Loyalty.
The O’Brien name was sacred. It went beyond petty squabbles and pointless vendettas, it superseded hatred and bypassed hurts and anguish. It was simple. We didn’t kill our own. Not unless they betrayed us in the most unforgivable of ways.
The moment someone married in and took our name, they assumed that protection too. It was the only law we all abided by.
Yet here I was, creeping across his roof in the dead of night, because he’d thought to bypass that single, eternal fact.
I crouched down, a hiss of pain escaping me as my ribs twinged from the movement. On doctors’ orders I’d been outa commission for a couple of weeks while my bruises and breaks healed after my fall onto that fucking car, but most of them were recovered now. Only the worst of the broken ribs still flared with pain from time to time, and I was past the point of waiting for them to stop.
This needed to be done. It needed to be over.
I dropped to my knee, gripping the edge of the roof before leaning down and taking hold of the side of the window beneath me. A long time ago, I’d created this weakness in my pa’s defences of his property just in case a day like this ever arose and I needed to gain access.
There was always a fucker on the roof. I’d told him that a hundred times at least. But no one ever did take my warnings seriously.
I pulled the pin free of the hinge, leaning even lower and ignoring the perilous drop beneath me as I repeated the action on the second hinge before easing the window away from the wall and creating a gap to allow me access.
I slipped inside like a demon in the night, drawing the window back into place behind me and creeping out of the darkened guest room towards the empty corridor beyond.
It was almost three in the morning, clearly a time when any normal man would be fast asleep, but as I turned towards my pa’s bedroom, I paused, glancing back over my shoulder.
I mighta been imagining it, but I could have sworn the scent of smoke lingered in the air, calling me back in the direction of the main staircase and beckoning me forth.
I hesitated, my fingers twitching for the feel of a weapon as indecision held me in place before I turned towards the stairs and hurried down them in the dark.
It had been a long damn time since I’d been a rebellious teenager, sneaking in after dark and trying to hide the blood splatter which coated my clothes like a right little ragamuffin, but I still recalled where each and every creaky spot on the stairs was and dodged them all with ease.
I slipped through the shadows in the dark, making my way down the corridor towards my pa’s office, taking note of the light which shone around the cracks at the edges of the door and smiling to myself at my correct guess.
I moved to stand to the left of the door, wetting my lips as my heart began to pound, the weight of this decision pressing down on me and reminding me that this would mean so much more than the death of a single man. I was donning a crown in this moment. One I had never had any desire to bear the weight of.
I reached for the handle slowly, drawing in a deep breath and keeping my back flat to the wall before turning it and letting the thing swing wide.
Three shots were fired through the open door in quick succession, the noise of them dulled by a silencer, though the sound of them slamming into the wooden panelling opposite the door was in no way suppressed.
I snagged a knife from my belt, hurling it through the door without risking a look into the room and smirking to myself as a curse followed the act and the gunshots ceased.
“You knew I was coming then?” I called cheerily, the scent of blood and gunpowder in the air making my pulse pick up.
“I’d hoped for both outcomes, if I’m honest, lad,” my father’s voice came in reply.
I kicked the door wider to get a look at him, finding him slumped back in his wingback chair with my knife protruding from his left shoulder and his gun fallen onto the desk between us.
“Hands where I can see ‘em,” I said, jerking my chin in command, though I made no move to draw any further weapons against him.
My father obliged, laying his hands flat on the desk as a grunt of pain confirmed that blade made it all kinds of painful for him to do so.
I moved into the room, picking up the fallen gun and inspecting it with interest before tossing it to a far corner of the room. I dropped down opposite the man who had claimed dominion over my life long before my conception, wondering what he thought of the man he’d created now that his moment had come.
“I always knew it would be you,” he said, coughing out a laugh which caused blood to ooze from the knife wound and a grimace to cross his features.
“Can’t say I did,” I replied, leaning across the desk and taking hold of the blade. I met my father’s cold eyes as I took hold of the hilt, smiling wryly as I yanked the thing out.
Liam cursed, thumping a fist down on the desk before slumping back in his chair and looking down at the wound which now bled freely, staining his white shirt with the bright redness of his blood.
“It was only ever a matter of time,” Liam muttered, his fingers moving towards a cigarette box and I inclined my head as he gave me a questioning look, allowing him to take one and place it between his lips.
His left hand fumbled as he tried to lift the lighter too, the injury I’d given him clearly making things difficult. I snatched it from his fingers, sparking up the smoke for him like a good son before taking one for myself and joining him in his filthy habit.
I leaned back in my seat, inhaling deeply, the flare of the cherry comforting to me like the hand of a father on my shoulder, supportive, loving, kind – none of the things my real father could count himself as.
“So,” I said, wondering if he might indulge me with a few parting words.
Liam looked me up and down, his eyes flaring with pride as he took me in and still some pathetic little piece of me enjoyed that, liked knowing that I was finally meeting with his expectations even though I cared not for his opinion. Even though I hated him with all I had. Even though I was here to see his end.
“She’s good for you,” he said, surprising me. “That little whip of a thing who you went and married.”
“Is that so?” I asked, wondering how he’d have any idea on the truth of that.
“I came while you were in the hospital,” he went on, shifting the cigarette to the corner of his lips as he inhaled again and parking it there. “Saw her praying to the Devil to bring you back kicking and swinging from wherever he had you trapped. You were off your face on pain meds and waiting on a bunch of scans, but I could see the way you smiled for her. That’s when I knew you’d be coming for me.”
“Did you seriously think I wouldn’t have figured it out?” I asked.
Liam shrugged like he hadn’t much cared one way or another. “The deal with the Russians was good for business. They wouldn’t keep up their end without a wedding, and I had no one suitable to offer aside from you. They didn’t want a grandson or someone too far removed from power. If you’d just done your duty, you coulda had it all, lad.”
“I never was one for duty,” I reminded him and he coughed another laugh, this one causing a whole lota blood to spill from the wound, making me pretty certain that I’d gone and hit something important with that strike.
“You were one for action,” Liam agreed, almost sounding fond over the fact. “Something which is wildly underappreciated in our line of business. Your siblings don’t have that same cutthroat ability to make a snap decision and see it through. You’re unapologetically single-minded. You don’t allow for regrets-”