Brush of Despair (Dublin Devils Book 2)

by Selena Laurence

  There was silence on the other end of the line as Liam waited anxiously for an answer. He didn’t realize until it came how much he’d wanted to hear it.

  “I miss the hell out of you guys,” Connor answered. “I don’t want you to think that I don’t. I think about you every day. Things I’d tell you, stuff I wish I could do with you.”

  He chuckled softly, and in that moment, the touch of dark all around him, Liam could physically feel his brother’s presence.

  “There’s this gym here. I’ve been going to work out a couple of times a week. It’s fancier than Sean’s place, but still solid. There’s a guy I’ve been sparring with, and he does that thing you were always on me not to, when he lets his left drop before he throws the right?”

  Liam listened silently. It had taken him a year or more to break Connor of that habit. He’d finally just had to punch the kid in the face to make him realize how open he was leaving himself. Thank God he hadn’t broken his handsome little brother’s nose. Their mom would never have forgiven him.

  “So every time I spar with this guy, I think about how much I wish it was you there instead. How much I’d love to have you there nagging at me about keeping that hand up.”

  “But you don’t need me there bitching at you anymore, because you already learned,” Liam told him.

  “It’s true. I don’t.” They were both silent for moment. “But what I’m saying is, I miss you guys even though I don’t need you anymore the same way—which isn’t what you asked me, is it? Was it worth it? Yes. Even as much as I miss you, it was worth it. And it’s not just Jess, man. It’s all of it. You know that feeling you have when you wake up in the morning? The way you feel totally relaxed like you could lie there in bed forever and be perfectly happy?”

  Liam snorted. “Uh, no. Not since I was a kid anyway.”

  “Exactly,” Connor replied. “I hadn’t felt that way since I was a teenager either. It leaves with the life—with the business. But now? Now I wake up, and not only is my girl here with me, but I can breathe. I guess that’s how I’d describe it best—I wake up in the morning, and I can breathe.”

  Liam watched Katya shift in her sleep, making small whimpering noises as she did. She was still reliving it all, throughout the night, throughout the day. When was the last time she woke up and could breathe? Really breathe?

  “I’m glad,” he told Connor. “I’m glad you did it. And I’m sorry I doubted you. You deserve this.”

  “We all deserve it,” Connor answered.

  As Liam disconnected the call, he wondered if maybe Connor was right.

  “How is she doing?” Cian asked when Liam arrived at his condo the next morning before dawn.

  “She’s really fucking sad,” Liam answered, looking pretty worn himself.

  “It’s no wonder. Even after all these years in this business, that was hard to see. I can’t imagine what it was like for a civilian.”

  Cian walked to the kitchen, and Liam followed. It was still early, so he offered his brother coffee instead of the beer he secretly wanted.

  “You looked like you haven’t slept.” He handed Liam a steaming mug of dark roast.

  “I haven’t. They’ve obviously hunted down our safe houses. I have no idea when they’re going to hit next or how. Jimmy and two of the other guys rotated all night so they could each get a couple of hours’ sleep, but I couldn’t relax enough to do that. I have her out in the car in the garage downstairs, with three guys on her. I don’t think we can stay anywhere more than a few hours.”

  “That’s exactly what they want.” Cian’s brow furrowed in concern at how defeated Liam sounded. “To get you off-kilter, make you anxious, paranoid. But Lila has some more things coming at them today. It might take their attention off you for a bit.”

  “It won’t matter,” Liam murmured.

  Cian watched his brother. Something was different about him. This wasn’t just exhaustion. At least not of the typical variety. This was something more.

  “What’s going on?” He set down his own cup of coffee.

  Liam rolled his shoulders and looked uncomfortable.

  “Hey.” Cian’s voice was sharp. “What is it?”

  Liam cleared his throat, then looked Cian in the eye. “When I was locked up, I used to spend so much time worrying about you guys. You especially. I can’t stand it when I don’t know what you’re doing and what guys are watching you. I only let you walk around town because I personally trained these men. They’re an extension of me, and they know your safety is the one thing I will never compromise on.”

