6. Safety Comes at a Cost
Chapter six
Safety Comes at a Cost
MICK
"That's it. I'm done waiting!" Fiona jumps up with a militant gleam in her eyes. "Zoey had better figure her loyalty stuff out because I'm not attending one more wedding in this family without at least having a date set for my own!"
Finally. It's about time my sister-in-law settled down.
She'll be in a position of leadership soon and the mob likes their leaders domesticated.
"What are you talking about?" áine shouts and then at significantly lower volume says, "I never yell."
Sadie claims her mom never loses her cool but you couldn't tell that by me. The woman is definitely riding the roller coaster on one rail right now.
"We can't get married. I just met you!"
Yep. Calm, she is not.
Sadie worries about the logistics of planning the wedding too quickly, showing she's got a practical mind and good instincts for identifying problems.
Fitz has solid taste in his friends. Which is why that little shit Kenny Jr. isn't one of them.
After today, that kid isn't even going to be in Fitz's circle of acquaintances.
"Contract marriages happen in the mob all the time," Fitz says.
I'm not sure if he's trying to comfort his friend or explain the reality of our life to her nearly hyperventilating mom.
áine mentions her traitorous bastard of a dead husband and Wraith doesn't like hearing his name any more than I do.
Then the woman starts making noises about leaving, like she's got no clue how significantly her life changed the second Wraith made his vow to keep her safe and I sanctioned the marriage that would make that possible.
Kara, my beautiful and feckin' smart wife, arranges for Fitz and Sadie to go with our security team to collect áine's younger daughters.
Aine sits back down on the couch and Wraith crowds her, making it harder for her to make a useless run for it. Kara, always in tune with the feelings of others, suggests he give áine more room, but Wraith, showing the smarts that has gotten him so far in our mob, doesn't budge an inch.
He even takes her hand to keep her in place.
Good move.
"Kenneth told you your husband was a rat?" I ask áine, going straight to the information that matters.
The marriage? Is a done deal, but how the bleedin' hell she learned about her husband's role in our mob and that he betrayed us is important.
If she knew all along, Wraith won't be able to save her, but I'll let him take responsibility for the girls to feed that white knight complex he's got going on.
He's a damn fine captain but no one is perfect.
"And that you killed him for it? Yes." She glares at me, showing more courage than half our soldiers would do. "And all the torture you put him through before you did it."
"Life in the mob is harsh," I dismiss. But what the feckin' hell was Kenneth doing blabbing about the details of Troy's death to his widow? "Our laws are inviolate and breaking them comes with heavy penalties."
The rat knew exactly what he was risking when he took money from Gabriel Lyon to spy on our mob and look the other way on the sonar equipment so Kara's cousin, Róise, could be kidnapped from under our noses.
Kara gives áine one of those gentle smiles of hers I'm not sure the other woman deserves. "Did you know Troy was mobbed up before Kenneth told you what he did?"
"I didn't know when he died," áine claims and if she's lying, she's a damn good actress because there are no micro expressions giving her away.
Then she tells us the feds took her in for an interview and told her about her husband's mob affiliation. They wanted áine to turn traitor. Typical.
But the woman didn't have any information to give them. We made sure Troy's financial accounts and communications were scrubbed. Showing she has more smarts than her husband did, áine turned the feds down flat.
"But you know all this," she accuses me with belligerent anger.
So, not so smart after all.
I wouldn't bother to ask the questions if I knew the answers and taking that tone with me isn't a good choice for her future.
She goes on to tell a story that would be unbelievable if I didn't already know Kenneth Shaughnessy is trying to set himself up as an alternative to me becoming the next boss.
That ship sailed the day Brogan and I added the addendum to the blood contract.
Kenneth didn't just tell the widow that I killed her husband, but he gave her chapter and verse on how I tortured Troy beforehand. The feckin' asswipe.
Wraith's stony expression says he's pissed about it too. As he should be.
That kind of information in the wrong hands could be bad for the mob. Not that there's any physical evidence anywhere linking me to Troy's death or corroborating the torture he endured.
But there were witnesses. Men who should be loyal and trustworthy not to turn rat, but it happens.
And that much detail for a crime of that nature catches law enforcement's attention, giving them a hardon for a case they'll be sure they can make.
