Page 32 of Sins and Salvation

"Family's complicated." I try for a smile, but it falls flat. "She wants control of the Donovan business. If I am on her side, it's two against Cormac."

"You have other siblings, why don't they side with the mental patient?"

"It's the safest option."

Maeve stands, pacing the room. "Nothing about this is safe, Declan. Nothing."

"I need you to trust me."

"Trust you?" She whirls on me. "You vanish for seven years, show up with violence following you like a shadow, and now you want me to hide away and hope for the best while you face your insane sister alone?" She saw glimpses of how unstable Siobhan was back then, I can only imagine her delusions of grandeur have gotten worse with time.

"I'm trying to protect you!"

"By getting yourself killed?"

"I'm not planning to die, Maeve."

"No one ever plans to." She wraps her arms around herself. "But Donovan’s have a way of ending up dead anyway."

I pull her into my arms, relieved when she doesn't resist. "I survived seven years in fighting cages across Europe. I can handle my baby sister."

"And then what? Say you win, you kill her, end the threat. What comes next?" I don’t plan to kill my sister, I will not stoop to the lowest point this family knows.

I rest my forehead against hers. "Us. If you'll have me."

She pulls back to look at me. "Us? You mean the happy family? You, me, and Conor playing house while you what—go back to cage fighting? Join Cormac in the family business? Have you lost your fucking mind?"

"I don't know yet. But I want to be with you. Both of you."

"What if I don't want you, this, all the violence and death, and fucking crazy sisters? What if I want you - but none of that?"

"I know I will never escape my family." I sigh.

"Pack our bags. We'll go to Kerry." She agrees.

Relief washes through me. "Thank you."

"Don't thank me yet. This isn't forgiveness, Declan. It's survival."

As I turn to go upstairs, she catches my arm. "If you die doing this, I'll never forgive you."

I kiss her hard. "Then I better not die."

* * *

I standin the doorway of Conor's room, watching him sleep. In a few hours, he'll wake in another strange bed, in another safe house, without me there.

Will he understand? Will he hate me for disappearing from his life a second time? Will I get the chance to explain?

Maeve appears beside me. "He's out cold. All that Nintendo with Finn exhausted him."

"He's amazing, Maeve. You did that. You raised him right."

"I did what I had to do. Don’t you fuck it all up now." She leans against the doorframe. "He's starting to like you, you know."

"Yeah?"

"He asked if you were going to live with us forever."

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