24. Cora
Cora
I towel myself dry in my husband’s magnificent bathroom. Though I consider returning to his office naked, when I spy my clothes folded neatly on the counter for me, I decide to put them back on.
It ends up being the right decision.
I emerge through the bookshelf door to find that Brady isn’t in his office. Instead, it’s Finn who’s lying on the couch, tossing a baseball into the air above his head. He catches it with a smack against his palm, then tosses it up again.
“Where’s—”
“Not here,” he says, toward the ceiling.
“Got that, thanks. So where exactly is he?”
“Not. Here.” Finn catches the baseball and swings himself upright to finally look at me.
He doesn’t look good. He’s sallow and exhausted, with circles under his eyes from what must’ve been a long night.
“Thank you, by the way,” I tell him, and I mean it. “For defending me last night.”
For a moment Finn’s caught off guard. Then he’s back to scowling at me.
“He left you a note,” he says, nodding toward Brady’s desk. Warily, I pick up the note my husband wrote for me.
Family dinner tonight at the pub. The dress you’re wearing is perfect. Be a good girl and wear nothing beneath. -B
My cheeks go red hot.
“Did you read this?” I ask Finn.
“What my brother writes to his liability of a wife is none of my concern.”
“This liability saved your life last night.” I clench my hands into fists.
“After endangering it in the first place.”
“How did I endanger you?”
“By existing,” he says plainly. “You’re a Muloney, and you’ll always be a Muloney. By marrying you, Brady’s brought the enemy into our family. And what’s worse, you brought your traitor brother with you.”
He’s threatening Connor, and I won’t stand here and listen to any more of it. With my anger rising past control, I turn on my heel and return toward the bookshelf.
I didn’t choose this marriage either. I hated the very idea at first.
But now…
It’s still not what I would’ve chosen. And yet, I know I can’t cram myself back into my civilian life, I can’t make my violence curl up inside a cage again. Being Brady O’Sullivan’s wife has its benefits. He’s recognized that unleashed part of me, and it matches his own so well.
Once I’ve closed the bookshelf door behind me, I stride through the bathroom and into the closet.
The term closet is less accurate than dressing room.
The space is so big there’s a chaise lounge beside the full-length trifold mirror.
All three of my reflections confirm that bralessness does not work with this sheath dress, especially not for a family dinner.
I try on one of Brady’s suit jackets, but it’s comically large on me.
Still, I want to wear what he asked me to, or rather, not wear what he told me not to.
The thought that he’ll reward me is too tempting not to follow his instructions.
But I’ll need something to conceal my nipples, which I know will harden into visible points as soon as he looks at me with those piercing eyes of his.
I think of what might annoy him the most, of what might lead to a punishment as well as a reward.
Running my fingers along Brady’s hanging shirts, I notice that each one is crisply pressed to his immaculate standards, and I have my answer.
Wrinkles. I select one of his white dress shirts and roll up the sleeves, then pull it on and knot it at the front.
It’s not perfect, but it’ll work as a dress cover-up. And it will definitely leave wrinkles.
* * *
Finn abandons me as soon as we step into the pub, and I exhale all my pent-up frustration with him. Because he didn’t want to get here “too early,” we spent the afternoon in sullen silence in Brady’s office. I assume it was so Finn could avoid the menial labor of tending bar.
Scanning the pub’s loose crowd, I spot Orla’s russet-and-silver bob through the decorative windows of the front room.
There’s only one large table in that section, separated from the rest of the pub by a short wall topped with industrial glass.
On the day I was here, the space was open to everyone, although the few customers who used it seemed like out-of-towners.
Today, its corner door is closed. Ten years of rule-abiding tell me to avoid it, to turn away and go chat with Erin, to see if she needs help behind the bar. Although we only worked together for a few hours, I really like the badass bartender.
But before I make any decision, Orla catches sight of me and beckons me over with a jerk of her head. I’m not thrilled about being summoned like that, but I’m here for an O’Sullivan family dinner. I dig my nails into my palms and do what I have to.
I pass a large customer who was blocking half my view, and I see that Orla’s not alone in the front room. She’s playing cards with her youngest son, Kieran, while Declan watches on.
I dig my nails deeper into my skin. I should’ve figured that the O’Sullivan patriarch would be present, but I didn’t mentally prepare myself.
For the entire afternoon, I was too busy containing my urge to argue with Finn, who’s made it clear he’s a threat to my brother.
Nothing else for it now but to show the rest of my husband’s family who they’re dealing with.
I let myself into the private room with all the confidence in the world.
“You look good in my son’s shirt,” Orla says, but it’s not a compliment. I know I look like a walk of shame, and I really don’t give a damn.
