14. Declan
Declan
Eamon’s insult lands in the study and kills what remains of my restraint.
One moment, he stands beside the fireplace wearing the face of the man who raised me.
The next, my fist connects with his mouth hard enough to drive him into the mantel.
Blood opens across his lower lip. I seize his throat before he recovers and slam him against the stone, scattering framed photographs onto the floor.
One shows my father with an arm around Eamon’s shoulders, both brothers young enough to believe blood could never become a weapon.
The glass cracks beneath my shoe as I tighten my grip.
Eamon’s pulse beats against my palm, steady despite the pressure.
“Say it again.” I force his head back. “This time, choose your final words carefully.”
Eamon’s bloody smile contains more contempt than fear. “She returns after seven years, gives you a son, climbs into your bed, and suddenly you place your uncle on trial. I overestimated you.”
My fist strikes his ribs. Bone gives beneath the blow, followed by the sharp loss of his breath.
I drag him upright before he can fall. He taught me how to hit without breaking my hand, where to place a knife beneath the sternum, and how long a man remains conscious while being strangled.
Every lesson waits inside my muscles. The boy he trained has become strong enough to kill him. The man he betrayed wants to prove it.
Maeve catches my wrist before I draw the knife from my belt. “If you kill him now, we lose every name, account, and piece of evidence he still possesses. Do not give him the easy death he expects.”
“He questioned Cillian’s blood.” My voice sounds distant, almost calm. That is when men usually begin praying. “He does not leave this room alive.”
“Our son does not need his first day as your heir to end with you murdering his great-uncle downstairs.” Maeve steps between us, forcing me to see her instead of the throat beneath my hand. “Use your brain before Eamon’s opinion of it becomes annoyingly accurate.”
The insult reaches me because it comes wrapped in logic.
I release Eamon and step back. He bends forward, coughing into one hand, though triumph flickers in his eyes.
He believes Maeve has protected him from me.
In truth, she has protected the evidence from my anger.
The distinction will matter when I decide how slowly he dies.
Eamon wipes the blood from his mouth. “You see how easily she controls you. Maeve knows which wound to press and which promise to offer. That child may resemble you, but resemblance can be arranged.”
I hit him again. This time, Maeve does not stop me until he lies on one knee with blood dripping onto the carpet.
She places her palm against my chest, directly over my heart.
Her touch is firm, not frightened. Seven years ago, she would have shouted.
Now she understands that quiet reaches deeper when rage has already deafened me.
“The next blow is for you, not Cillian.” Her fingers tighten in my shirt. “You want to hurt him because part of you fears he is right about the man he made you. Do not confuse that fear with defending our son.”
I look down at Eamon and recognise the satisfaction beneath his pain.
He wants me violent, reactive, and easy to direct.
Even now, accused of choosing my targets for fifteen years, he tries to place another one before me.
Callum’s final warning moves through my mind.
If you still believe obedience is strength, he has already won.
“Did you corrupt the execution system?” I ask. “Did you create the concealed override?”
“No.” Eamon pushes himself upright with one hand against the mantel. “I protected that system while you drank through meetings and treated killing as leadership. Callum controlled intelligence. Maeve controlled the Gallagher routes. Yet you accuse the one man who never abandoned you.”
“You had uninterrupted access across all fifteen years.” Maeve remains beside me rather than retreating behind my authority.
“You supervised the office that produced my false witness-protection records. You recommended removing full intelligence packages from Declan’s review after Patrick’s murder. ”
“I kept Declan functioning after Patrick died.” Eamon straightens his waistcoat despite the blood staining his shirt. “You were gone. His captains smelled weakness, the Crown suspected the Irish, and every rival waited for him to collapse. I did what was necessary.”
“You poured whiskey when he questioned himself and gave him targets when he grieved.” Maeve’s voice remains cold. “That is not protection. It is conditioning.”
Eamon’s gaze returns to me, and something long hidden finally strips the warmth from his face.
“Your father declared you his heir before you understood what leadership required. It was his one unforgivable act of sentiment. I had spent my life building the organisation beside him, yet he chose his son because blood travels downward more comfortably than sideways.”
