I try to hide my emotions, wanting her to keep talking. I couldn’t live with myself if I rescued her, only to return her to the people who brought her here in the first place. A lot of people in this world have had their families turn against them, and I don’t want this sweet girl to be another statistic.
“And who is your ma?”
“Maeve O’Connor.”
Alarm flashes on my face, and no matter how hard I try to school my features, I know she sees because she drops her eyes. “My ma is a good person. So is Papa Paddy. Please, can I go home? They will give you whatever you want. Nanna will even bake you a cake.”
The O’Connors are as well known as The Kellys. As is the war that wages between them. Usually, children aren’t caught up in the day-to-day mafia world. They are considered off-limits, like wives and Omegas, but times are changing. Especially here, which is why I’m here too.
“What is your name, princess?”
“Daisy. After my mom’s sister, Noinin. She died before I was born.”
I stagger backwards as if someone punched me right in the face. Suddenly, I’m dragged through time to a summer so long ago when Noinin and I crossed paths briefly. Hearing her name is like opening a window and letting small, jagged memories flood out.
Another gunshot sounds behind us, and I slam shut the wandering of my mind, back to helping to return this little girl to her family. A family I have a little history with.
“Okay, Daisy. I want you to climb back on, and we’re going to get you home. How does that sound?”
“Good,” she says softly.
We work together getting her in position, and I take my time triple-checking we’re in the clear before we emerge from theshadows. The sounds and shouting behind us keep going, more sporadically now, though.
I stick to the edge of the building as we creep closer to the carpark. My plan is to break into one of the cars, hot wire it, then hopefully Daisy will know where we need to go. I’ll get her home, eventually. It’s a great plan, until we walk out into the open and a man is being dragged out of a car by his hair, three men surrounding him.
Yes, I’m only one person, but the injustice, the wrongness, of the situation has me twisting around to Daisy.
“I have to go help him,” I say quietly, looking around for somewhere she’ll be safe. An air conditioning unit is a couple of feet away. I pick her up and plonk her onto the top of the unit.
“Lie down, Daisy. Close your eyes again, and count up to one hundred, and I’ll be back.”
“You won't forget me?”
“Never,” I promise. It’s an easy promise to make because she’s firmly found her way into my mind forever.
She’s such a good kid. So brave. I get a little smile before she ducks her head down. I hope she doesn’t look, because the violence happening in front of me is awful.
I take off, knowing I’ve made her as safe as possible. By the time I reach the guy who was in the car and being dragged out, he’s on the ground, getting the absolute shit kicked out of him. Although he was clearly armed, he isn’t now. As I race in on quiet feet, I scoop up his knife. I am completely focused on the outcome I see in my head—these attackers dealt with and the man safe—nothing else getting in to distract me.
Having the advantage of surprise, and the darkness around the car, I manage to spring forward and use the butt of the knife handle against the temple of one of his attackers, making the attacker drop like a bag of rocks. It means I only have two othersto deal with, but it also means I’ve alerted the other two that I’m here.
I take a protective stance in front of the man they’re beating up, instinctively knowing he is a good person. I have no clue how I know it, but I have enough faith in myself to trust my gut. Standing up for him feels like something I have to do.
One of the men is fast and obviously trained. He comes at me, knife out defensively, and we move as if we’re sparring. Except, right here, right now, is life and death.
We trade blows, and after one of his lunges, my arm burns. I don’t need to look down to know he’s cut me. It doesn’t make me scared; the slice is like adding fuel to a fire. I fly at him in a rage, pummeling him with my hands and feet, jabbing and kicking where I can.
I swing around and get him good. The doughy feel that accompanies the hit only confirms I stabbed him somewhere important. His fight drains from him. Not fast like a flash, but fast enough that I see him losing the battle to stay on his feet.
He drops to the ground with a sickening thud, and I twist around to face his other opponent, but stars explode in my vision and pain bursts against the side of my face.
I try to stay upright, my arms windmilling, but nothing short of a miracle is going to help. I’m too far gone, given the way my vision is tunnelling, the light around me fading.
Every part of me is suddenly too heavy to hold up, and my feet skate out from under me the harder I try to stay upright. The stomach-dropping sensation of free fall stops, replaced by a second, larger explosion of pain.
And then, nothing. Nothing, except for a strangely sweet, seductively spicy hint of…
Chapter Sixteen
