records, and client files.
All of it untouched for two decades. It just didn’t make sense.
Then there was the third stack.
The one that physically made me sick. Ledgers of sales, men and women trafficked. Children taken from their parents, raised in a place that was so heinous, I wanted to bring my father back to life so I could kill him myself.
I prayed Maddie didn’t know this side of her grandfather and the man she thought was her father.
Was this the reason she’d hidden Henry? Was she afraid Nolan would traffic him?
Steal him away from her? I didn’t want to believe my father had been that kind of man, but the truth was staring me in the face.
The people he’d worked with. How had no one figured this shit out?
And what would I do with it now?
Most of the people in these files were dead, but there were a few still alive. What would they do if they knew my father had kept these records? What would they do if they knew I’d found them? And what about the victims? Where were they now? Had they escaped? Were they even still alive?
Some of the shit I’d read in those folders was so heinous, so disgusting that I had to take a break so I could throw up.
The idea of my father being involved in something so baseless, so degrading, didn’t fit with the man I knew and loved.
Sure, I knew he was a criminal. He ran the fucking Mob.
But I’d been na?ve to think the worst thing he was involved in was money laundering and extortion.
Had Sal known the files were here? Is that why he hadn’t cleaned out the office? But if he knew, surely he would have found what I’d given to Brian. He’d have known the truth.
I leaned back in my father’s chair. “Why were you such a bastard?” I whispered aloud.
I heard the front door open and quickly left the office, locking the door behind me. When I made it to the front room, Sal was there. He looked around the room, taking in the changes I’d made.
“What did you do with the things you didn’t want?”
“I donated them,” I answered, waiting to see what he wanted.
“It looks good in here. Brighter.”
I looked around the room, taking it in the way he might. I’d painted the dark burgundy walls a soft grey that had a hint of blue in the undertones. Gone were the heavy drapes and oversized furniture, replaced with sheer curtains and blinds underneath that could be lowered for privacy.
The furniture was dark blue with white pillows that had a navy floral print. I’d had the carpet stripped off and the wooden floors refinished.
“It was depressing before. Dark and foreboding.” I pressed my lips together to avoid saying something I shouldn’t.
“Well, that was Eamon. Dark and foreboding,” Sal agreed. “What’s your plan for the kitchen?”
“Something similar, maybe green or yellow,” I answered as we walked toward the back of the house. “Do you want coffee?”
“Thank you.”
My brother sat at the table while I set the coffeemaker. When I turned around, he was watching me.
“Are you ready to talk about everything?”
I sighed. “What is there to talk about? I cheated on my husband, had another man’s baby, and never told him about it.” I shrugged. What else could I say? Was what I did wrong? Of course it was. Did I care? Not anymore.
I’d let the guilt eat away at me for years.
Let the secrets I held keep me from living the life I wanted.
But now there was no room for those secrets; there were new ones to keep.
There was no room for that guilt because it had been replaced by the guilt of knowing I was responsible for what my daughter had endured.
“Have you talked to Maddie? Tried to explain why you kept her from Cian all these years?”
“She doesn’t want to talk to me, Sal. I have to accept that. I won’t push her into anything. I deserve everything I’m getting right now. If she wants to forgive me, and I pray someday she will—not that I deserve forgiveness—I will be here waiting and take whatever crumbs she’s willing to give me.”
“You’re such a fuckin’ martyr,” he hissed.
“It’s called taking responsibility for your actions, big brother. It is my fault Maddie’s life was so fucked up. Had I known Nolan knew about Cian and that Maddie wasn’t his, things could have been different. But I’ve accepted my part in what happened. Maybe you should try it.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
I turned my back on my brother to make his coffee and mine. When I set it in front of him, the look he gave me told me he wouldn’t let this go.
“You knew what our father was like. When Darcy disappeared, you should have known he had something to do with it.”
“I did fuckin’ know. But I couldn’t find any fuckin’ proof. I didn’t know Tyran was a backstabbing motherfucker.”
“Have you tried telling your son that you’re sorry?”
He nodded. “I’ve tried everything, Caity. He’s as stubborn as Darcy was.”
I snorted, and Sal looked at me through narrowed eyes.
“You’re the fuckin’ stubborn one. He gets that shit from you.”
“You’re one to talk,” he muttered before taking a sip of his coffee.
