Epilogue A Deal with the Devil
OWEN
Boston looked different when I got back.
Same brick buildings and staid apartments. Same worn streets, cobbled or concrete. Same swampy July weather that could turn from sunshine to a rain cloud on a dime, depending on its mood.
Something had shifted, though.
Maybe it was me.
My broken nose throbbed with every pothole as Mac drove us away from Logan Airport.
Funny how I was the one getting the big man’s special attention now.
Always a “principal,” I’d always been last on the security team’s priorities, partly because I was crazy, partly because I was always armed anyway, and partly because I was the last Black anyone would expect to take things over.
But now Brendan was out, and Ronan too. Both of them abandoned our legacy within the space of a few short months.
Shea was young and had gone back to California for the time being.
Which left me with my busted face and spectacular bruising, here to absorb the old man’s rage and take on the family mantle.
God, I was his worst nightmare.
Seventeen hours in a car with Laney Fisher, followed by another night in Vegas and a long plane ride home, had given me time to think.
About what we’d done to Ronan. About the backhanded ways I’d always dealt with my family. About the jealousy that had been eating me alive for years because of the way Brendan and Ronan seemed to curry favor in ways I never could.
But now, I couldn’t stop thinking about the way my brothers had looked as they walked away from everything. The company, the CEO position, our father’s approval—all for a woman.
Meanwhile, I had returned to Boston alone, my phone full of message from Dad demanding updates from Vegas, my inbox flooded with board members wondering why the hell Ronan had just sent his resignation letter and who was Ares Antoni and why was he suddenly in possession of so many shares?
For the first time, I was also the one expected to have all the answers.
The problem was, I didn’t. And I never had.
Mac pulled up to my father’s Brookline mansion just as the sun was casting diamonds across the pond across the street.
As we traveled up the circular driveway, the house loomed with its colonial facade in the twilight.
A picture of conservative strength and tradition, despite the fact that its owner had been anything but.
Any respectability of the Black family had been purchased, not earned. We didn’t deserve the history this house suggested. Especially with the war and tension that simmered inside.
“He wants you inside,” Mac said as he cut the engine.
I didn’t move. “You go. I need a minute.”
Mac looked unsure, but he just nodded and got out to wait by the door.
Slowly, I went through some of the mindfulness exercises the therapists at the VA had taught me when I first got back from the war.
First, closing my eyes and taking stock of my body, noticing the varying degrees of tension and temperature held in each muscle, each limb.
Then I held up one hand and traced each finger with the others, noticing an emotion for each finger.
Anger. Fear. Confusion. Frustration. Envy.
Nothing good. But judging wasn’t the point.
I was still working on that part, the non-judgment, ten years later.
These exercises didn’t always work, but they were better than nothing. The point wasn’t to escape my emotions, but to learn to observe and tolerate them without losing myself to them.
Yeah, I was still working on that too.
The problem was, I knew what was waiting for me in there. Dad was probably pacing the drawing room with Violeta, furious about the defection of yet another son, and even more angry that another piece of his company had just been given away.
And then there was the other problem.
Niall Black was supposed to be CEO of Blackguard Holding, but he hadn’t been cleared to work after his heart surgery three months earlier.
Dad was strong as an ox for a man in his eighties, but he was still an old man.
He wouldn’t be cleared for months to go back to work, if ever, which was why he had announced his plans to name a successor.
I’d stood by as he first named Brendan, the heir presumptive, only to be made a fool of when Brendan traded that for life on a dairy farm. Now it had happened again with Ronan, and someone had to step up.
That left me, Shea, or someone else.
I didn’t think our father would choose my baby sister, but I’d be damned if I let the position go outside the family.
I’d earned this. I’d given everything for this family, even when it seemed I couldn’t measure up.
When school hadn’t worked, I’d given up my twenties to the military to make myself a man my father could respect.
Special Forces and three tours, plus scars and a Purple Heart I kept in a drawer later, I had somehow managed to force myself through college and mold myself into a man who could learn the business.
“It’s my turn,” I muttered through my teeth. “It’s my fucking turn.”
Except… I already knew what they were going to tell me.
That no one wanted a vet with PTSD at the helm of one of the largest companies on the planet.
That I was too much of a wild card, too intense, too crazy to trust. What showed that I could commit?
What showed that I had calmed down enough to do what it took, that I was the reliable sort a bunch of rich old men could trust?
I knew what my brothers had done. Brendan had gotten fake engaged for the same purpose, and then Ronan had decided to keep the wife he married on a bender.
And then they were stupid enough to fall in love.
Well, I wasn’t going to make that mistake.
Love was a weakness. A vulnerability. A way for people to get leverage over you.
I’d seen what love did too many times over.
To soldiers who got Dear John letters in combat zones only to go home and find their sweetheart fucking another man.
So many times that was the difference between a man who could figure out the mess in his head the war left and the ones who got lost in a sea of mental illness and drug addiction.
Love wasn’t permanent. It was a joke. A really fucking dangerous one that ruined almost everyone it touched.
No, I definitely wasn’t making that mistake. And if I had to get married, I’d do it before they told me to do it. And I’d do it with the right person.
I pulled out my phone, scrolling through my contacts until I found the name I was looking for, then hit the call button.
The phone rang three times before she picked up.
“Owen Black.” Jenny Churchill’s voice, warm with just a hint of husk, was pure annoyance. “To what do I owe the displeasure?”
“Ace.” I used her old nickname, the one from high school when she’d been editor of the school paper, and we’d dreamed of a life where she traveled the world covering political intrigue and I served as her bodyguard.
“I told you not to call me that.”
“Well, I don’t listen to you, so I ignored it. See how that works?” Yes. This was good. This was what I wanted. Hatred, pure and simple.
“Still an asshole, I see.” I could hear her moving, like she was pacing her office at The Globe. Or did she work at home since she only wrote for them on contract? “What do you want? I’m on a deadline. Your family’s making the news again.”
I grimaced. God, she knew how to push my buttons, and one of the biggest ones was the gossip about my family. Me in particular, but all of us.
“Stop what you’re writing. I have a proposition that will make it better.”
“Nope. I don't take bribes, if that’s what you're calling about. And for the thousandth time, I do not know Ivy Ink. Not every reporter in this city knows each other—”
“It’s not a bribe. It’s an arrangement. For business.”
Jenny paused. “Okay. Listening.”
“How would you like exclusive access to Blackguard Holdings for the next year? Full transparency. Board meetings. Financial records. Strategic planning sessions. The kind of access that would make your career.”
I happened to know that Jenny had been trying to get on the regular staff at The Globe for years. In fact, she’d been trying to get on regular staff at any paper across the country at a time where most of them were either downsizing or shutting their doors entirely.
Journalism was a sham in the era of AI and private equity, like my company. Everyone knew it. But she was still hanging on.
Finally, she answered, just like I knew she would: “What’s the catch?”
I swallowed. This was the hardest part. “I have two requirements: First, you write fair, accurate stories. Not hit pieces. Not puff pieces. Just real journalism.”
“I always write real journalism, you condescending—”
“Second,” I interrupted, “you marry me.”
Thank you for reading MORALLY BLACK ELOPEMENT! I hope you enjoyed Ronan and Laney’s story.