Chapter 3
Dervla
“There have been coordinated blasts in Dublin. Financial, transport, and storage points. Two men attached to St. Augustine’s were taken off the road ten minutes ago. One is dead. One is missing.”
The room seems to narrow around me. “Taken by who?”
“Me, obviously. You need to tread very carefully when you set foot on campus. There is going to be a lot of families pissed off about their legacies going up in smoke.”
“Dad’s drive,” I mutter. “What did you do?”
“I opened the first layer.”
My stomach drops. “First layer?”
“Your father was not a careless man. He built contingencies. Timed releases. Triggered disclosures. If certain files were accessed in a particular sequence, information would move automatically.”
I shut my eyes for a second. “Of course he did. Why build one disaster when you can build several?”
“Exactly,” Séamus says. He sounds almost impressed, which is not helping my blood pressure. “Listen carefully. There will be secondary movement now. Men will scramble. Some will run. Some will try to secure assets. Some will come for you to stop me. I want you here.”
“If you were doing this today, why didn’t you just stop me from leaving earlier?”
“You needed to claim that seat. Now I get to destroy every fucker who has betrayed me.”
I blink. I have no other reaction to that for a moment. “I don’t want to be holed up in your mansion. I want to be here,” I say steadily. “Leave your men, if you must.”
Aidan groans, but I ignore him and nod at Declan, who has come up into the room with a tray of food and tea in the middle of chaos.
Séamus is quiet for one beat, which somehow feels louder than his voice.
“That is not a request I’m willing to indulge.”
“Then indulge this instead,” I say. “I’m not running every time someone rattles a cage.
You wanted me visible this morning. I was visible.
You wanted me in that seat. I’m in it. If I vanish into your estate now, everyone at St. Augustine’s reads that as weakness or control. I’m not giving them either.”
Aidan makes an aggravated sound behind me. Declan sets the tray down on the desk. Cormac appears in the doorway a second later, phone in hand, face like carved stone.
“You are confusing bravery with utility,” Séamus says. “At present, you are far more useful alive.”
“Same to you,” I shoot back. “Which is why I’m not tucking myself away while half of Ireland loses its mind over a drive my father built. I stay here. Your men can lock down the perimeter if it makes you feel better.”
“It would not make me feel better.”
“Shame.”
A long exhale comes down the line. “You are impossible.”
“Apparently hereditary.”
That gets me silence again. I count it as a win.
“At minimum,” he says, each word clipped hard, “you do not step outside that house again today.”
I look at the rain sliding down my window and tighten the towel higher on my chest. “That was already the plan.”
“For once in your life, make it stay the plan.”
“What else?” I ask.
“I’ve sent more men. They’ll rotate the perimeter. Nobody in or out without clearance.”
“My guys—”
“Remain with you,” he says. “I’m not removing your protection. I’m reinforcing it.”
Protection. Right. Because nothing says reassuring grandfatherly concern like armed men and a tightening radius.
“What am I looking for?” I ask. “If this is the first layer, what starts happening next?”
“Noise,” he says. “Misdirection. Panic dressed as opportunity. Calls from people who suddenly care how you are. Invitations to meet. Offers to explain. Threats if charm fails.”
My mouth goes flat. “Standard Irish family dynamics then.”
He ignores that. “If anyone asks for the copy, the answer is no.”
My hand goes instinctively to the inside pocket of my coat hanging over the chair. “Already my instinct.”
“Good. Keep it.” His voice drops colder. “If Whitmore contacts you directly, take the call.” That catches me. “He knows where pressure will surface first.” Before I can ask anything else, the line clicks dead.
I stare at my phone. Then at the wall. Then at absolutely nothing.
“Right,” I say to the room. “That was comforting in a deeply threatening way.”
Aidan takes the phone out of my hand before I can drop it. “What did he say?”
I tell them while getting dressed at speed, because apparently my life has become a sequence of briefing rooms and partial nudity. Knickers. Bra. Leggings. Tee. Every sentence out of my mouth makes the room tighten further.
“Coordinated blasts,” Declan says when I finish. “Financial and transport points.”
“And storage,” Cormac adds. He checks his phone again. “That’ll be cash, records, product, maybe safe houses if he’s broadening the hit list.”
Aidan swears under his breath. “He’s cutting tendons, not skin. If he hits finance, transport, storage, and the university pipeline all at once, nobody knows which fire to run to first.”
“Which is the point,” I say, dragging a brush through my wet hair. “Dad really made a fucking onion of disaster, didn’t he?”
Declan lifts a mug and hands it to me. “Drink before you pass out and make all of this even more annoying.”
I take the tea because my hands are starting to shake in a way I dislike. Not fear exactly. Adrenaline crash. Sleep deprivation. Rage. Pick a poison. The first sip is hot enough to sting my tongue. Good. Something sharp and ordinary in a day that has gone fully feral.
Cormac is still on his phone. “Campus is locked down unofficially. Nobody’s said the words, but nobody’s pretending classes matter now either. Group chats are full of smoke videos, road closures, Gardaí everywhere, and ten different versions of what happened in the hall.”
“What version is winning?” I ask.
“That you claimed the seat and somebody immediately got executed for objecting.”
I stare at him over the rim of the mug. “Executed.”
“Not wrong,” he states.
“True. St. Aug’s being closed is an annoyance. How am I meant to burn this place to the ground if there is no one inside to burn?”
“Maybe that’s also the point,” Aidan says, a wicked gleam in his eye. “Walk in and take it.”
My eyes widen fractionally. “Like the Board seat?”
“Like the Board seat.”
“You are diabolical.”
