Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
Ashland
Normally, I like my cousin's house. The McCarthy family mansion sits, formidable and majestic, behind wrought iron gates in Ballyhock, just outside of Dublin. And goddamn, I miss my brother Lorcan. We were always tight, but even more so now that Donovan’s gone. And I hate keeping anything from him.
But today, all I can think about is Bianca, alone and probably frightened.
Definitely trying to escape.
Lorcan grins and hugs me when I arrive, then leans in and slaps my back hard. I hug him back. We were never much for hugging before Donovan’s death. The loss of an anchor in your life changes things.
“Missed you, brother,” he says before we head to the office .
The conference room at Seamus's reeks of old leather and even older money.
I sit in my chair, arms crossed, while Seamus holds court at the head of the table, like the king he is.
My da sits to his right, his hair silvery blond in the overhead light, and Lorcan flanks me on the other side.
His eyes flick to the empty chair to my left, where my brother Donovan once sat.
I check my phone under the table so Seamus doesn't lose his shite. The cabin security feed loads, slow as molasses.
Kitchen, empty. Living room, empty. Bedroom, empty.
Fuck .
I look up to see Seamus watching me with sharp eyes. My cousin is loyal to his core and a good man to me, but they don't call him The Undertaker for nothing.
“You with us, lad?”
I slide the phone into my pocket, but my hand stays there, my thumb hovering over the screen. “Just distracted.”
Seamus leans back, his fingers steepled. “Distracted by what, exactly?”
I shrug and let him wonder. Cavin snorts across the table, and I shoot him a look that shuts him up quick. My younger cousin's happy he's not the arsehole under his brother's scrutiny for once.
When I don't answer, Seamus takes another tactic. “When's your next fight, lad?”
I shrug. “ Fortnight.”
His jaw tightens as he nods. He doesn't like us fighting in the underground ring, but he's given up on trying to stop us fully.
And I fucking love the ring. Miss it as of late.
My younger cousin Kyla is watching me too, curiosity in her bright, keen eyes. Bronwyn's pretending not to notice anything, but her stillness gives her away. They're both too fucking observant for their own good.
“Let's get on with it,” Da says, his voice carrying that rough quality that comes from years of whiskey and orders. My mother has softened him, but he was a right hard man once.
His hearing's gone in recent years, and it's a bloody shame.
Seamus nods to some corporate suit I don't know and don't care to, who starts droning on about trusts and distributions.
We're here because Donovan had one last trust that still needs to be distributed—one he'd have gotten if he hadn't turned traitor, if we hadn't put a bullet in his skull to punish him for his deception.
I swallow hard when a lump rises unbidden in my throat.
My oldest brother was close to me, almost as close as my Uncle Tiernan.
Almost. But he turned coat. Gave in to the Boston Irish, took a bribe, and paid the ultimate price.
They’re still at large, the bastards, and we know it’s only a matter of time before they rear their fucking heads again .
But fuck, I miss him, traitor and all. Donovan would've given me advice on how to take Crowning down and how to do it without causing devastation to the McCarthy family.
I stop listening when the lawyer drones on.
My phone buzzes with a motion alert.
I pull it out and angle it so nobody can see.
I breathe again.
She's in the kitchen, moving around, opening cabinets, looking for something to use to get out, probably. Smart lass.
Crowning will pay for ever making her think she's anything but perfect, the fucking prick. I'll shove his goddamn toast down his fuckin' throat and beat him bloody with a crusty baguette.
Bastard .
My chest tightens as I watch her. Even with the picture pixelated and grainy, she's gorgeous. Her dark hair falls over her shoulders against her pale skin, and the way she moves—careful and deliberate. Scared, yes, but not panicking.
“Split between the remaining sons,” the lawyer is saying. “Ashland and Lorcan McCarthy, in equal shares.”
I should feel something about it, but… money's just money. All I can think about is whether I reinforced the window locks enough. If she breaks the glass? —
Fuck .
“It's a lot of fucking zeros,” my younger brother mutters beside me.
“Aye,” I say. “I'd rather have my brother here.”
“Same.”
My da makes a sound like a half sob. His eyes are wet. “God. My fucking boy,” he whispers.
The room goes quiet. Even Seamus has the decency to look away. Donovan's betrayal cut deep for all of us, but for Da, it destroyed something fundamental in him. A father's not supposed to outlive his son, and no one wants to bury a son as a traitor.
