Exploding: A Mafia Romance (The O'Keefe Family Collection #1)

by Tuesday Embers

  Carrigan’s cadence turned gentler and had the air of broaching a delicate topic. “Maybe moving home’s not such a bad thing. You were shot today, honey. Dad and Kill can protect you better at home. I know it scares Dad, you living here alone. Or maybe Danny could move in here for a while, at least.”

  Fallyn chewed on the inside of her cheek, swallowing venomous words that would do no good. “I was shot while Killian wasn’t even ten feet away. It’s my choice. You all treat me like I’m five, but I’m not. I know what I want, and I’m more than capable of going after it. But I can’t do it with Daddy pulling all the strings.” Her eyes closed as her arm throbbed. “That’s if he’s having a good day where he knows who I am.”

  “I shouldn’t have said anything. Kill’s better at handling you when you’re like this.” He stood, oblivious to his sister’s guffaw and offense. He adjusted his utility belt and subconsciously touched his holstered gun. “I’ll wait outside until Dad gets here. Try to calm down. His only daughter just got shot. He’s allowed to make a fuss.”

  Fallyn kissed her brother’s cheek out of habit and sent him outside to wait in his patrol car. She pushed back the overwhelming chaos of her life and focused on the tornado at hand. She hadn’t dusted in a week and hoped her father wouldn’t notice.

  When the patriarch of the family knocked on the door, Fallyn stood as tall as she could when she let him in. “Let me see where that idiot hit ya.” Patrick O’Keefe’s Irish brogue was thick, and had not been passed down to his children, who had adopted the standard Midwestern non-accent they were surrounded with. He barreled into the cream and peach living room, his nurse and Carrigan shuffling in behind him.

  Fallyn reluctantly lifted the gauzy peach fabric of her sleeve to show him the white bandage. “There’s barely anything to see, Daddy. They didn’t even take me in. The medic stitched me up just to keep Killian from blowing a gasket. It probably didn’t even need stitches,” she lied. “I’m totally fine. Vince and Killian handled it, and Angelo killed the guy on their turf who grabbed me.”

  “How did he grab ya?” Patrick demanded, his face red. He was tall and mildly heavy-set. Though his face was lined with seventy-nine years’ worth of wrinkles, he was strong as an ox and could be mean as one, too. “Show me.” Carrigan acted as Gino and wrapped his bicep around Fallyn, miming choking her. When Carrigan held his fingers in the shape of a gun to his sister’s temple, Patrick was enraged. “That scum held a gun ta my daughter’s head? I want his body on my doorstep!” he yelled at Carrigan, who released his sister and leaned against the sofa with his arms crossed.

  “I’ll see what I can do,” Carrigan replied. Random police jargon crackled on his com, and Carrigan answered succinctly. “I have to get back in a few minutes.”

  “I brought Nurse O’Malley. She’s here ta check yer arm.” Patrick held up his hand to silence his daughter when she opened her mouth to protest. “Don’t ya dare fight me on this, young lady. Ya were shot today. I have every right ta make sure my girl is as okay as she claims!”

  Fallyn was flustered, never liking it when her father shouted. “Daddy, stop yelling at me! I’ve barely said two sentences since you got here! If Nurse O’Malley wants to give it a look, fine.”

  Patrick scooped his daughter into his arms, his face pointed toward Heaven as he called on as many saints as he could name to protect Fallyn. “Vince will pay for this!”

  The pain from her bullet wound made her bite her lip through a whimper in her father’s firm embrace. Fallyn ducked out of her father’s grip. “Vince had Gino shot for what he did to your daughter. You should be sending him wine for the stand he made. Now everyone knows that they can’t mess with our family when we’re in their territory. Vince made a bold statement, and he’s already paying for it. Do you think that was a popular choice he made to have one of his own killed for an O’Keefe? He stood by our family today, Daddy. If you can’t see that, it’ll make a bigger mess that Killian will have to clean up. Make peace, Daddy. I’ve been living in your war for too long.”

