Chapter 18
ROSALINA
I cannot stop crying.
It has been three days since Margaret's phone call, and the tears just keep coming—sometimes in great shuddering sobs that leave me gasping for air, sometimes in quiet streams that I do not even notice until Dante or Gabriel or Luca gently wipes my face with their thumbs.
My eyes are perpetually swollen, my throat raw, and there is a hollow ache in my chest that feels like someone has carved out something essential and left me to function around the absence.
Numb. That is the word that keeps circling through my head. I am numb and grieving and crying all at once, which should not be possible but apparently is.
I have tried calling Erin seventeen times.
Seventeen calls to the number she used when she contacted me, and every single one goes straight to voicemail.
I have left messages—increasingly frantic ones—begging her to call me back, to let me know she is okay, to come home for the funeral.
But there is nothing. Just silence on the other end, and the terrible fear that something has happened to her too, that I have lost both of them.
Dante keeps telling me she is probably just out of cell range, that farms in rural Texas do not always have great service, that she will call back as soon as she gets the messages.
But what if she doesn't? What if something happened and I do not know and I cannot reach her and—
I force myself to stop that line of thinking before it spirals completely out of control.
I need to focus on what I can control. Which right now is getting through this meeting with Patrick without losing my mind or my temper. I straighten my shoulders and look around, trying to ground myself in the present moment.
The O'Connor estate looms around me, familiar and wrong in equal measure. Everything is exactly as I remember—the green carpets, the tall windows, the artwork on the walls—but it all feels empty now. Hollow. Like someone has sucked the life out of these rooms and left behind nothing but a shell.
Seamus's office door is closed. I cannot bring myself to look at it.
I keep thinking about the fact that I never said goodbye.
That the last time I saw him was at the wedding, and I was so focused on Erin, on making sure the substitution worked, on getting through the ceremony without being caught, that I didn’t stop to tell him I loved him.
Did not stop to thank him for everything he had done for me.
And now I never can.
The guilt sits in my stomach like a stone. I should have come back to visit after the wedding. I should have called more. I should have made time instead of being so wrapped up in my new life with Dante and Gabriel and Luca that I forgot about the man who made that life possible.
Some daughter I turned out to be.
I am sitting in the hallway outside what used to be Seamus's office, my back against the wall, knees pulled up to my chest, staring at nothing. Dante is beside me—has been beside me for hours now, silent and steady, his presence the only thing keeping me tethered to reality.
We are waiting for Patrick Murphy.
Seamus's right-hand man. His closest friend. The man who, according to Margaret, has somehow been named the new leader of the Irish mafia.
That part does not make sense to me. Seamus had a will. He had plans for succession. Patrick was loyal, yes, but he was not supposed to lead. That role should have gone to—
I do not know. Someone else. Anyone else. The whole thing makes my stomach turn, makes the grief sharpen into something that feels uncomfortably close to suspicion.
But maybe I am just looking for someone to blame. Maybe grief is making me paranoid.
Dante's hand finds mine, fingers threading through mine and squeezing gently. I squeeze back without looking at him, grateful for the contact, for the reminder that I am not alone in this even though it feels like I am drowning.
Footsteps echo down the hallway—purposeful, unhurried—and I look up to see Patrick approaching.
He looks the same as he always has—tall and broad-shouldered with graying red hair and a face full of freckles that make him look younger than his fifty-some years. He is wearing a dark suit, appropriately somber, but there is something in his expression that makes my chest tighten.
He is smiling.
Not a big smile, not inappropriate, but there is a lightness in his eyes that should not be there. This is a man who just lost his best friend, who should be devastated, destroyed, barely holding himself together.
Instead, he looks almost... pleased.
"Rosalina," he says warmly, opening his arms as he approaches. "I am so sorry I am late. There has been so much to handle with the transition."
The transition. Like Seamus's death is just a business inconvenience to be managed.
I stand on shaking legs, Dante rising beside me with fluid grace, and I let Patrick pull me into a hug that smells like expensive cologne and cigars.
"I am so sorry for your loss," Patrick murmurs into my hair, his arms tight around me. "Seamus loved you like his own. You know that, right?"