I thank her anyway as I take my seat. When I nod my hellos to Declan and Kieran, Declan grunts and Kieran gapes at me, most likely at my outfit.
“We’re teaching Kieran the finer aspects of poker,” Orla says, indicating the stacks of quarters on the table. “It’s five card draw.” She deals me in without asking and slides me what looks like ten dollars in coins.
Orla, Kieran, and I play a few hands without talking much, apart from the occasional advice to Kieran. If it weren’t for Orla, it’d be a very uncomfortable silence.
Declan sits unmoving, but everything about his presence is quietly threatening.
“Da, I’m dealing you in,” Orla announces.
To my surprise, he doesn’t grumble about it, he just picks up his cards and takes his quarters. There’s now at least forty dollars in play, and I get the impression that we are playing for keeps.
The fact that Declan’s participating seems to activate his willingness to speak.
“You’ve been in our town for a while now,” he says to me.
“Ten years.”
“Cubs or Sox?”
“Sox.” It’s the truth, but even if it weren’t, I’m not about to tell a South Sider I’m a Cubs fan.
Declan grunts to confirm I gave the correct response. I let him and Orla win the next several hands, mostly because I don’t draw any good cards.
Whenever Declan rakes in his winnings, he leaves them in a heap compared to everyone else’s neat stacks. It’s the technique of someone who doesn’t want his coins countable by others, who relies on the appearance of winning, whether or not he has the funds to back it up.
“Our man in Boston did a little digging on you.” Declan says it calmly, but it makes my pulse increase. If the O’Sullivans learn my name is still legally Samantha Greene according to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the loophole in my marriage disappears. But I keep my voice nonchalant.
“Did he?”
“You don’t hold the respect you should for the sacraments.” Brady’s father levels his gaze at me across the table.
I almost sigh with relief. They haven’t uncovered my identity, just something brash I did as a teenager. I should’ve known that story would catch up with me eventually. Tempted as I am to glance to Orla for her reaction, I hold Declan’s stare.
“I save my respect for more consequential things,” I tell him.
“Such as?”
“Power.”
Declan barks a laugh, a condescending noise with a slight wheeze to it. I stay silent as he shakes his head.
“You don’t think there’s power in the sacraments?” he asks.
“They rely on the power of belief,” I say. “Which, yes, is very strong. But if, tomorrow, everyone stopped believing in the sacraments, they’d be meaningless.”
Kieran sucks in a breath. In my peripheral vision, Orla goes still. I’ve just wobbled on this tightrope that I’m walking, and I can’t afford to fall.
“But take actual power. Say…” I wave my hand vaguely. “The type of power you wield. If, tomorrow, everyone stopped believing you were powerful, you’d prove them wrong.”
Declan’s eyebrows twitch up at this, a subtle cue that I’ve impressed him. I keep my face impassive as he tries to evaluate me, then Orla tosses her cards face down between us, breaking our staring contest.
“I’ll not hear any more blasphemous talk,” she says. “Kieran, it’s your pot.”
Nervously, the youngest O’Sullivan rakes in his quarters.
“Don’t go spending all of those at the arcade now,” his mother says.
What the hell else is a thirteen-year-old boy going to do with a bunch of quarters? Apart from keeping a roll of them in his fist for fighting, which sweet Kieran doesn’t seem like the type to do.
Our table returns to its silence, and it’s even more tense than before. Declan may be pleased with my responses, but Orla is visibly upset with me.
I do my best with several crappy hands in a row, meaning I fold more often than I’d like. After what feels like a long while, I get a hand with four clubs and one spade.
“One,” I tell Orla, discarding my spade.
“One means you’re usually going for a flush,” Kieran pipes up.
He’s as old as Connor was when I hugged him goodbye in Boston, but Kieran seems significantly younger than my brother at his age.
It’s not that Connor has ever been mature, just that he was left to his own devices as a kid.
Kieran, however, is so clearly cared for and protected by his family that it’s like he’s gotten a proper childhood, despite growing up in the mafia.
“Usually,” I agree. “But counting on a flush is pretty foolish.”
I peek at the card Orla dealt me, and let my lips twitch the slightest bit before sliding the card into my hand, second from the right.
I raise by a dollar and Kieran folds. Declan re-raises me. It’s the first time he’s done anything but call or fold. He stacks up some of his coins to slide eight dollars into the pot, the exact amount I have left. Orla folds.
I can recognize a test when it’s presented, and the O’Sullivan patriarch is challenging me. I go all in to call him. Declan lays down his hand, jack high, aka nothing. He was just calling my bluff. I lay down my hand of four clubs and one heart, queen high.
Also nothing, but higher than Declan’s nothing. He pushes the pot toward me.
“So you know how to lie,” he says, and I meet his pale gray eyes.
“I know how to win.”