  Patrick looked down on his daughter, his temperament vacillating from fuming to something softer. “I don’t like that ya were held at gunpoint on his territory. I could’ve lost ya today.” He lifted the gold medallion on his chain under his shirt to his lips and kissed it. “What yer mother would say if she were here now, I can only imagine. This nonsense of trading cookies between sides? It’s done. It was a terrible idea.”

  “It was my idea!” Fallyn’s hands rested on her hips, indignant.

  Patrick shouted again, slapping the back of his hand into his large palm. “Any idea that gets a gun pointed at my daughter’s head is a bad idea!”

  “Stop yelling at me!” she insisted, wishing his temper didn’t rattle her so. She hated it when he yelled, which was a thing he did if even the slightest bit provoked. In the past few months, when he was lucid, he was yelling, and when the fog of age took over, he was more docile but couldn’t remember who she was. She couldn’t decide which version of the father she loved was worse – the yeller who knew who she was, or the kind old man who didn’t know her from Eve. “Don’t start a war over this, Daddy. I mean it. Vince is going to bring his things to me next time instead of us going into their territory. Is that better?”

  “Vince and I are going ta have words about this. He’s practically a child! This is exactly tha kind of thing that happens when ya hand half an empire ta a child.”

  Fallyn took in a steadying breath, determined at least one adult would be present in this conversation. “Daddy, I’m alright. A little shaken, but fine. You getting all worked up isn’t helping me feel better. It’s making things worse.”

  After a brief examination of the wound and a few tenderness checks, spindly red haired Nurse O’Malley ruled that the EMT did a fine job and Fallyn could return to work the following day, provided she took it easy. She called in a prescription for the pain. “Now Patrick, it’s time to go on home. You’re overexcited, and you can see your daughter’s just fine.” She shot Fallyn a look of controlled exasperation, which Fallyn returned.

  “See? I told you it was nothing.”

  Patrick shook as he picked up the nearest throw pillow and whipped it across the room. Though it was a soft object, Fallyn always grew fearful when he started in on throwing things. “Nothing?” Patrick bellowed. “Nothing?! Yer coming home with me, young lady. Pack a bag.”

  Fallyn shook her head slowly, keeping her eyes on her shoes. “No, Daddy. I live here now. You told me I could.”

  “Carri, pack yer sister a bag!”

  “Dad, I don’t think…”

  Patrick picked up the cookbook Fallyn had been studying from the end table and launched it across the room. “Two children who don’t respect their father! Two! What did I do ta deserve such treatment? I raised ya, I put a roof over yer head that’s no longer good enough for ya, and this is tha thanks I get? March!” Without thinking, Patrick grabbed his daughter’s upper arm in an attempt to make her obey.

  Fallyn screamed, her legs giving out as the pain blinded her for several seconds. The pressure on her fresh wound built to a searing level. Carrigan scooped her up, holding her crumpled form like a baby as she shook in his arms. “Dad, we respect you fine, but you can’t come into her house and shout at her like this! Either let Nurse O’Malley drive you home, or you can get in the back of my patrol car. I’ll drive you home so we can have a talk if you can’t be civil to your only daughter. Take a breather. You just hurt her!”

  Patrick went from boiling rage to scared old man in the span of a breath. “Honey, I’m so sorry. I forgot which arm it was and grabbed tha wrong one. Here, let Nurse O’Malley take another look at it.” He went from larger than life in Fallyn’s eyes to looking fragile and stooped.

  “It’s okay, Dad,” Carrigan assured him. “I can check it again. Fallyn needs to get some sleep. I’ll make sure Vince’s people pick up the pastries at her shop, and that she doesn’t have to cross over into his territory again. S
he’ll take the day off and rest, and then she’ll call you in the morning.”

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I didn’t mean ta hurt ya.”

  “You never do,” Fallyn whispered.

  Patrick left after several more minutes of apologizing, shuffling out of the house after Nurse O’Malley with only his shame intact. Carrigan walked to Fallyn’s bedroom with his sister still cradled in his arms. It was so rare that she permitted any of them to carry her anymore that he took his time, holding her a few seconds longer than he needed to, rocking her back and forth as he stood by her bedside. He was ten years older than she, and had rocked her to sleep many a night when she’d been a little girl. Though she fought hard to get them to see her as an adult, her brothers had a hard time viewing her in any other light. “It’s alright, Fally. You know Dad didn’t want to hurt you.”

