He stilled. "You know that fucker was beating me."
"Did he know you were Da’s?"
"Apparently."
I grunted. "That’s why you ran away?"
Finn reached up and tugged on his shirt collar, pulling away the already loose necktie. As he did, I knew the desire to lie was strong in him. I could fucking feel it.
Just like when Da had been looking at Finn and me, there’d been a different kind of hell in his face when his gaze had glanced off me and pinned itself to Finn.
A hell that made me wonder shit.
"You got married here," I said softly.
"I did."
"Why?"
"Because it was expected of me. Just like Jake’s baptism." He hissed. "What would you have had me do, Aidan? I couldn’t tell your da."
"Our da," I corrected.
He heaved a sigh. "Today was the first time I ever said that out loud. When I learned what he was to me, he wanted me to call him Da but I’ve never wanted to say it, didn’t want any of you guys to know."
"Why not?"
"I don’t know. I didn’t want anything to change, I guess, and Da just doesn’t sit well on my tongue. Maybe because he’s Aidan Sr. to me? Either way, it, well, I-I just couldn’t not call him that today. It wouldn’t have been right, not when he was going through...that."
"Fucker lost the plot in the cathedral."
"Your ma wasn’t that much better," Finn groused, his head tipping back as he looked up at the church which was picture perfect thanks to the cold midwinter night. "I have no idea how she managed it, but she hurled herself off my shoulder. She didn’t land right."
"She hit her head on the way down and passed out?"
He sighed. "Yeah. I checked her over before I went in after you. She’s got a nasty crack on her forehead, think that’s probably why she passed out."
I scrubbed the back of my neck. "Thanks for coming and helping me with Da."
"You know I’ve got your back. Always."
And I did.
"We should talk about what happened," I rasped, everything inside me needing to never talk about that fucking day so long ago at this very site but maybe we should. We'd covered it up for so many years… The destruction we’d left behind in Midtown spoke loudly about how bad it was to repress shit like this.
"Since when did we grow pussies? I don't need to talk about that day."
I winced because I was grateful. Then, a thought occurred to me. "Do you resent me?"
Finn blinked. "Huh? Resent you? Why the hell would I? You saved me. We didn’t have to be this close, Aidan. We’re brothers by fucking choice. It’s just sealed by blood now. That’s all."
It settled something inside me that he was right. We were exactly that. I was, in all honesty, closer to him than I was the rest of my siblings. I didn’t know if it was an age thing, or if it was that Finn and I had been together since nursery, whereas Brennan had been a pain in my ass since he was a toddler. Being an only child would have suited me down to a tee and that little fucker had been a crybaby on steroids.
Finn and I had gelled. I’d kill for my brothers. They were the only reason I’d gotten out of bed these past couple of years, but family and friends came with different expectations. You chose your friends, after all.
I didn’t have a say in being irritated by Conor, or having to listen to Declan waxing lyrical about Swan fucking Lake.
Me and Eoghan could argue over football where he was always wrong, and Brennan and I would forever butt heads. I had no say in that. Didn’t want one, to be fair, but that was the reality of family.
Whereas Finn and I had chosen to be close over years spent loyal to one another while supporting each other during crises.
"I’ve got your back too, Finn," I promised him. "Always."
He smiled and clapped me on the shoulder. "Tell me something I don’t already know." He peered up at the church though. "You want to burn it down?"
"Don’t you?"
"Wanted to burn it down long ago, but got used to it." He shrugged. "I can deal with putting up with stuff I don’t like better than you can."
"Is that the privilege of being an heir?" I winked at him when he just snorted.
"It’s either privilege or you’re a spoiled ass." He folded his arms across his chest then winced and barked out a cough. "Fuck, I got a mouthful of smoke that last time. Feels like I’ve been sucking on cigarettes for the last fifty years."
I shot him a concerned look. "Do you need a doctor?"
He grunted. "I don’t think so. I don’t think I’m bad enough to call the whole guard in." By whole guard, he meant the ghost hospitals we constructed when one of us was mortally injured. Much as Declan had been treated in a ghost hospital when he’d been shot.
"Well, the option’s there if need be."
He clapped me on the back. "I know, Aidan. I know. Now, what’s the game plan?"
"Arson attack against the cathedral, the night before their biggest mass of the year, gives it a terrorist vibe. Wouldn’t you agree?"
"Shit, yeah, it does. Last thing we need to stir is that hornets’ nest."
"Agreed." I scratched my stubble, grateful as always for the relationship we had because talking shit out with him let me think with a clear head. "Target that and this church, people won’t suspect us, if anything they’ll think it’s an attack against the Irish Mob. That’s better for a whole host of reasons," I explained, giving him my logic. "Namely that the city won’t lock down again like it did after 9/11."
When he didn’t argue, just said, "We need to get on with this. It’s more residential here so we run more of a risk of getting caught," I knew my thinking was sound.
"No one would squeal in this neighborhood," I pointed out.
"There’s always a first so let’s not rock the boat."
"True." I sighed, and began limping over to the trunk where the gasoline was stored. As I pulled out one of the tanks, Finn grabbed the other, and I asked, "You good?"
"Been better but this makes sense."
"You know it’s probably a thirty-year prison sentence if we get caught at two arson attacks," I pointed out softly, needing him to know because Aoife and Jake were at home, waiting on him.
"We ain’t gonna get caught," he denied, "but it’s fucking freezing and I think we need to do something about that."
I smirked at him as we hauled the gas canisters over to a place that was our personal hellhole, and forty minutes later, when it was burning up real good, I wasn’t ashamed for tears to prick my eyes, tears that had nothing to do with the heat from the fire, smoke, or the glare.
It was simply relief.
Like I could take a deep breath at long last because I’d never have to come to this place ever again.
It was gone.
The past wasn’t, it would always be there, would always shadow us, but this church didn’t have to plague our future.
"A fresh start," Finn rasped, coughing a little.
I turned to him, saw the gleam in his eyes and nodded.