When I made it inside, I headed to my favorite part—themonastery. AKA, The Cuxa Cloisters. It framed a courtyard that was too miserable to sit in thanks to the weather, but that suited my mood to perfection.
I didn’t take any notice of the ancient stone arches that a stoic bell tower loomed over, I barely noticed any of it as I leaned against one of those arches and tried not to fucking cry.
Working with Da meant being his fists. So far it was a miracle I’d avoided wet work, but it seemed like my time had come.
Before the year was out, I knew I’d have my first kill under my belt—
“Declan?”
The soft voice, the whisper of my name, broke into my thoughts.
Before I could get angry at having my space invaded, my private place that was free from the Irish Mob’s taint because no Westie would be caught dead here, I saw her.
She was like an angel.
A dark-haired one.
Her face was petite, rounded at the chin with the tiniest little indent in the middle, and her cheeks were rosy with the cold. Her eyes were bright with expectation, and her smile was hesitant as she looked at me like she expected me not to know her.
But I did.
I knew her.
I’d seen her with Deirdre, which should have marked her for death, but how could any lover of art mark a woman like this for death?
She was beautiful. She was gothic. She was a muse in the flesh.
Titian would have switched from redheads to brunettes for her.
Aela O’Neill.
Walking salvation and the promise of hell.
I should ignore her, should send her packing, but instead, I rumbled, “Hello, Aela,” and took my first steps, without even a blink, into the abyss.
* * *
DECLAN
NOW
“You have a son.”
My mother’s voice was calm. Relatively speaking, anyway. Lena was one of those women who either looked like she was a duck—all serene on the surface, but below it, her flippers were paddling like mad—or she was just so crazy that she didn’t get flustered by much.
Having known her for as long as I’d been alive, I figured it was a mixture of both.
To put up with my father, you had to be a little nuts. Let’s make that a lot. Aidan O’Donnelly Sr. had a rep the size of New York state, and for a reason… he was insane.
Categorically, undeniably.
He saw the world in a different way too, and God help me, after having been around him my whole life, I knew I had his slant on things as well. All in all, that didn’t bode well for me as a parent, did it?
Two nutcases for folks… didn’t exactly put me in the major leagues for potential parenting skills.
I mean, I knew Ma and Da would kill for us. But that was part of the problem.
Most parents usually only said that, they didn’t think they’d have to act on it. In the life, murder was as much a part of it as having eggs for breakfast.