The resentment in his voice predates Maeve, Callum, and every corrupted order.
It reaches back to my childhood, perhaps to the day my father announced that I would inherit everything both brothers built.
Eamon never challenged the decision. He placed his hand on my shoulder and swore to prepare me for the throne.
I believed sacrifice made him loyal. I never considered that patience might have made him dangerous.
“You wanted his position.” I study the man who taught me never to reveal envy. “You believed you should have become king.”
“I would have made a better one.” Eamon meets my stare without apology. “You have the brawn to terrify men but not the brain to control an organisation this large. Your father saw his own face in yours and mistook resemblance for ability.”
The accusation finds its mark because part of it is true.
I allowed authenticated orders to replace judgment.
I killed seven people without examining the complete evidence.
I let grief over Patrick turn whiskey into habit and obedience into relief.
Eamon stood beside me through every failure, correcting enough mistakes to keep the empire intact.
Perhaps he made me dependent because he wanted control.
Perhaps I handed it to him because ruling was easier when someone else decided where violence belonged.
Maeve withdraws her hand from my chest, but she does not tell me Eamon is guilty. She does not ask me to defend her or choose our son over the man who raised me. Valeria’s advice has given her patience, though I doubt she enjoys using it.
“I am not asking you to believe me because you love me.” Maeve looks at the cracked photograph beneath my shoe, then at Eamon. “I am asking you to look at what you know and choose the truth yourself.”
Love. She says the word without dressing it as history or regret. Eamon hears it too. His expression hardens, but I feel something inside me steady. Maeve does not need my blind faith. She wants the judgment I denied her seven years ago.
I call Ronan into the study with four guards.
Two disarm Eamon while the others search him.
They remove a pistol, a narrow knife, and an encrypted phone registered outside Irish channels.
Elena will examine the device. Eamon watches the procedure with the wounded dignity of a man determined to appear betrayed rather than exposed.
“Place him under armed restriction in the west guest suite.” I keep my attention on my uncle. “No electronic access, no visitors, and two guards outside the door. Seal the windows physically. He eats only what Ronan’s men prepare.”
Eamon laughs once, then winces at the injury to his ribs. “You imprison your father’s brother because a dead coward recorded a riddle.”
“I confine one of four remaining suspects while the evidence is examined.” I pick up my father’s broken photograph. “You taught me caution. Try to appreciate the lesson.”
Ronan escorts him upstairs while Maeve and I remain in the damaged study.
Blood stains the mantel where Eamon’s head struck it.
My father’s face stares through cracked glass, his arm still resting around the brother who resented his choice of heir.
I remember Eamon standing beside me at the funeral, holding my shoulder while the coffin disappeared beneath Irish soil.
He told me that grief was private but duty belonged to everyone.
I was fourteen. I mistook cruelty for preparation.
Maeve kneels beside me and removes the photograph from my hand before the broken glass cuts deeper into my palm. “You did not condemn him. You contained him while you investigate. That matters.”
“It feels like betrayal.” I watch her wrap my hand in a clean handkerchief. “Choosing the evidence over Eamon feels like cutting away the last connection to my father.”
“Then let it hurt.” She ties the cloth without looking away. “Pain does not mean the choice is wrong. Sometimes it means the lie was attached to something you loved.”
The alarm sounds twenty-six minutes later.
Ronan calls from the west wing while I am examining Eamon’s encrypted phone.
One guard lies dead outside the guest suite with a bullet beneath his chin.
The second, Liam Doyle, has disappeared along with Eamon.
Doyle joined Irish security fourteen years ago after Eamon personally recruited him from Belfast. The electronic lock never opened, the window sensors remain armed, and no camera captured either man leaving.
For several minutes, the secure room appears to have swallowed them.
Maeve finds the answer behind a nineteenth-century wardrobe bolted to the wall. One panel bears fresh scratches near the floor. Ronan’s men tear the wardrobe free and uncover a narrow iron door hidden beneath the plaster. Beyond it, stone steps descend into darkness.