7. Maeve
Maeve
Thomas Keane’s blood stays beneath my fingernails long after I stop trying to scrub it away.
I stand at the marble sink in Declan’s bathroom, watching pink water spiral into the drain while the house moves around me with the controlled urgency of an empire discovering rot inside its walls.
Keane’s body has been taken somewhere the Crown can examine it without producing a police report.
The two unconscious guards from the safe house are being tested for sedatives, and every record of the security override is being copied before someone can erase it.
Cillian and Niamh returned from Lorenzo’s estate after Declan’s security sweep cleared the family wing, though guards now occupy both ends of the corridor and patrol beneath every window.
My son sleeps two doors away, unaware that the man who saved his life has been murdered because he knew who wanted him dead.
I press my wet hands against the edge of the sink and stare at the woman in the mirror.
Seven years ago, fear made her run. Tonight, the same fear wants her to take Cillian and disappear before Declan’s enemies learn how to reach him again.
“You have washed your hands six times.” Declan stands in the doorway, his jacket gone and his black shirt open at the throat. Exhaustion darkens the skin beneath his eyes, but nothing weakens the force of his attention. “Keane’s blood was not on them.”
“It feels as though it was.” I shut off the water. “Apparently guilt does not respect basic hygiene.”
“Guilt is arrogant.” He enters and places a folded towel beside me. “It assumes everything is about us.”
The observation is unpleasantly perceptive.
I dry my hands while Declan watches, giving me the same undivided attention he once reserved for threats and for me.
In the early years, I mistook that focus for possession.
Later, I understood it was the closest he came to worship.
He learned the exact amount of milk I wanted in my tea, remembered which songs I hated, and could recognise my footsteps in a crowded building.
He also believed a file over my word and promised to kill me.
Love did not make him safe. It merely gave him more precise ways to destroy me.
“I want to take Cillian away from here.” I drop the towel onto the counter. “Keane was inside a protected Irish property for less than four hours before someone executed him. Your walls are not protection if the person with the key is already inside them.”
“No one leaves until I know how the safe house was breached.” Declan’s jaw hardens. “Moving Cillian now would expose him to another road attack.”
“That sounds dangerously close to an order.” I turn to face him. “We both remember how well I respond to those.”
“You respond by disappearing for seven years.” His gaze drops briefly to my bare hands before returning to my face. “I remember with irritating clarity.”
Pain slips beneath the words before he can bury it.
I should enjoy knowing my absence wounded him.
For years, I imagined Declan untouched by what happened, drinking expensive whiskey while another woman warmed his bed and my execution order gathered dust in some forgotten archive.
The truth is less merciful. He kept the lighter I gave him, never married, and carries hatred like a relic polished by constant handling.
Part of him waited for my return. Part of me left a path because I expected him to follow.
We were both too proud to admit hope survived after trust died.
“If you want to understand why I left, stop giving commands and listen.” I walk past him into the adjoining bedroom. “You have heard the shortened version. It is time you heard what your system buried.”
Declan closes the bathroom door and follows. “Cillian is sleeping, so try not to shout.”
“I do not shout.” I take the chair beside the cold fireplace. “I project disappointment.”
“You threw a bottle at my head once.”
“You deserved a second bottle.” I look toward the window instead of him. “Sit down, Declan. This will be easier if you are not looming like an undertaker waiting for measurements.”
He lowers himself into the chair opposite mine.
Between us stands a small table holding the silver lighter, his pistol, and two glasses no one has filled.
The arrangement is painfully appropriate: our past, his violence, and the drink that once helped him avoid discussing either.
Seven years ago, I spent countless nights in this room.
The furniture has changed, but the fireplace bears the same pale mark where I knocked over a candle while Declan had me pressed against the mantel.
I was twenty-five and convinced the most dangerous man in New York became harmless when he touched me.
Youth is not innocence. Sometimes it is merely arrogance without evidence.
“I noticed the first discrepancy eight months before the warehouse raid.” I fold my hands to stop them trembling.
“A shipment of rifles was scheduled to leave Belfast for New York beneath a construction-company manifest. The intelligence attached to the transport claimed the weapons were needed for protection after a threat from a rival crew. That should have required two vehicles and one secured container. Instead, the operation reserved four vehicles, a refrigerated truck, and a temporary warehouse near the Hudson.”
Declan leans forward, his forearms resting on his knees. “A refrigerated truck is used for body removal when the target must disappear.”
“I knew that.” I meet his eyes. “I also knew the warehouse had a concealed drainage system and no cameras. Someone was planning an execution, not a defensive shipment. When I searched the related payments, I found a lawyer whose retainer came from the same shell company. He had been investigating Crown property purchases. Three days later, he was declared an informant and killed.”
Declan’s expression does not change, but his fingers curl against his palms. “I carried out that execution.”
“I know.” The memory of seeing the closure code in the ledger still tastes metallic.
“After that, I searched backward. The alleged traitors were not selling secrets. One was an accountant tracing money missing from a Greek-controlled construction fund. Another was a broker who questioned payments passing through dormant Irish companies. Two were informants who encountered pieces of OB6 while investigating unrelated federal cases. Each discovered something, and each became a Crown threat before they could explain it.”
“You should have come to me immediately.” His voice is controlled, but regret sits beneath the rebuke. “Whatever you suspected, you should have brought it to me.”
“I tried.” Anger rises so quickly that the room seems to tilt.
“You were in Dublin when I found the weapons shipment connected to the next assassination. The intelligence claimed a Serbian trafficker was arriving in New York to kill Lorenzo. The shipment dates proved the operation had been arranged before the supposed threat was discovered. I placed a hold on the cargo and sent a report to your office marked for your attention only.”
“I never received it.” Declan’s response comes without hesitation. “Eamon told me the shipment delay resulted from a customs problem.”
“I received a message from your office instructing me to release it.” I remember staring at the authorisation, knowing the rifles would leave the warehouse within hours.
“I refused. I copied every manifest I could find and requested a private meeting with you the moment you returned. Before you landed, federal agents raided the warehouse.”
The raid lives in fragments. Helicopters over the river.
Men dragged onto wet concrete. Crates split open beneath white lights.
Television reports describing one of the largest illegal-weapons seizures in the city’s history.
Two Irish soldiers received sentences long enough to erase their children’s childhoods.
Millions in weapons, cash, and routes disappeared into federal custody.
By sunrise, evidence had surfaced showing that I provided the warehouse address, the access schedule, and the names of both soldiers.
The tip had been sent from an account connected to my home network.
Payments appeared in my name. Messages showed me negotiating witness protection in exchange for testimony against Declan.
“The evidence was perfect.” My voice sounds distant even to me.
“That should have frightened you. Real life is untidy, but the case against me arrived wrapped with a ribbon. Every document said I had betrayed the Syndicate, and every document appeared before I could place the genuine records in your hands.”
“I confronted you before examining the source.” Declan looks at the untouched pistol on the table. “I had just watched two of my men taken in chains. I believed the woman sleeping in my bed had sold them.”
“You did more than confront me.” I force myself to hold his gaze. “You called me a federal whore. You said I had opened my legs for you while opening your empire to your enemies. Then you told me that if I disappeared before you returned, you would hunt me down and kill me yourself.”