Page 441 of Rage

Nodding, I plant my feet shoulder-width apart, bracing myself as if readying for battle. My leather jacket is a bit too big for my slender body, my combat boots too scuffed to belong to a mafia princess. But I don’t rely on my father to buy me things. I never do.

My shoulders tense as he stands. Ferguson O’Brien dwarfs me easily.

“You are to be betrothed.”

The wind rushes from my lips silently. My body locks, fight or flight mode activating as adrenaline surges through my veins.

“Betrothed?” I could not have heard him right.

Sloane was to be married. Collins was to be a doctor. Briar was to be a soldier.

I’m supposed to be Queen.

“Yes.” My father claps Michael on his shoulder in a show of some familiarity. They’re the same age, having come to America from Ireland decades ago.

Michael chews on the butt of his cigar and his blue eyes turn malicious.

Something is niggling at me, in the back of my head, a nail poking a festering wound. I need to pay attention here. But my focus is entirely on my father. On the indescribable feeling ofwrong.

Swallowing, my hands fist at my sides.Breathe.“And what of my birthright?” The words sound hollow.

Ferguson snorts. “Birthright?” He shakes his head, temples barely grey. “Your birthright is what I tell you it is.”

“I’m your oldest. Yourheir,” I stress the word.Heir.Birthright. This clan ismine.

If not, why was I on the streets, selling drugs? Why did I know what it was like to take a life, hands warm from freshly spilled blood? What was the point of it all if he’s just going to sell me to the highest bidder?

“You are my heir,” he says slowly. “But you will never lead this clan, Maeve. There is no way a woman could be what this clan needs at its head.”

I rear back as if struck. He thinks, because of what was between my legs, that I can’t rule effectively. That I can’t be the person who strikes fear into the men of this clan, that I cannot wield my power like an untouchableman.

How very fucking wrong he is.

“Instead, the clan will continue in our name, through you.” He gestures to my body, still developing into girlhood. I haven’teven started my period yet, and he’s already discussing the use of my uterus to this family.

“You’re going to give the clan to an outsider.” Someone who is not an O’Brien.

My father spent decades building this clan into the powerhouse it was now. We have two rivals in Boston who we fight on the regular for territory. We went from nothing tosomethingand he just wants to give it away.

He claps Michael again. “Not an outsider. To someone in the family.”

My green eyes land on Michael and everything goes eerily still.

Him. My father is giving me tohim.

Michael, who my little sisters call Uncle Mike. The man who my father goes to strip clubs with and who pays prostitutes to lower themselves to their knees for him. The man has a beer belly and usually wears a stained white shirt and dirty jeans. He’s balding with yellow teeth and gives me the absolute worst creeps.

He’s to be my husband.

I feel sick.

“No.” I shake my head. “No.”

Ferguson grabs my upper arm, hauling me close. At his nearness, I can see the flecks of gold in his brown eyes—the same ones I have—and I can feel his power in his hands. One flick of his wrist and he can break my thin arm without a second thought.

“Yes,” he hisses. “You will marry Michael. You will be a good,obedientwife to him and produce heirs to our clan. And you will do it all with a fucking smile on your face. That is my decree. Or,” he breaks off, tossing me back. My feet stumble over the stationary chair I had refused to sit in. “You could leave, Maeve.Walk away. But I will say that if you do, someone will still be Michael’s wife.”

“Someone?” I lick my dry lips, glancing from his second to him. “Who?”

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