  Cian’s chest ached suddenly. “I know. And you’ve kept me safe all these years. You’re the best there is, and I’m grateful.”

  Liam looked away. “But there was something else I thought about when I was locked up—I used to think how strange it was that Pop is the one who made me able to survive that. He made me prison-worthy, you know?”

  Cian’s damn heart nearly broke then, and he reached out and put a hand on Liam’s shoulder, giving it a quick squeeze. “You’re a survivor, and you’re the strongest person I know. Pop gets no credit for that. He tried to take away who you were and replace it with fear. He failed. We won. Never forget that.”

  “But did we? Did we win when we live like this?” He waved his arm around as if the air in the kitchen showed a picture of some sort. “I finally realized last night that I’m fucking homeless. Everything I had—which wasn’t much, mind you—was in that apartment. It’s been blown the fuck up. I spend my entire life trying to keep from getting killed. It’s like I never got out.”

  “Of jail?”

  “Exactly. Because this is just another kind of prison, Cian. And I’m not sure I’m strong enough to survive it forever. Eventually, prison breaks everyone, and I think it’s about to break me.”

  He’d never seen Liam lose his cool like this before. This was the family brute. Their enforcer. Liam had killed men, tortured them, he’d trained every guard they had, and put the fear of God in most of their distributors. Liam didn’t get scared, he didn’t complain, and he didn’t break.

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying I think I want out.”

  The room was silent for a long moment, nothing but the hum of the refrigerator and the clicking of the ice maker.

  Cian swallowed. He’d worked for nothing more than to keep his brothers safe since he was eighteen. But he’d never thought Liam would want to leave him. Connor and Finn, sure. They weren’t made for this life, and Cian had always expected to send them away somehow. But Liam? No, he’d thought Liam would go through witness protection. That the only way he’d get Liam out was if Liam had no other options. He never in a million years thought he’d hear Liam ask to leave.

  “Out…”

  “Of Chicago. Of all of it.”

  He released a long slow breath. Damn.

  “You want to pull a Connor?”

  Liam snorted. “With the Russians after me? You think I could just wander off someplace and get a job managing a bar? Get married, have a couple of kids?”

  Cian shook his head sadly. “No, I don’t. The only way you could get out of all this is if people think you’re dead.”

  Their gazes met, and that was when Cian knew what Liam intended. “And you’ve already thought of that.”

  Liam continued to stare at him.

  “You want to take Katya and go. Fake your deaths and disappear.”

  “It’s the only way,” Liam said sadly. “I did this to myself, but in a way, I almost wonder if I did it because I knew there’d be only one way out. Although I don’t know that I counted on…her.”

  Ah. Now we get to the real issue, thought Cian.

  “So, you and Katya…”

  Liam ran a hand across his hair, and for one rare and pure moment, he looked like a little boy. Not the hard man Robbie had made him, but the kid Cian had grown up with. The one who had come home, crawled into bed with Cian, and cried after their father held a
gun to his head, before he’d woken the next morning a different person.

  “She’s wrecked. So we haven’t…but there’s something there. She’s like me. We understand each other. And I want to help her. I want to give her something. I asked her what she wants most in life, and she said, ‘Freedom.’ If I can get that for her, then that’s what I want to do.”

  “And you couldn’t just send her away for that?” Cian almost wished his brother would do that very thing.

  “She needs help, man. Protection, ways to stay off the radar…”

  “And you don’t want anyone else to do that for her, do you?”

  He shrugged.

  Cian tried to calm his breathing. This felt so very different than it had with Connor. He’d been relieved as hell to get his baby brother away from all of it. But Liam? Liam was his partner, his backup, the only other person on the planet who knew what had happened to them that night with Robbie. Yes, he’d told himself this was what he wanted, but now it was here? The idea of never seeing Liam again, of letting him walk away, was terrifying.

  “You’re serious? You barely know her. What if you end up hating her? What if she leaves you? What if she’s some sort of total nut job who stabs you in your sleep?”

