Chapter 53

I hold onto Enya as her breaths slowly wheeze out of her, then…nothing. Her body goes limp in my arms while I repeat the promise I made to her over and over again until it’s the only thing I know, the only thing I can hear.

“Don’t be sad, Little Doll,” Ronan says as he pulls me off of the ground, away from the person I loved the most in this world. The one I lived for, sacrificed for, some days she was the one I breathed for.

I stare at the floor as the tiles become consumed with red, chasing away every happy thought or memory I had of my sister and replacing it all with gore, death, and pain.

My heart begins to beat faster and faster as I try to gain control of my emotions. Shooting Ronan right here will only end in me dying alongside my sister and a new, worse regime will take place. My father will walk away, and my mother will have no one left to defend her.

“Now you can be mine with nothing between us.” I don’t understand what he’s trying to say, but the first part registers enough.

“I will never be yours,” I whisper so that only he can hear. My father is yelling, trying to weasel his way into turning back time so that my sister would still be alive.

But there is nothing he can do here. There is nothing any of us can do. “I will be the death of you, Ronan O’Brian. One day it will be your body lying at my feet.”

There’s no menace behind my words, they’re said as if I were simply looking into the future and reading him his fate.

“Challenge accepted, Little Doll. We will see who breaks first.”

Ronan raises the trigger to the bomb that my son is sitting on. When he presses his finger down, my world fades away for a brief moment. Our eyes lock, and I remember the challenge he took.

Ronan said he wanted to go up against the first female Irish Reaper. The woman who had to fight her way to the top while everyone around her threw new challenges and insults.

Boris’ words come back to me as Ronan and I face off.

You’re the woman born of crimson flames, and when you open your eyes, you are going to fight to burn down everyone who ever took something from you.

The sound of tape ripping has me blinking my tunnel vision away, coming back to the room around me just as Kai stands up from the bomb he was sitting on, tearing the final piece of tape from his mouth.

“You should really learn to tie better knots.” Kai casually tosses the homemade bomb into the air before catching it, making my mother-heart panic just a bit. “And maybe learn to build better explosives. This one is amateur at best.”

“That’s my boy,” Cillian says, clapping him on the back.

“Proud of you, Son,” Boris says as he pulls him in for a hug.

The pain I have felt over the last five hours without my son in my arms finally eases.

“I was never meant to be yours, Ronan,” I say, stepping closer to him, keeping a barrier between the man who has caused me and my chosen family so much heartache.

“You accepted my challenge that day you killed my sister, right here in this room.”

I point to the floor where her body laid just four years ago. “But you don’t know the promise I made to her.”

I watch as realization begins to set in, his eyes filling with fear. He presses the emergency button on his desk that is supposed to alert his team of distress while reaching for his gun tucked under the drawer. Thankfully, I hear Lev over the comms in an instant.

“You can let him know I disabled that, and also, all of his men are dead. Lyra just called to tell me they got the last one about four miles out.”

My gun fires, and Ronan yells as his hand snaps to his body before he can grab his weapon, a bullet hole shot right through it. “Fecking hell!”

I smile, staring down the man who thought he would one day control me, the one who thought he could break me and remake me in his image.

“No one is coming for you because I won.”

Ronan slumps in his chair, finally beneath me where he knows he belongs. “I swore to Enya I would burn it all down.”

Gesturing outside his widow, he turns his chair to see his empire up in flames.

“All of your men are dead. I have taken everything from you.”

“Who are you?” he asks, finally seeing me for the first time. It’s like a light bulb went off in his head now that he is stripped of everything he has ever worked for, his empire now turned to ash.

“I am the woman you had no right to ever try to own.” I take a step back, standing with my family as I raise the crimson gun I gifted to my son. “I am Nessa Kelly-Mikhaus, and I am your death.”

I pull the trigger, twice, a move my son seems to be fond of, and watch as crimson begins to drip from the chair. Flames overtake the back of the house, leaving us only minutes to walk out the front door.

“Double tap,” I say with a wink. Kai and Cillian both fist bump me while a broad smile paints Boris’ face.

“What should I do with this?” Kai asks, holding up the bomb.

“Burn it down,” I say.

Kai tosses the device into Ronan’s lap as we rush to the front door. Everything behind us is engulfed in fire and smoke as we step out to meet our family.

“You did it, Little Fox,” Boris says, kissing me on the head.

“No.” I look at him and take his hand while Cillian wraps an arm around my back, and Kai takes my other hand. “ We did it. Together.”

“Together,” we all say in unison.