Chapter 16

Tag

Seventeen fucking messages. Doesn't anyone in this city sleep anymore? I managed to close my eyes for all of four hours before I woke up to the buzz of notifications and found seventeen messages.

It will take me all morning to clear them up.

My coffee is black and strong, exactly how I need it if I'm going to get through the morning. If the McGuires intended on fucking up my mood and pissing me off, they've succeeded.

That's the only win I will give them.

Da didn't fight his way up from nothing to leave us a family legacy just for me to drop the ball…or worse, hand the Quinn territory over to the McGuires of all people.

Never going to happen.

My stomach growls loud enough that if I weren't alone, I would be embarrassed. Doesn't matter. As much as I'd rather be having breakfast with my American wildcat, the day is already filled with dozens of problems that bubbled up after last night's meeting.

As I scroll through the messages, my blood is simmering at a low boil. Every one of these texts is a point of the chaos awaiting me outside the compound.

The pub needs renovations and a fuck-ton of PR to erase the bloodstains from last night.

The kids who died from the McGuire meth have left some very angry and upset parents.

The advance by the McGuires has shaken faith in Quinn territory and will only be put right once we've responded with equal or greater force.

There's a buzz with the factions outside the city, as all eyes are on me to see where this will go.

"Fuck you, Mattie."

How would Da handle it?

Who are we kidding? He wouldn't have to. He brokered the truce, and those relationships are age old. There's no way Mattie McGuire would've advanced on Cormack Quinn.

The drizzle outside picks up speed and begins an all-out downpour. Figures. The foul weather only adds to the growing unrest, casting a gloomy shadow over the entire city.

I take a long drag from my cigarette, letting the smoke curl in the air as I ponder my next move.

"Hey, Tag. You coming to breakfast?"

I look up and find Finn leaning in the door. "Laine is making a plate, and the twins are keeping her company. She asked if you were going to join us."

It's stupid how much her asking about me lightens my mood. It's like I'm fourteen again and Maeve Stewart asked if I was coming to the St. Paddy's Day parade.

Not that she was allowed to talk to me.

Still, I liked that she asked.

"How does she seem this morning?"

Finn frowns. "Uh, fine now, I guess."

I stop with the lip of my mug at my lips. "Explain."

"Well, when I went up, Siobhan was in her room, and they seemed to be politely cat fighting. I didn't hear much, but Laine definitely told her to feck off."

I chuckle. "Did she, now? See, I knew the woman had good taste."

"Better than you."

Fair. "You know the saying. Young, dumb, and full of cum. So, you don't know what they were fighting about?"

"Nope."

"All right. Is that it?"

Finn's frown deepens. "Before we came down, she went into the loo with her bag and when she came out, her skin was blotched and she reminded me of a kettle that's about to blow."

Wonderful. I was truly hoping things might look better in the morning. "All right. What about what I asked you about last night?"

He steps inside and closes the door. "Things seem to line up at first glance. Laine O'Neill arrived from Chicago around seven yesterday morning. She had a certificate to transport the remains of her mother that included the death certificate of Katherine Kelly O'Neill. There was a Kate O'Neill born in Brittas Bay fifty-eight years ago. I've got school and doctor records for her for fourteen years here, and then nothing."

"Laine said her grandparents moved to the states when her mam was a teenager."

"Seems she was telling you the truth."

"She mentioned wanting to connect with an aunt. Did you find her?"

"I focused on Laine. Do you want me to keep digging?"

I'm torn between wanting to know everything about her, wanting to prove Aiden's suspicions wrong, and wanting to respect her privacy.

"Aye, given the current climate, I think that would be best. Also, I get the sense that she's left a man in her rearview mirror. See what you can find out about that, too."

"You got it."

"Thanks, Finn."

He opens the door and swings it wide. "Breakfast, brother. You've got to eat, and if you leave your lady-friend too long in the company of the twins, they'll proposition her with a Quinn sin sandwich."

They better fucking not.

I sigh, staring at my phone. "I suppose the troubles will still be here waiting for me after a plate of steak and eggs."

"Aye, they will."

Sliding my phone into the pocket of my workout pants, I grab my coffee and follow my little brother out of my office and down the hall.

Damn. I've missed seeing my brothers on the daily. My loft is private and quiet and has no ghosts to haunt me, but it also doesn't have my family.

I didn't feel their absence so keenly until now.

The hutch behind the dining room table is filled with covered serving tureens and my stomach lets off another long rumble—this time, in approval.

"Morning, all," I say, setting my mug on the table.

"Morning, T," Brendan says, standing to help himself for a second plate. "How goes the battle?"

I grunt. "It goes."

After mounding my plate with a heaping portion, I settle into Da's place at the head of the table. It feels all wrong and I hate it, but I've been thinking; if I can't even fill Da's shoes in the privacy of our home, how can I convince the outside world that I'm every bit as in control of the Quinn family businesses as he was?

Sipping my steaming cup of coffee, I let the bitterness settle on my tongue. "Good morning, Laine. Did you sleep well?"

She slides a slow glare over to me and dips her chin. "Not especially, no."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable?" She pegs me with such a murderous glare I freeze, my fork hanging mid-way to my mouth.

"You can give me back my mother's urn, the money you stole from me, and let me the fuck out of this elaborate prison for a start."

I blink, my mind stalling out on that. Casting a glance around the table, I see that Bryan, Brendan, and Finn are all wearing equal looks of surprise.

"I told you I called over to Jimmy to search for your mam's urn. He'll find her and I'll get her back for you. As for your money—I don't know what you're talking about. What money?"

Her gaze narrows on me and I know she's searching for the lie. She won't find one.

"Seriously, Laine. I have all the money I could ever want or need. I wouldn't steal from you. We're not like that."

"Right. You just kill men and shove them into vans under the cover of three AM darkness."

"Well, fuck," Bryan says, sitting back in his chair.

Well, fuck is right. Laine had that nightmare right when we finished with the McGuire men last night. Brenny, Bryan, and I came up to go to bed, while Grady and Aiden were heading out to return them to the McGuires.

"If it calms your fears any, those men weren't dead. After a little applied pressure, they told us what we wanted to know, and so we returned them to the south side, back to the McGuires."

"I don't believe you."

I shrug. "Whether or not you believe me, I've never lied to you and have no intention of starting now."

She shakes her head. "Well, I don't believe you. I saw those men get thrown into that van and they weren't moving. And I know you stole my money. You may be stupidly hot as fuck, but you're also controlling, manipulative, and dangerous."

I press my hands flat against the linen tablecloth. "First, thank you for the hot as fuck acknowledgment. Second, you're new to Dublin, so I'll let you in on a fact that everyone around here knows. The Quinns live dangerous lives—I don't deny that—but we also live by a code. The locals call them the Quinn Laws."

She sighs. "And what does any of this have to do with me?"

"When you're hurling libelous comments about me—everything. You are both a woman and an innocent outside the sphere of our world. That makes you precious to me, my brothers, and everyone in our organization. You're off limits."

"First, it's slanderous, not libelous. Libel is defamation in written form, slander is oral. Second, if you didn't take my money, where is it?"

I pull my phone free from my pocket and find Aiden's contact. He picks up on the second ring. "Oi, mate. I'm still not used to this number popping up on my screen."

"I've got a new phone being delivered. I'll be off the burner by this afternoon. Where are you now?"

"Outside doing a security sweep on all the cars."

"Good. I need you in the dining room." I hang up and meet Laine's feisty fury with a smile. "Stop looking at me like I killed your dog. I didn't steal from you. Give me a chance to figure out what's going on."