I know I should say something. Comfort him, maybe, but my throat's tight. My phone buzzes again, and I'm grateful for the distraction. All I can think about is Bianca.
If she escapes, she'll run straight back to fucking Crowning. My jaw clenches. She doesn't know what he is, what he's done.
She thinks I'm the fucking monster.
Maybe I am, but I'm the monster keeping her alive.
“Ashland,” Seamus says again. His voice is harder now. His ruddy cheeks are a little darker than normal, his blue eyes narrowed. “You need to be somewhere, lad?”
“No,” I say, staring at him without flinching.
“Then put the fucking phone away and pay attention.”
Kyla shifts in her seat and sits up straighter. Lorcan's downright grinning now, enjoying the tension. Bronwyn's eyes dart to me sympathetically.
I let out a long breath, then check the feed one last time, risking my fucking neck with Seamus.
There she is again. Trying the door. Testing the locks.
Everything in me says go. Leave. Get back to her.
Now.
“Sign whatever needs signing,” I tell the lawyer. “Transfer it. I don't fucking care.”
“There are tax implications?—”
“I don't care.”
My da's rubbing at his eyes. “I don't want to talk about this anymore either, Seamus. Finish it,” he says. “Please. Sign the papers. I want to get back to my wife.”
He looks at me then, and Lorcan lays a comforting hand on his shoulder.
Why do I feel tears prick my eyes? Donovan was a good man before he turned traitor.
He taught me how to ride a bike when I was four, running beside me with his hand on the seat until I found my balance.
Taught me how to speak to a woman— respect her, Ash, always respect her —even though he was shite at taking his own advice.
Taught me how to throw a punch, how to take one, and how to get back up when the world knocked me down.
Losing a brother is a devastating sort of blow. It's like losing a limb you didn't know you needed until it was gone. It's phantom pain that never stops, an ache in your chest that won't heal, no matter how much time passes.
Because no one really knows the fabric of who you are better than the one who grew up beside you. Donovan knew every scar, every secret, every stupid thing I'd ever done. He knew me before the ink, before the fights, before I became the weapon the family needed.
He knew me when I was just… me.
But he's gone.
And I'm still here, carrying all the parts of myself only he understood.
“Right,” Seamus says. “Let's finish up, then.”
Still, his eyes linger on mine. Seamus didn't get to his place as The Undertaker and head of the McCarthy family by being easily duped.
He stands and dismisses us.
I take a casual look at the bank draft in my hand. It's a lot of fucking money, and I hate it. I hate that my brother died for me to have this money.
But I'll put it to good use .
Seamus walks over to me, his hands shoved in his pockets. “What's got you so distracted, Ash?”
Everything. Nothing. Her.
“Got things to handle,” I say in a way that doesn't invite questions—before I come up with a lie that won’t hold up under his scrutiny.
My phone vibrates.
Connection lost.
Fuck.
She found the fucking router and broke it.
“I need to go,” I say quietly.
“Ashland—” Da turns to me.
When I look at him, he's watching me with red-rimmed eyes. “Whatever's got you running, son, don't end up like Donovan. We stay loyal. We don't hide things from the McCarthy family, aye?”
The words hit me like a fist to the gut. If he knew I've got the daughter of a traitor locked in a cabin in the woods… If Crowning found out I took her…
The McCarthys won't just lose me. They'll lose everything.
But I can't just hand her over to a man who'll kill her the same way he killed the others.
I fucking won't .
“You don't have anything to worry about,” I tell Da. But I'm swallowing a lie.
Seamus puts his hand on my shoulder. “Go,” he says. “But I want the truth, Ashland. I don't want another problem.”
My truck's parked out in the front, right outside the gate. I'm in it before anyone else leaves. The city blurs past. It's a rainy, gray day, nothing like the quiet of the woods where I've got her hidden.
Where I had her hidden.
The cabin's forty minutes out. I make it in twenty-five.
The router's smashed on the kitchen floor. She's not in any of the rooms—not in the bathroom… not in the bedroom.
Fuck .
Where is she?
I look frantically, tearing through the whole fucking cabin until I find the back window, the one I was fucking sure was safe. Apparently, the metal panel inserts came out.
Fuck it.
I'm out the door and into the woods in seconds. She can't have gone far, not on foot, not in this terrain. Not without knowing where she is.
But she's clever. Desperate. Scared of me.
I start running.