"I know," I manage, my voice hoarse from crying.
He pulls back, keeping his hands on my shoulders, and looks at me with what I assume is supposed to be sympathy but looks wrong somehow. "All things happen in time, Rosalina. That is what Seamus always said. All things in time."
The phrase sends a chill down my spine, though I cannot articulate why.
Patrick's gaze shifts to Dante, and his expression cools slightly. "Dante Salvatore. Thank you for bringing her home safely."
"Of course," Dante says, his voice carefully neutral. He has been like this since we arrived—polite but distant, watching everyone with the focused intensity of someone expecting an attack.
"I need to speak with Rosalina," Patrick says, turning his attention back to me. "Privately. There are some Irish matters we need to discuss regarding Seamus's affairs."
"Anything you need to say to her, you can say in front of me," Dante says immediately, and there is steel beneath the politeness now.
Patrick's smile tightens fractionally. "I am afraid this is an Irish matter. Family business. Surely you understand the need for privacy in these situations."
"Rosalina is my wife," Dante counters, his hand finding the small of my back. "That makes Irish business my business."
"Actually, it does not." Patrick's voice hardens. "Rosalina may be married to you, but she is still a part of the O'Connor family. Still Irish. And there are some things that need to stay within the family."
The tension in the hallway ratchets up several notches. Dante goes very still beside me, and I can feel the anger radiating off him in waves, can see his jaw tighten as he processes what Patrick just said—essentially, that Dante is not family and never will be.
"Dante," I say quietly, placing my hand on his arm. "It’s okay."
"No, it is not—"
"Please." I look up at him, trying to communicate with my eyes what I cannot say out loud—that I am exhausted, that I do not have the energy for a territorial pissing match, that I just want to get through this conversation so I can go back to the hotel and fall apart in private. "Just wait outside. It will be fine."
Dante looks like he wants to argue, looks like he wants to physically remove Patrick from the premises, but after a long moment he gives a tight nod.
"I will be right outside this door," he says, loud enough for Patrick to hear. "If you need me, you say the word."
"I know." I squeeze his arm.
He presses a kiss to my forehead—brief and fierce—and then steps back, moving to lean against the wall opposite the office door with his arms crossed and murder in his eyes.
Patrick opens the office door—Seamus's office, though it does not feel like his anymore—and gestures for me to enter.
The room hits me like a physical blow.
Everything is exactly as Seamus left it. His desk is still covered with papers. His reading glasses are folded neatly beside his laptop. There is a half-full glass of whiskey on the side table that no one has cleared away, and the sight of it makes my throat close up completely.
He was here. Days ago, he was here, living and breathing and existing in this space.
And now he is gone.
"Sit, please," Patrick says, moving to close the door firmly behind us.
I sink into one of the leather chairs facing the desk, my legs too unsteady to hold me up any longer. Patrick does not sit behind the desk—Seamus's desk—but instead leans against it, looking down at me with an expression I can’t quite read.
"How are you holding up?" he asks.
"How do you think?" The words come out sharper than I intended.
"Fair enough." He tilts his head slightly. "I know this is difficult. Losing Seamus. Being married to an Italian. Trying to navigate two worlds that do not always play well together."
I do not respond, just stare at him, waiting for him to get to the point.
"That is actually what I wanted to talk to you about," Patrick continues, his voice taking on a different quality—harder, more businesslike. "Your position as an Italian wife."
"What about it?"
"It puts you in a unique position, Rosalina. You have access to the Salvatore family now. Their home, their business, their secrets." He pauses. "That could be very valuable."
My stomach drops. "Valuable how?"
"To us. To the Irish." He leans forward slightly. "Seamus may be gone, but the Irish mafia still needs to thrive. And right now, we have an opportunity—a chance to expand our territory, to take what should have been ours all along."
"I don't understand," I say slowly, even though I am starting to understand all too well.
"Brooklyn," Patrick says simply. "The Italians have had Brooklyn for decades. But with the right information, the right timing, we could take it. Push them out. Claim it for ourselves."
The words hang in the air between us, and I feel like I can’t breathe, can’t process what he is saying.
"You want me to spy on them," I say flatly.