  She wriggled down from his grip. “I know. Thanks for sticking around to break up the fight. I’m going to bed now, so you can get back to work.”

  He kissed the top her head before leaving. “Love you, kiddo.”

  “Love you too, Carri.”

  After she heard the click of the front door, Fallyn changed back into her pajamas and collapsed into the bed, crying quietly into her pillow until she fell asleep.

  16

  Lawyer of Mine

  After a three-hour nap and a few painkillers, Fallyn dressed for her date. Thoughts of Vince plagued her as she tried to focus on the date she had been excited about the day before. The drive was nearly half an hour and gave her plenty of time to turn back, but she kept on. She was determined to put her family, Vince and her bullet wound behind her and start afresh. James was normal. He was a successful lawyer. Her fresh start would begin with him.

  She handed her coat to the Maître D’ and sat at the table she’d reserved under the name Sally Jones. Her light green silk dress hugged her curves on top and belled out at the waist. The hem fell halfway down her legs, showcasing the silver heels she never had an excuse to wear. She wore the dress because it was beautiful, sure, but it also featured three-quarter length sleeves that hid her wound.

  James was not there; she wasn’t sure she expected him to be. The heaviness she tried to brace herself for crashed down on her shoulders and weighted her spirit. She ordered a glass of wine and a salad, telling the waiter she would be dining alone. She had been prepared for this possibility, and pulled a pen and paper out of her purse to scribble lists and jot new recipes on so she could ignore the low candlelight, the romantic wall art and the couples that seemed to be ever more in love everywhere she looked.

  Fallyn decided as she wrote down things she needed to purchase for the bakery that a table for one might be the inevitability for her future, and there was nothing she could do to change that. Her father wouldn’t allow a man near her, her brothers wouldn’t tolerate anything short of perfection in her mate, and the only way she managed to steal half a day away from her job was to get shot. Fallyn held her crushing depression at bay just barely, putting her energy into making lists and conjuring up fresh recipes. She called Jen to check in, grateful to hear her assurances that everything at the bakery was fine.

  “Killian stopped by and dropped off the desserts from La Cucina Italia. I put them in the case, and they’re almost sold out. Killian mentioned Vince’s people are coming by tomorrow at seven in the morning to drop off more. That okay?”

  “I love that you ask me if it’s okay, like I have any say in what my family does with my business. But yes, it’s okay.”

  Jen’s voice was reassuring and warm. “Hey, you’re the boss. That’s why I asked you, not Killian. Just please be here when Vince’s guys come by tomorrow. Or send one of your brothers. I don’t like Vince in your place.”

  Fallyn cleared her throat. “You don’t have to worry about Vince. He’s trying to make peace, so we’re encouraging that.”

  “I don’t like it, Fal. I don’t like him in the store. I feel like anytime he’s around, bullets might start flying at random.”

  “He’s not so bad. I’ll see you in the morning.” Fallyn went back to her list as she picked at her salad and sipped her wine. Her mind began to wander to Vince. His lips on hers still felt like a dream. Surely she wouldn’t have made such a terrible choice in real life.

  Her phone rang, and she didn’t look at the caller ID, assuming it was Jen calling back with another thing to discuss about the bakery. “Hey, sweetie. Miss me already?”

  The voice that answered made her sit up straighter. It was deep and velvety, and she’d known to fear the sound of it since childhood. “I do. But something tells me you were expecting someone else. Who’s my competition?”

  “Vince! I thought you were Jen,” Fallyn whispered, ducking down in her chair and glancing around to make sure no one she knew was in the restaurant to overhear her crime. She cleared her throat. “What can I do for you?”

  “I want to see you again. That kiss wasn’t enough. Left me wanting more.”

  “Well, you can’t have more. It didn’t happen. And if it did, it was a moment of insanity. How did you even get my cell number?”

  “How little power do you think I have? You’re thrown by me getting your cell number?”

  Fallyn rubbed her hand over her face. “I’m just plain thrown today. The bullet, the kiss, then family drama. It’s been five days all rolled into one.”