“Thanks.” He gives me a grin that is all menace. “My dad will be proud.”
My phone starts ringing again before I can answer that.
We all look at it like it might explode.
“Whitmore?” Declan asks.
“Only one way to find out.” I set the mug down and answer on speaker. “What?”
“Miss Callaghan.” Whitmore’s voice is as dry as paper. “Still alive, I trust.”
“Barely. Heartwarming to hear concern from you.”
“I’m not concerned. I’m calling because the first scramble has begun.”
I move to the edge of the bed and sit. “Séamus said you’d know where pressure would surface.”
“He gives me too much credit.”
“No, he gives me too little information. Different issue. Talk.”
A pause. Paper rustles on his end. Or maybe he is moving. I can’t tell.
“Three things,” he says. “First, several staff members have just discovered they are unexpectedly unavailable for work tomorrow. One has resigned. One is missing. One has developed a conscience, which is usually the least reliable condition.”
“Who?”
“Names later, if needed. Second, the Board is splitting exactly where your father expected it would.”
That gets my full attention. “How do you know what my father expected?”
“Because I helped him model it. He was building contingencies. I was one of the people he trusted to stress-test them.”
“Stress-test,” I say flatly. “You people really do love making evil sound administrative.”
“Call it what you like. The point is that he predicted where the fractures would appear if pressure was applied to finance, transport, and institutional links simultaneously. He was right.”
Aidan shifts closer. “Which way is the Board splitting?”
“Two will run towards whoever looks strongest in the immediate term. One will attempt neutrality and fail. One is already trying to disappear. One is on your side. Roisin is where Roisin has always been, which is useful only if you understand her. And you now occupy the seat that forces everyone else to declare themselves.”
I stare at the rain on the window. “That is not a split, that’s a scattering. Who is on my side?”
“Gallagher.”
“Are you sure about that?” I don’t know why I’m asking Whitmore like I suddenly trust him. I don’t. But Séamus said to take the call, so here I am.
“Yes,” Whitmore says. “Gallagher has been yours since before you understood what that meant. He is your godfather.”
I pause and then snort. “I hope you mean that in the non-mafia way.”
“Quite,” he says with that dry tone that means he finds me slightly moronic. “He was loyal to your father since they were children. That loyalty has transferred.”
I press my fingers against the bridge of my nose. “What else?”
“Someone is going to try to reach you before nightfall and present themselves as your father’s ally. They will claim to have answers about his death. They may even have some.”
“Who?”
“No idea. My point is, don’t believe them.”
“Yeah, I kind of figured that out already.”
“I had to say it. Who killed your father is your weak spot. People will pressure test it. Even if they are convincing, don’t give them an inch.”
“But what if they’re—”
“No,” he grits out. “That is exactly what they will be hoping for.”
It hurts to breathe for a second, but then I say, “Okay.”
Whitmore hangs up before I can ask anything else.
I stare at the phone for a second too long.
“Well,” Declan says. “That was grim.”
“Helpful, though,” Cormac says.
“Those two things should not be allowed to coexist in one man,” I mutter.
I stand and set the tea down on the tray before I spill it on myself. My nerves feel skinned. Every tiny sound in the house now seems louder. The old pipes. The wind at the window. A car somewhere beyond the drive. My pulse is hammering at the base of my throat.
“Okay.” I drag in a breath. “Let’s do this properly. Doors locked. Curtains shut. Nobody answers anything without checking with the rest first. If anyone comes to the house, they stay outside.”
“What about Gallagher?” Aidan asks as I pull the curtains firmly shut. “If he is so much on your side, where the fuck is he?”
“Good question,” I mutter as my phone rings again.
We all stare at it, but then I answer with a cautious, “Hello?”
Cormac grimaces at the deviation from my usual brusqueness.
“It’s Roisin. I’m with Gallagher. Are you safe?”
“Depends. Where are you?”
“That’s the right answer. Well done you.”
“Fuck off. Where are you?”
“In Gallagher’s car,” Roisin says. “Parked two roads over because your grandfather’s men have turned your house into a fucking embassy.”
I shift the curtain a fraction with one finger. Two dark SUVs. Men at the gate. Another at the corner of the drive. “That is annoyingly accurate.”
Gallagher’s voice cuts in, lower and steadier. “Don’t come out.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Good,” he says. “Because this is the sort of afternoon where people start making sentimental mistakes.”
I look at the others. Aidan is already checking the front security feed on his phone. Cormac has moved to the landing window, body angled, scanning. Declan is at my desk, lifting the copied drive, then setting it down again, as if he is checking it still exists.
“What do you want?” I ask.
Roisin answers. “To warn you before someone else gets there first.”
My stomach goes tight. “Whitmore already beat you to the grim briefing. Try again.”
A short pause. “Then he told you someone would come claiming to be your father’s ally.”
“Yes.”
“Good.” Roisin exhales. “Then here’s the part he might not know. There’s a woman moving. Mid-forties, dark hair, navy coat, scar at the left temple. She uses the name Maeve Doyle when she wants to sound respectable. She’s not respectable.”
Gallagher adds, “If she reaches you, she’ll lie very well.”
The word drops into me like bad weather.
“What does she want?” I ask.
“She will tell you she knows who killed Cillian.”
“And does she know?” I croak.
“She knows,” Roisin says grimly. “She did it.”
Cormac’s gaze shoots up from his phone screen to my eyes. He makes a slashing motion at his throat.
I gulp. Whitmore said I could trust Gallagher. He also said I can’t trust those who claim to know who killed my dad.
“I have to go,” I say and abruptly hang up.