Pride wasn’t something I often felt, because it was the lesser of the seven deadly sins in my opinion and seeing as I had a hold of most of the worst ones, I figured pride was something I could do without.
At that moment, pride began to swell inside me.
Like father, like son.
Nostrils flared, jaw clenched, I sought out my son’s eyes, and I rasped, "Did you do me proud?"
"It was nothing to be proud of."
Some semblance of peace settled inside me. Junior wasn’t as bad as me, and I hoped he never would be either, but when he saw red, it was the same shade that always plagued me.
That meant the bastard had suffered.
As much as a teenaged Junior was able to make a man like that suffer. Which, now I thought about it, wasn't much. Wasn’t enough.
My eyes grew wet, and unashamed of the emotion flooding me, I let the tears gather.
"How did you make him pay?" I needed to know, more than I needed Lena to take her next breath.
"He was a bloody pulp by the time Uncle Paddy got there and helped us clean it up."
I tensed. "Padraig knew?"
"He did."
Had this been his first kill?
I remembered sending him to the optometrist because the boy couldn't shoot in a straight fucking line, then there'd been that phase where he and Paddy had gone to the boxing club every couple of days—both him and Finn now that I thought about it.
This must be the reason why. Paddy had taken them away to help them.
My poor boys.
This had made them men.
And they’d gone to Paddy, not me.
Fuck.
I knew I was a monster. The Five Points needed that. They didn’t need some pansy-assed wimp sitting on the throne, but a man who knew how to lead through fear. Who had the whole city at his feet, who made them scared of what the O’Donnellys would and could do next.
I’d done that.
I’d been all that.
I’d even treated my sons like they were toy soldiers and I was their general.
I’d forged them in fire, strengthening them until they were ready to take over in my stead, but they’d gone to my brother when they should have come to me.
That had the stuffing in my joints disappearing as I dropped to my knees, sagging over, panting as I rested my hands on the floor.
It was only then I saw the blood on my fists, the wrecked skin, the busted knuckles—but I felt no pain. I rarely did. Blood spattered against the wooden slats beneath me, the garnet red drops dark as night against the mahogany floor.
Junior muttered, "Conor made him swear that he wouldn’t tell you. You know Uncle Paddy took being a godfather seriously."
"Why didn’t you tell me? I could have made him pay. Made him suffer. Made him fucking hurt."
"Because Conor made us promise not to. He didn’t want you to know," Junior whispered rawly.
The shame that triggered in me almost made me twist around so I could slam my head into the wall a few more dozen times.
"Why not?" I cried, unaware that tears mingled with blood as they coursed in rivets down my cheeks. "He had to know I’d burn the church down for him."
How the fuck was I supposed to confess there now?
How the fuck was I supposed to get to my knees, admit to my sins and atone for them, in the place where my boy had to get to his knees? Had to—
Dear God.
How many times had Conor confessed in that booth?
How many times had I made him go to the place where he’d been abused? Made him confess for his sins, atone? Seek penitence in a church that must have been his personal hell?
"I don’t know why. I wanted to—" He heaved a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. "You know what Kid’s like. He moves in his own way."
"I’d have made him pay," I raged. "He had to know I’d kill for him. For all of you."
Anything for them.
My boys.
My fucking boys.
Didn’t they know the only warmth this broken soul of mine ever felt was when I was with them and Lena? Didn’t they know that my family was the only light in the darkness? The only thing that kept that fucking pit of blackness that threatened to swallow me whole every day at bay?
"I’d have made that bastard pay. He has to know that. How couldn’t he know that?" I sobbed out.
"The only way to find out is to ask him yourself," Junior whispered.
Finn cleared his throat. "Why’d you break that promise now, Aidan? Neither of us have even spoken about it together, never mind telling someone else."
Junior skewered Finn with a look. "I found out today that the Archbishop of New York is a Sparrow."
"Monsignor Masters is a Sparrow?" I repeated dazedly, needing to know for sure.
I clung to the statement like the saving grace it was.
McKenna was dead. I couldn’t kill him again.
The Archbishop still breathed and he was one of those secret society sons of bitches. That put a nice, big fat target on his forehead. At least, it did as far as I was concerned.
Junior nodded slowly. "He is."
"How do you know?"
"It’s been a busy couple of days," my eldest said with a grunt.
"Start at the beginning," I snapped. "Just tell me what you know."
"You heard of Valentini?"
"That Sicilian who slices up one side of a fucker’s face?"
"That’s him. He’s making a power grab for the head of the Famiglia. Says that peace with the Irish will help him cement his position if we grant it."
"Why would I grant any Italian bastard peace?" I rasped, confused. My mind already felt fractured, but the out-of-the-blue topic jarred it even more.
"Because it’s good business?" Finn questioned softly. "It’s doing no one any favors for us all to be at war, and with the Russians having new leadership as well, it’d be a good time to broker a deal between the top factions. A mini-Summit, as it were, but with anything other than the Sparrows as the subject on the table like last time."
"That," Junior agreed, "as well as the fact that Valentini’s the one who told me Monsignor Masters is a Sparrow?"
"He did?" I whispered, my brow furrowed, blood dripping through the wrinkles.
"He did," Junior confirmed. "He wants to speak with you, see if you can come to some sort of arrangement together." He hesitated. "The Archbishop is in the white van... Valentini said it’s his Christmas gift to you." Tension riddled me like cancer through a bone but before I could say a word, Junior carried on, "He said that the Archbishop has sheltered several pedophiles within the church."
Wrath howled inside me again.
Conor didn’t want me to know about this. If he did, he’d have come to me and shared the truth years ago, and that was my failing. My flaw as a father. Junior had done my job for me, getting rid of the predator who dared prey on my son, so that option wasn’t open to me either.
The Archbishop was the only remaining pawn on the chessboard. He was the only piece I had left to play and play him I would. So fucking brutally the Devil wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between him and one of his demons when I was done with him.
Nostrils flaring wide, I growled, "Sheltered seven sick fucks, did he?"