They'd be wrong but it would still put a spotlight on me that I don't need and make it harder for the feds we have in our pocket to smooth things for us when we need them to.
Bleedin' feckin' hell.
It doesn't take us long to figure out that Kenneth telling áine the things he has is part of his plan to oust me as the next boss.
"Then why did Kenneth tell me any of it?" áine asks, expressing her emotional upset in a way those of us raised in the mob are taught not to do.
She's betraying way too much vulnerability and she's damn lucky Wraith already agreed to protect her. She needs watching out for by someone who understands our world.
"He was setting you up as a patsy," Wraith explains to her, reflecting my own theory.
"A patsy? For what?" she asks, her bewilderment showing her innocence of our world.
"For him getting rid of a rival without it blowing back on him." Quiet fury darkens my wife's hazel eyes. "Not that he is a rival, but in his own head, he thinks he's in competition for the position of boss with my husband."
"There is no competition," I promise the only woman in the world that matters to me at a cellular level.
"He's going to rat you out." Wraith sounds angry.
Because he takes his oath seriously and would never betray me or Brogan while Kenneth is clearly prepared to do both.
Kara gives áine a pitying look. "And make it look like áine did it."
"But then why try to force me to have sex with him?" áine asked with the shocked naivete of an outsider. "Wouldn't that point the finger toward him too?"
Fury infuses Wraith's muscles with rigidity. "He tried to rape you?"
"He tried to coerce me. I told you he makes passes at me at least once a week.
Kenneth said I had to prove my loyalty to the mob.
That's why I had to work for him and his snobby family.
Lately, he's decided me spreading my legs for him would be stronger proof of my loyalty.
" The disgust in áine's tone leaves no doubt how she feels about that possibility.
Kara grimaces with the same emotion.
I run through scenarios for why Kenneth would use that tactic.
Lust. áine's nothing special like Kara but she's got bangin' curves.
Control. He believes he'll have better control over her if she's his mistress.
Plausible deniability. If she's his mistress with the run of his home, it's conceivable áine would have access to information that could get me arrested. Thereby making it more believable that he didn't rat me out.
Especially if he broke up with her before turning rat. He could claim she acted out of anger at both him and me for the wrongs she believed we did her.
If I'm not giving him too much credit, Kenneth isn't bad at strategizing. Too bad for him, I'm better.
Wraith's face sets in implacable lines. "He's dead."
After replying to something áine says, I tell my soldier, "You have to wait to kill him until we know who else is complicit in his plans."
In the mob, we can never afford to take things at face value or assume players are working alone.
Kara's hands fist in her lap, her beautiful body vibrating with rage. "I can't believe he thinks he could get away with turning you over to the feds. If he succeeded in getting you locked up, I'd kill him myself and I'd ask Miceli De Luca to help me torture him first."
I don't chide her for going outside the mob for her cohort in torture. If I'm not around to do it, De Luca is a close substitute.
"I would have allowed you to move your family from New York before Kenneth talked to you and told you too much, but that's not a possibility now," I inform áine, feeling a faint stirring of pity for her that surprises me. "You have two choices."
"What are they?" she asks.
I approve of her practical approach and don't try to sugar coat the options. "Marry Wraith and accept his protection for yourself and your family. Or stay in New York without it."
"Are you saying that if I'm not married to Kieran, Kenneth can rape me without punishment? That his son can do the same to my daughter?" áine asks in furious tones.
We all say no, but I put my hand up to silence Kara and Wraith. "Kenny Jr. will be punished for what happened today."
"He needs to be taken out from under the influence of his father," Kara opines.
And I don't hate what she's suggesting.
A boarding school that specializes in building character and a sense of honor might be Kenny Jr.'s salvation.
"It could only be an improvement, but I'm not sure it will make any difference to his character at this point," áine mutters.
"But we can try." Kara gives me a beseeching look.
Of course I'll listen to her, but I remind her, "The punishment for rape in this mob is death."
"Fitz stopped them!" áine cries looking shocked at herself for taking up for Kenny Jr. and his hoodlum cohorts.
"Even sociopaths can be taught a sense of honor." Kara looks at me with the love and approval I've come to crave and rely on.
I'll look into the incident more fully and decide if boarding school is an option.