“It’s the O’Malley way.” I sighed.
“What about Ci?” Sal asked, catching me off guard.
“What about him?” I set my cup on the table and stared at it. I wasn’t sure what he wanted to know, but the truth wasn’t something I felt comfortable giving him.
“Have you talked to him?”
I shrugged. “He stopped by last week. But only for a minute.”
“Kelley’s dead, Caity. You’re free to live your life now. Be happy.”
I shook my head. “That time has come and gone, Sal. I’m too fuckin’ old for any of that shit anymore. Maybe one day Maddie will forgive me, find another man to love and have more babies.”
My eyes teared up at the thought of my grandson living in New York, away from his mother. I wanted to snatch him away and hide them both.
We sat at the table, neither of us saying a word. It wasn’t awkward or unusual for us. We both had our demons to keep us company. Sometimes you just needed to sit with your big brother. Sometimes, knowing he was there was enough.
“Have you been in the office?” Sal asked, and I tried not to react.
“The door is locked; do you have a key?” He shook his head—no. “Why haven’t you cleared it out? Surely there’s information in there you need?”
“Everything I needed, I already had.” He looked down the hall. “It’s the secrets that scare me,” he whispered.
“Secrets have a way of coming out no matter how hard we try to ignore them,” I said, knowing firsthand the truth of my statement.
“Doesn’t mean we have to go looking for them.”
“Isn’t it better to be prepared instead of being blindsided?”
We’d both been blindsided by our secrets. The only difference was, I’d lived with the guilt of knowing mine could be found out, and he’d lived with the ignorance of ever knowing his existed.
“I’m not sure either is preferred. If I could choose, there wouldn’t be any fuckin’ secrets.” Sal stood and rinsed his cup in the sink. Following behind him, we walked to the front door.
“Unfortunately, secrets are a part of life. Especially this life.”
He nodded, then turned to hug me and kiss the side of my head before he said, “Do me a favor, will you? Don’t go into the office without me. Leave it for last, and we’ll do it together.”
This was my moment. The opportunity to come clean and tell him I’d already started. Share the secrets I’d found. But instead, I nodded. Making a promise I’d already broken.
Maybe this was a good thing. Maybe I could shield my brother from more hurt. Remove the secrets that would only hurt him further. I could live with them. I could shoulder the burden of proof for him.
“I love you, little sister.”
“I love you too, big brother.”
I closed the door behind him and slumped against it, letting the tears fall in the privacy of my solitude. Decision made; I wouldn’t allow my brother to be hurt anymore. Pulling out my phone, I called Brian.
“Hello, Caity.”
“You can’t tell him.” I pushed off the front door and walked back to the office. Pulling the key I had from the new doorknob I’d installed, I pushed the door open and walked to the desk.
“He has a right to know, Caity.”
“What’s done is done, Brian. Nothing can be changed by telling him. It will only hurt him more.”
“He deserves answers. They all do.”
“Answers won’t make things right. Please, Brian, don’t tell him.”
Brian sighed heavily on the other side of the line, and I waited with bated breath for him to agree. “I will hold off telling him for now. But it is something that will eventually come out. And if he finds out you knew and didn’t tell him, he will be hurt even more.”
“I know.”
Sal would see this as a betrayal. More so than my sleeping with his best friend.
He didn’t care that I’d cheated on my husband.
Sal hated Nolan. But keeping Maddie from her father hit differently now that he knew Darcy had kept his son from him.
When he learned what I’d found, he’d hate me for not telling him immediately.
“He won’t know unless you tell him I was the one who gave you the information.”
“He’ll ask how I know. He’ll want to know how long I’ve had the information and why I didn’t tell him.”
“Please give it more time, Brian.”
“I’ll see what I can do. Bye, Caity.”
It wasn’t a promise. It wasn’t even an agreement to keep the information from Sal. But it was all I’d get from him. Brian, for all the criminal activity he was involved in, had very strong beliefs when it came to family.
I could only hope my relationship with Brian was a touch stronger than his relationship with Sal. I knew I was putting him in an impossible position, but it couldn’t be helped.
Once Sal knew the truth, it would destroy him. The dead needed to stay dead. And the secrets they took with them had no business being put out into the world.
You didn’t get to continue hurting people from beyond the grave.