  Liam raised an eyebrow and just stared at Cian. Yeah, okay, that last one wasn’t likely, but the rest of it was probably more than likely.

  “Connor had dated Jess for five years. We always knew they’d end up together. He also wasn’t you. He’d always done what we do because he’d never been given the option. You—”

  Liam stiffened. “I what? Enjoy it? I’m really good at it? I’m too stupid to do anything else?”

  Cian stared. Where the hell had that come from? His gut went sour. “No, of course not. I didn’t mean…”

  “I know you didn’t. But it’s what people think, and in some ways, they’re right. I’ve never minded who I am or what I do. Until I got locked up. And that was different.” His voice lowered, husky with emotion. “It was rougher than I could have imagined, and if I’m being honest, it took a lot out of me.” He faced Cian then, and Cian saw it all, laid bare in his eyes, in the way he held his body, in the tone of his voice. “Running from the Bratva, it feels like that again. I don’t want to do it anymore. I don’t want Katya to have to do it. I want to breathe.”

  And so Cian wrapped a piece of steel around his heart, and he said the words he wouldn’t have dreamed he’d ever say, the ones that took a piece of him he’d never get back. Liam was his best friend, his shield, his history, and with one word, Cian let him go.

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll worry about you—”

  “It’s okay,” Cian repeated as much for himself as for Liam.

  “We’re going to have to lie to Mom.”

  “I know.”

  “She’ll be heartbroken.”

  “Eh, it’s you. She might not be that upset,” Cian said, shoving Liam in the chest. His brother was on him in an instant, punching Cian in the midsection, not hard enough to do any damage, but hard enough Cian felt the air whoosh out of him.

  Liam danced away across the kitchen, fists raised above his head. “Yes! Yes! Speed and agility win again.”

  Cian stood, coughing as he regained his breath. He pointed a finger at Liam in warning. “You’re going to pay for that.”

  Smiling, Liam answered, “I’ll be long gone, brother. Long gone.”

  Yes, Liam would be long gone, and Cian would be alone for the first time since he was two years old.

  Katya had slept through much of the morning, and when she woke, they were in a cheap motel room with an expressway outside the small window.

  “Hey.” Liam came walking out of the bathroom, hair wet, a towel around his waist.

  For one brief moment, Katya was so distracted by the vision of him bare-chested, tattoos covering his shoulders and pecs, that she forgot about Nadja. Then it all came rushing back like a wall of cold, stinging water that plowed into her full blast. She gasped and put a hand to her face, covering her eyes for a moment as she reminded herself to let the breath flow in and out of her lungs.

  She felt the weight of the bed shift as Liam sat on the edge. His hand touched hers where it lay over her face.

  “It’s always hardest first thing in the morning,” he told her gently. “There’s that second where you forget that the worst thing to ever happen to you has, and then it hits you like a freight train.”

  She let him pull her hand away, and her gaze met his. His eyes were so kind, so warm and understanding. She didn’t know how she’d ever thought he was harsh or cruel or rough. No, Liam MacFarlane was a big, rough man, but he was a loving, gentle one as well. He might break the laws, but he was nothing like the men at the brothel—the men who had tortured and murdered sweet, good Nadja.

  “I know it doesn’t feel like it,” he continued, his thumb stroking the back of her hand over and over. “But it will get easier. Not every morning will feel like this.”

  “I want to feel this always,” she said. “She was worth this. She was worth my sadness every day.”

  He cupped her face with his other hand, his palm covering her from jawbone to temple, and just watched her while she spoke.

  “I never know Nadja’s mother, and her father leave many years ago. She grow up with her grandparents. They are poor, and old, but they love her. When she leave to come to America, they think they’ll never see her again. She think she would save money and send for them very soon. I never agree—they are old, they do not speak English.” She shrugged, and Liam nodded to indicate he understood.

  “But now I will tell them…this…” She swallowed to keep the tears at bay. “She was not like me. She was loved.”

