"Anyway, in the grand scheme of things, you were a blip on his radar and we have massive whales on that goddamn radar on the regular." At least, I really fucking hoped that was the case.
"I shouldn’t be offended by that, should I?"
I snorted. "No. It’s a good thing not to be on our shit list."
"Let’s hope you’re right and that he doesn’t remember my name." She took a deeper sip of Monster. "I can see why you gave me this now. Better that than a bottle of vodka."
I leaned over and pressed my hand to her lap. Squeezing gently, I murmured, "All will be fine."
"You don’t know that."
"I do." I shrugged when she shot me a disbelieving scowl. "Look, you were a problem before, but now you’re helping us get rid of the Sparrows. Wasn’t he lucky I was disobedient?"
She chuckled. "That’s one way of looking at it."
"Mostly, he’s not going to like that I’ve brought you to the house. I doubt he’ll remember your name."
"He won’t like it because of what he thinks it means for you to be bringing someone home to meet the folks?"
I hummed as security finally walked out of the gatehouse, eyed the car up and down, then checked us out with one of Conor’s gadgets. After it was done, I opened the window, and asked, "Jonesy, where’s Da?"
"Don’t know, Aidan, but I know that a van rolled up an hour ago. Maybe he’s with that?"
Smiling, I said, "Good." I rolled up the window, then drove through the gates once Jonesy had opened them.
"You think the Archbishop is going to detract from my presence?"
"He is." There were no two ways about it.
I felt her gaze on me, felt her curiosity and braced myself for what was coming. "It was Conor, wasn’t it?"
I tensed. "What about him?"
She sniffed. "Don’t play games. We both know what I’m asking."
We did.My mouth tightened. "Yes."
Blowing out a breath, she whispered, "Oh."
"Oh."
"What happened?"
"You don’t want to know. Safe to say the priest who hurt him didn’t get the chance to hurt any other kids ever again."
"See, it’s when stuff like this happens that I like this world." She grunted. "I talked about so many shitty situations on TV, had to read out so many atrocious stories where people just didn’t get any justice at all, that I understand the satisfaction of jungle justice.
"Then, I recognize that we can’t have everyone going around killing people in the name of an eye for an eye."
"No, you can’t," I agreed. "But that’s the mobster way. Mafia 101, little one."
"I know," she said with a huff. "I’m just talking out loud, trying to reason why I’m so glad you killed that sick fuck when I really shouldn’t be happy to know you murdered a priest." Despite myself, I had to snicker, and when she slapped her hand against my thigh, she muttered, "Hey, don’t laugh!"
I snatched her fingers and raised them to my mouth as I steered one-handed.
"I’ve done a lot worse besides that, and it won’t stop, but they’re not good people. Anyone in this world isn’t good by proxy."
"Your sisters-in-law are innocent."