Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 92734 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 464(@200wpm)___ 371(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92734 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 464(@200wpm)___ 371(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
Until Devlin died.
It seemed like so much of their lives centered on that one tragedy. Things had been a certain way. Before Victor Halloran lost his mind and declared war. Before things escalated to the point of no return. Before a bullet from a Halloran man snuffed out the life of the best and brightest of their family. Now life was divided into Before Devlin and After Devlin. She rubbed a hand over her chest, wondering how much time it would take to dull the edge of pain that thinking about him brought.
As Cillian moved closer, the toll the last few months had taken on him was written all over his face. Even in the shadows, his eyes were haunted. He glanced at the intimidating front door to the town house, the trees lining the street making the darkness feel more absolute despite the lights peppered between them. “I wasn’t ready to go in.”
To face their reality.
Was there anyone in their family who didn’t want to run as far and fast as they could to get away from the hell they lived in? Carrigan didn’t think so. Six months ago, she would have put Cillian on that short list. Maybe even Devlin, too. Now? Now Devlin was gone and everything was different.
Devlin was the one who had still maintained an aura of innocence despite everything. The one who might have escaped the net their father was so intent on tangling them in. The net called family. She almost laughed. Who was she kidding? No one escaped. Not Devlin. Not Cillian. Sure as hell not her.
And what would you do if you did escape?
There was no point in thinking about it. This was her reality, and she had to make the best of it that she could. Carrigan looped her arm through his. “I’m not ready, either. Want to go for a walk?”
He glanced down the street. The same direction he’d been coming from—the direction of the pub where her brothers had all been walking back from the night everything went to hell. “It’s not safe.”
She could argue that it was as safe as it ever was, that they were supposed to be back to peacetime relations with the Hallorans, and that Teague marrying the heir to the Sheridans had made sure that they’d be fine on that end as well. But the memory of James waiting for her in that club was still too fresh. It wasn’t safe. It might never be safe again. “The Commons?” It was cold enough that she was already starting to shiver, the faint wind cutting through the thin fabric of her dress.
He hesitated, and she thought he might refuse. “You still have that Taser that Aiden gave you?”
“I don’t leave the house without it anymore.” It wouldn’t have made a difference that night when James threw her in the trunk because she hadn’t had her purse, but she didn’t go anywhere without it now. What had started as almost a joke was now a reassurance that she had a way to defend herself.
“Good.” Cillian shrugged out of his coat and draped it over her shoulders. “You know, it is December. There’s even snow on the ground.”
“I didn’t want to have to check a coat.” She clutched the fabric more firmly around her. He was hardly underdressed in a three-piece suit, but it wouldn’t be long before he started to feel the cold.
They made their way down the block, her heels clicking in the darkness. With the snow covering the grass and decorating the trees, it looked like something out of a fairy tale. Like if she just walked a little farther, she might find a stray streetlamp that would signify she’d stepped into a different world.
Except that kind of thing only happened in storybooks.
She slipped her arm through her brother’s. There was so much to say, and nothing at all. What could she say that would make anything okay? It wasn’t okay.
“I thought you were at Our Lady of Victories.”
It wasn’t really a question, but she answered anyway. “Sometimes I need a break.” A break that no church could give her, despite what her father believed. She’d tried when she was still in high school. They attended every single Sunday morning Mass, and she’d thought that maybe the salvation she was looking for could be found inside those four walls. So she’d spent hours on end there, praying with every ounce of will her sixteen-year-old heart could muster up. Praying for someone to save her.
Silence had been her only reply.
So she’d gone looking for salvation in other places.
In all the years since, the closest she’d come to salvation was what she felt that night in James’s arms.
CHAPTER TWO
James cruised through Boston, letting his mind wander even as his route did. Finally, a few hours before dawn, he had to admit that he was stalling. It was time to go back to the house. At some point in the past, it might have actually been a sanctuary, but it’d been a long time since he thought of the house where his old man had reigned like that. In reality it was more like a prison… but less cheery. With a curse, he turned on the next street and started for Southie.