Page 95 of Arranged Scars
“No, thanks. I’m good here.”
“Good.” He brushes fingers through my hair. “And when it’s over? You’re staying.”
“I guess I’ll have to start ordering furniture.”
“Why?”
“Because this place seriously needs to be redecorated.”
He laughs and hugs me tight. I grin against his chest, eyelids fluttering. My stomach is warm and full. My core pulses to the beat of his heart.
We’re going to kill my remaining brothers, and after that?
Maybe we’ll renew our vows.
35
FINN
Malachy really is a pathetic mess. He’s practically twitching when I shove a file across the table and he snatches it up greedily.
“That’s the best we could find on short notice.” I lean back and glance up at the light. Smoke swirls around the small room. We’re in the basement of a club my family owns. Malachy’s chain-smoking cigarettes like his life depends on it as he scans the pages, flipping through them with angry grunts.
“What the fuck is this?”
“Financial documents mostly. Dermot’s smart but transactions don’t change, no matter how deep you bury them. If you wanted better, you should’ve given me more than a few days.”
Mal sits back and stares. He looks drained. The poor bastard’s probably been losing his mind this whole time. I should’ve let him stew longer, but Caroline’s getting impatient.
She wants this over with, and I can’t blame her.
“Just explain this shit.” He tosses the pages down. “Plain English.”
“Guns. Lots of guns.”
Mal flinches. “Seriously? Dermot?”
“Stockpiles of guns from arms dealers across Russia and the former Soviet bloc. Good weapons too. Old stuff, hard to trace, but solid.”
“He’s got security. Why does he need guns? Dermot hates guns.”
“Private security is licensed. They’re tracked and watched. That hit he sent them on? That shit probably cost a fortune. But if he hired real shooters, serious killers, they’d need weapons that couldn’t be traced.”
“Guns.” Mal’s shoulders slump. “God, he’s really doing it. I had hoped… but no…”
I don’t say anything. It takes some serious self-control not to rub this in his face. And maybe I should. Maybe it’s suspicious that I’m not enjoying this more. Mal knows I hate him. The man isn’t stupid. He knows what he and his brothers did to me all those years ago.
But he’s so desperate he can’t see past his own impending murder.
Which really is hilarious. He’s totally right about dying soon. It’s just that the bullet isn’t coming from where he thinks it is.
“What the hell are we going to do?” Mal sounds old and tired. But he quickly starts flipping through the pages—all of them fake, cooked up by Liam with help from Seamus—before finally coming back to life. “We need to kill him. Right fucking now.”
“I’m not sure that’s reasonable.”
“You’re Whelan. You have muscle. Get your crew here. Call up a dozen men, good ones, and we’ll storm Dermot’s apartment. I don’t care how many guards he hires or how good his algorithms are. We’ll kill that motherfucker.” He crumples the pages and throws them on the floor with a snarl.
I smirk at him.Good boy.Now roll over.
