Or how lonely.
If she didn’t know what he was before she moved there, she certainly found out fast.
He was a king. Wealthy. Proud. Charismatic. Both feared and respected, and known by all for his commitment to his honor but especially for his thirst for violence.
Exactly like Liam Black.
“Killian,” I say aloud, correcting myself.
Killian. Not a nickname, not a middle name, not a name he’s called by anyone else. It makes no sense that he would demand I call him that. It irks me.
What irks me more is that I haven’t told Fin and Max about it. I’ve always been good at keeping secrets, but not from them. This name thing, though…I’m still working it out. There’s something important there. A clue. But to what, I don’t know.
The last time I spoke to my father was seven years ago. I’d been arrested for shoplifting. It was the only time I’d seen the inside of a police station, before or since. The bail was only five hundred dollars, but I had no money of my own. I didn’t have a job. My father paid for everything. It was the day after graduation, and I was scheduled to return to New York within the week.
But that phone call with my father changed everything.
In the mafia, a thief is the lowest form of garbage aside from a snitch. Made men will happily profit from the spoils of stolen goods, but they would never themselves stoop to the actual procuring of it. Their “honor” won’t allow it. They have associates who do that sort of thing instead—people not allowed in the mafia ranks. Non-Italians, those of poor reputation, etcetera. So when I had to call my father to wire bail money, and he discovered that I’d dishonored the family name by stealing, he flew into a rage. He screamed at me. He called me names.
He said I was stupid, my mother’s daughter to the core.
And something inside me snapped.
I was done. Done with all of it. Especially done with him.
I hung up the phone in the middle of his tirade.
I told the arresting officer I’d stay in jail until the arraignment. He looked at me strangely, then said he’d talk to the judge. I seemed like a nice girl, he said. And it was my first offense. He had a daughter about my age, and it didn’t make much sense to have me in jail with the sex offenders and drug dealers for stealing a ten-dollar lipstick from a department store.
The judge decided to be lenient. I was released after twelve hours sitting alone in a cell, thinking. It was the first time I’d truly been alone in my life.
I loved it. There were bars on the door and window, but I’d never felt as free.
I knew my father would come for me, even though he was furious. I belonged to the family. I was chattel. I had value as a bride for a favored ally or payment for a debt: it was unthinkable to simply let me go.
I disappeared instead.
I moved to Boston with Fin and Max. Fin knew someone who knew someone who got me a fake ID. I got a job working in the mailroom of a local paper.
I was terrible at it, but I learned.
From the mailroom, I was quickly promoted to the advertising department, and from there to an assistant position for one of the staff writers in the features department. Hank had aspirations to grandeur: he wanted to win a Pulitzer for reporting. He was dogged in his pursuit of “real news” and taught me how to do data mining on the internet for research, how to piece together seemingly unrelated tidbits of information, and, most importantly, how to verify facts.
I became adept at all those things. In my spare time, I used those skills to find our marks.
Criminals—the “good” ones, at least—are also skilled, especially at hiding their criminal activities. When I saw the news report about Liam Black’s arrest and almost immediate release, I decided to find out more about him.
But for a man with such a huge reputation, there was curiously little to find. No verifiable address, no history of arrest before the recent one, no social media presence, no photographs. It was as if he existed by word of mouth alone. As if he were a ghost, a Bogeyman parents used to frighten their misbehaving kids.
My interest grew.
I kept digging until I found something: in the Massachusetts Secretary of State’s corporate licensing database, there was a listing for Black Irish Enterprises, Inc. The name jumped out at me. The corporate headquarters address was a post office box. All the officer positions were listed under the name Mail Kcalb.
A name that made absolutely no sense, until you spelled it backward.
After more digging, I discovered that Mr. Kcalb was the owner of ninety-five other companies, most of them in foreign countries and operating under DBAs. The majority of them were shell corporations. Meaning they had no employees, no active business operations, and no significant assets.
Suggesting they were formed only for the purposes of money laundering and tax evasion.
I played the clip of Liam Black being led into the federal building by FBI agents over and over again, memorizing his face, making note of the tattoos on the knuckles of his left hand. He left an indelible impression on me. I’d never seen a criminal as beautiful as that one, or half as smug.
The combination was infuriating.
By that time, I’d lived in Boston for over a decade. It was long enough to have heard the stories about the Irish mafia and its ruthless leader. Remembering how my father had screamed that I was stupid, I decided there was another arrogant mobster who needed to be shown he wasn’t actually king of the universe. That there was someone out there who wasn’t afraid of him.
That being a girl—younger, smaller, powerless—didn’t mean I couldn’t beat him at his own game.
Max was right, though. I did stew about it for months. Months and months and still more months, until almost a year had gone by before I finally pulled the trigger on the job.
In all that time, I never once asked myself why I was stalling.
Now, sitting here at my kitchen table, grappling with the past, I have to admit Max was right about something else. I knew from the moment I laid eyes on him that the formidable Mr. Black was lightning, and I was a lightning rod.
Made to attract his strike.
I say darkly to the empty kitchen, “Okay, gangster. You want to play this game? Let’s play.”
But I’m in it to win.
The coffee steams in the cool morning air, sending up perfect white whorls like in a commercial. Approaching the SUV with a mug in each hand, I’m careful not to spill any on the front of my pretty white dress.
When I’m twenty steps away, Killian bursts from the passenger seat as if the car spat him out.
He stands stock still as I approach. Staring at me. Eating me up with his eyes.
I stop in front of him and look up into his burning gaze. Holding out one of the mugs, I say pleasantly, “Good morning.”
He accepts the mug without looking away from my face. “Good morning.”
“You look like shit.”
“I haven’t slept.”
“The front seat of your macho truck isn’t good for that sort of thing, hmm?”
He licks his lips. Drinks his coffee. Licks his lips again.
I say, “Have you considered that you hanging out here on the street with your goombahs will bring a certain amount of attention? Considering you’re trying to keep me safe, it might not be the best strategy.” I look him up and down. “You’re not exactly incognito.”