I lie flat on my back and press weights, pushing myself to the max while my muscles strain, and sweat pours off my body. It feels fucking good to face this challenge, to welcome the pain in my muscles. I was a right gangly teen, but one could say I’ve come into my own.
I drop the weights and breathe between sets, when the door to the workout room opens and Keenan enters.
“Mornin’, Tiernan,” he says, shutting the door behind him.
I nod. “Keenan.”
At nearly forty years old, Keenan has the face of a much older man, the strain of his role reflected in the gray at his temples and beard. But still, he keeps himself in tip-top shape. While other mob leaders let their money and prestige sometimes get to them, Keenan fancies himself just one of us.
I grab the bar and continue to lift.
“You hear from Lachlan lately?” Keenan asks, heading to a treadmill.
I shake my head. “Not in a day or so. Everything alright?” My voice is strained with the effort of talking while I lift.
“Oh, aye,” he says. “But he had a follow-up with Calum in Boston, and I figured if he found anything out you’d be the first to know.”
I shake my head. It’s been three years since Lachlan and I were together in Boston, but it already feels like a fucking lifetime ago.
A shadow crosses Keenan’s features, but he doesn’t say anything.
“You sure everything’s okay?”
He nods, picking up his pace on the treadmill.
“Aye. I did find something interesting out, though.”
“Did you?”
He nods. “You remember Fiona’s friend Aisling?”
“Aye. How could I forget the little brat?”
Billows of blonde curls, a ready laugh, and bewitching eyes capable of conjuring up trouble in her sleep. I remember my sister’s best mate well.
The memory comes quickly, unbidden. It’s a warm day in Ballyhock and I’m only seventeen years old.“Tiernan! You can’t catch me!”
She squeals with laughter and Fiona’s on her heels, both of them laughing their damn heads off like stealing my t-shirt’s the funniest thing they’ve ever seen. They’re barely out of primary school, but fancy themselves all grown up now, what with boys and cars and mobile phones. But they’re still silly little girls, and they get under my fucking skin.
“You give that back.” I follow them, not chasing them like they’ll have me do, but stalking after them. They’re quick, but they don’t know the cliffs of Ballyhock like I do.
I’m home for the weekend, since I normally board at St. Albert’s. Keenan wanted to see me, and to check on my progress at school. So Nolan picked me up last night. I woke up early this morning and trained hard. I want to be a man of the Clan like the men I admire, and they push their bodies to peak physical shape routinely.
I woke up at the crack of dawn, went running with Nolan, lifted with Lachlan, then ate breakfast with them. After an intense meeting going over international travel and guns trade, I came out to the Cliffs for a walk. But the sun beat down mercilessly, a rare warm day in Ballyhock. I stripped off my shirt and put it under my head as a pillow, and drifted off to sleep.
I woke to the sounds of giggles.
Motherfucker.
I don’t like being woken from a nap, and I don’t like being taunted by Fiona’s bratty friend.
“Give that back!” I yell.
“Or what?” she taunts. She looks to Fiona, and covers her hand with her mouth to hide a giggle. “He looks like the giant from Jack’s beanstalk, doesn’t he? All growly and angry and furious. Pounding his chest, because he wants the golden goose.”
“I’ll give you a fucking golden goose,” I grate out, which only makes them giggle louder. She holds my shirt over the edge of the cliff.
“Come and get it then.”
“What are you, twelve?” I ask, rolling my eyes.
That gets her attention.
“Fourteen, you twat,” she says, her eyes flashing at me. She balls up my t-shirt, and Fiona gasps.
“Ais, don’t!”
Too late. She’s whipped the t-shirt far out into the Irish sea. We watch as if in slow motion as it flutters to the water like a flag, quickly saturates, then sinks below the blue-green waves.
She looks to me, wide-eyed, the anger quickly gone. “I’m… sorry?” she says, before she turns and they both take off at a run.
I give them chase. I want to throttle the little brat for losing my t-shirt. Nolan got me that on his last trip to Spain. No one ever gets anything for me. It actually meant something to me. I’m bigger and faster than they are. They squeal, and finally Aisling trips and goes sprawling. Fiona screams, as I catch them.
I grab Aisling right up off the ground. Her palms are scraped and bleeding, and my desire to shake the living daylights out of her quickly vanishes. Her eyes are damp with tears.