  “You’ve always been an overachiever.” His tone changed to that of an old friend calling for no reason other than to chat. “Sounds like too much today. How are the guys? Have they bought you a bulletproof vest yet?”

  “Aw, you say that like they didn’t already get me one for my eighteenth birthday.”

  “Seriously?”

  “I wanted a necklace.”

  “That’s not exactly a necklace.”

  “Nope.” Fallyn sipped her water and checked around the restaurant to make sure that she had in fact been stood up. “I’m sure they’re freaking out, but I left the house so I could get some space. Daddy was in rare form today.”

  “Well, his daughter got shot. I think he’s got the right.” When Fallyn didn’t say anything to this, he changed his tone to a lower note. “What are you wearing? You sound like you’re wearing a dress.”

  “As a matter of fact, I’m wearing the Kevlar under a ski suit right now. And all that’s underneath a Halloween costume.”

  “You minx.”

  Fallyn narrowed her eyes and shifted the spring-hued green silk of her dress. “You can’t tell what I’m wearing over the phone.”

  “I just did. I can tell because I’m also wearing a dress, so I recognized the similarities in our voices.”

  “Stop turning me on,” Fallyn teased, her tone smoldering. “A sexy, built guy all trussed up in a dress? It’s my kryptonite. Don’t ask me for anything – I’ll only say yes if you’re wearing heels.”

  “Then I should take my window and ask to see you again. Next time without the gunfire.”

  Fallyn’s heart fluttered with nerves at the dangerous game she was playing without a script. “You know we can’t do that.”

  “You think I’m sexy and built.” He called her out on her admission with a dark allure to his voice.

  Fallyn gulped. “Yeah, well that was when I was picturing you in heels and a dress.”

  “What color is your dress?”

  She debated for ten whole seconds before whispering like a confession, “Green. It’s green silk.”

  Vince hissed. “You shouldn’t have told me it was silk. It’s like you want to torture me.” He sounded amused, as if he wanted nothing more than to toy with her. “I’ve never made out under a desk before. I felt like a teenager hiding from a teacher or something.”

  “Yeah? Well, you’re about to get sent to detention if you keep this up, young man.” She shut her eyes in chagrin at the unintentional sexy note her voice took on when scolding him. “I didn’t mean… You can’t call me!”

  “But I just did. I can do all sorts
of things. I can think about where that kiss might’ve led if we hadn’t been interrupted. I can think about doing it again, only perhaps not on the floor of my office next time. I can think about your legs.”

  “No, you can’t! You absolutely cannot think about my legs or any other body part.”

  His voice darkened. “Yes, I can. And I’ll keep thinking about you and your legs until I see you again. Do you think about me?”

  Fallyn wanted to lie. She wanted to hang up. She also wanted to kiss him again, and was trying everything in her arsenal to not admit that exact thing. “I shouldn’t think about you.”

  She could hear the smile in Vince’s voice. “But you do. You’ve never had a kiss like that, either. You want more.”

  “I’m on a date!” she confessed, her hand on her forehead.

  “You’re out with a guy, yet you’re on the phone with me? Can’t be all that great a date if you’re picturing rolling around on the floor with me.”

  “Shut up!”

  “Enjoy your second choice, Fallyn. I hope you kiss him tonight. I hope you try to recreate some of the fire we have just so you can see how dim his light is.”

  “You’re a jerk!”

  Vince chuckled. “Order some wine. It might give the poor guy a fighting chance if you have a bit of alcohol in you.”

  Fallyn leaned her elbow on the table and rested her forehead in her hand. “He’s actually not here. I’m pretty sure he’s standing me up.”

  “Where can I meet you?” She heard his chair creaking as he stood. “Let me take you out tonight. Anywhere you like. I have to see if your dress is as sexy as I’m picturing it.”

  “You know that can’t happen. We can’t… I’ll see you when I see you. And don’t you dare call again. My brothers are no joke, and I don’t want anything to… Just don’t.” Fallyn hung up the phone and pretended to be engrossed in her notes for as long as it took to get her blush to retreat.