  A fierce expression spread over Liam’s face, and he took her face between both of his hands, his voice a rough growl as he leaned close to her. “Don’t you ever say you aren’t loved. The people in your life may not have been good at showing it, but believe me, no one could know you and not love you, Katerina Volkova.”

  His kiss was firm, reassuring and unsettling all at once. She made a small sound as he caught her off guard, but when his hand wrapped around the back of her neck, cupping her head like it was the most precious thing in the world, she melted into him, opening to him with her body and her heart.

  The heat between them exploded, and in moments, she was flat on the bed, his big body on top of hers, his knee between her legs, and his hands roaming everywhere, one hand on her bare leg beneath her pajama shorts, and the other caressing her breast through the thin cotton of her tank top.

  She gasped as everything inside her came alive, and then she remembered Nadja. Nadja, who would never again feel a kind touch. Nadja, who would never again have a friend listen to her sorrows. Nadja, who would never have the freedom Liam had promised to Katya.

  As if he could read her mind, Liam stopped, pulling away and watching her carefully.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “Too fast? Please don’t let me do something you don’t want. You’ve been through more than enough.”

  She smiled at him even as a tear rolled down her face. “And someday, I tell you all that happened. Someday, I will need to tell it, and there is no one who understand better than you. But no, it’s not too fast. It’s that Nadja will never know this”—she pointed between them—“and that makes me more sad than all the rest.”

  Liam sighed as he buried his head in her hair alongside her neck. “It makes me sad not just for Nadja,” he murmured, caressing her cheek with his. He looked into her eyes. “It makes me sad for everyone who isn’t you and isn’t me. Because I can’t imagine any two people have ever known each other the way we do, and that’s beyond sad.”

  Then he kissed her again, and this time, Liam didn’t stop, and Katya didn’t think about Nadja or the Bratva or the men who’d bought her in the brothel. She only thought about life, and Liam, and what it meant to understand another human being clear to your very soul.

  Th
e plan came together overnight. A long night that had Cian, Liam, Lila, and Finn pacing the floor of an expensive hotel suite while Katya sat on the sofa, quietly watching all of them.

  Lila felt the tension between Cian and Liam, but she didn’t know what to do about it. Cian had told her Liam was leaving, but he’d refused to discuss it with her, and it hurt. His refusal to confide in her made her feel as though he was releasing her alongside his brother.

  “At nine thirty, I’ll contact Sergei and tell him you’re ready to meet,” Finn said.

  “At ten, we’ll get the girl’s body into the warehouse where the meeting is set.” Finn glanced at Katya with an apology.

  “We’ll be out by ten fifteen. Your contact sends the feds in immediately after,” Liam said from his perch on top of the dining room table where he’d lain down in exhaustion, his six-foot-two frame covering most of the long surface. Cian didn’t seem to mind his brother had his steel-toed boots on the glossy black tabletop.

  “Louis will be waiting with a boat for us at the dock so we don’t risk getting snared on the way out,” Finn continued.

  “Leaving the Russians to face the feds with Nadja’s corpse and the USB drive detailing all their business,” Lila finished. She’d been amazed at how easily Finn and Liam had accepted Cian had contacts with access to the FBI. They hadn’t questioned him at all, and somehow the possibility he’d been informing never crossed their minds. It frightened her that he could engender so much trust in those who loved him while simultaneously lying to their faces, and it made her wonder if he was playing her the same way every moment they were together.

  “Okay, how does it go from there?” Cian spun his finger in the air to indicate they needed to keep rehearsing.

  “Louis takes us to the airfield, where Jimmy will have Katya waiting with the plane and the paperwork,” Finn said.

  Lila watched Cian’s face and saw the way he flinched when Finn mentioned the word airfield.

  “Katya and I get on a plane, and Finn tells everyone we were still there when the Russians and the feds showed up and I was shot as we escaped to the boat. Then he tossed me overboard when I bled out, I’m dead at the bottom of the lake, and no one can look for me because we can’t admit I was there in the first place.”