Page 17 of Stolen Rival
“Oh, that’s right,” he says, feigning innocence when he’s anything but. “You need a wife, and fast. I can see it now. You standing at the altar, and her screaming obscenities as we haul her up the aisle. I’m sure Father O’Connor won’t smell any kind of a rat while performing the ceremony.”
“Father O’Connor will do as he’s fucking told if he wants to see another Sunday mass. But you’re right, I need her compliant and willing.” My smile comes slowly. “And that’s what leverage is for.”
Darragh frowns. “Leverage? What leverage?”
I sip my coffee, eyeing him over the rim of the mug. “While she was languishing in the hospital, I took the opportunity to put the feelers out, do a little research. I wanted to make sure there wasn’t another one I’d missed. Turns out, I did miss someone else.”
Liam’s eyebrowsflicker up. “Who?”
“The McCarthys have another kid. He’s eighteen. The youngest of the family.”
Darragh tilts his head to the side. “He was in the house?”
“No. He doesn’t live with them.”
“Why not?” Liam queries. “Where does he live?”
“Brannock House?”
He frowns. “Never heard of it.”
“Neither had I. It’s a live-in facility for people with severe brain damage who need round-the-clock care.”
Darragh lets out a low whistle. “They kept that quiet.”
“Yeah. My guess is they didn’t want their enemies discovering they had a special needs child in case they used it against them. You know what this world is like. Can’t show weakness. According to my sources, he’s lived there since he was two days old. Mother died in childbirth, apparently, although the official story is that she had a heart condition that killed her.”
“But I don’t get it.” Liam scratches his neck. “If they kept him hidden all this time, how come it took, what, a phone call for you to unearth his existence?”
“Because, brother, when an entire family is wiped out, save for a couple of distant second cousins who fell out with the McCarthys years ago, people’s tongues loosen. They want to kneel before the new king. Me.”
“What are you gonna do?” Darragh wonders.
“About the kid? Nothing yet. But use him to bring the spitfire to heel? You’d better believe it. And if she doesn’t play ball, she can watch while her only remaining sibling takes his last breath.”
“You’d kill a special needs kid?” Darragh’s always been the softest out of the three of us.
“He’s not a kid. He’s eighteen. And yeah, if the troublemakerupstairs keeps kicking up shit, I will happily put a gun to his head and pull the trigger.”
It’s not a bluff. She fucks this deal up for me, and I will take my revenge. I would wager she thinks he’s safe, but safety is an illusion created by people who think that good still exists in this world.
After Sorcha McCarthy witnessed her entire family being gunned down, I’m pretty sure she no longer believes there’s good in the world, and I’m only too happy to prove that to her.
“So, what happens now?” Darragh asks. “What’s your plan?”
“Tomorrow, I’ll sit our guest down and tell her she has a choice to make. Be obedient and silent, and agree to marry me, or watch as her brother’s brains paint the walls of Brannock House. From what I’ve seen, it could do with a paint job.”
Liam snorts. “You’re a fucking animal.”
“Yeah, I am. As firecracker Miss Sorcha McCarthy is about to find out.”
Chapter 10
SORCHA
I didn’t thinkmy third chance at escaping this sick motherfucker Mahoney would come quite so soon. But as I sit cross-legged on my bed, my damp hair making my clean clothes wet, a buzz of excitement zips through my body. Turns out, he’s handing freedom to me on a silver platter, and who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth?
Especially when that horse killed my whole fucking family. If I could, I’d murder him,andhis smug arsehole brothers in their sleep, drink a glass of whatever they have in their bar downstairs, and leave in a blaze of bloody glory.
