“Lily, stop,” I plead, voice breaking. “Let us handle it. Letmehandle it.”
Her sob tears through me
“Why?” she whispers, shaking so hard her teeth chatter. “Why would she do this to me?”
Isabella’s lips tremble, tears spilling freely now.
“She said you mattered too much to him,” she whispers. “That as long as you were breathing, he’d never go through with the marriage.”
Her voice breaks.
“She said you had to disappear if I ever wanted to have a family.”
Something in me snaps so hard I taste blood.
“That’s enough,” I growl, stepping forward, still holding Lily tight against my chest as she shakes, her eyes locked on Una with a kind of haunted fury that will never leave her. “You touched her. You hurt her. That makes it personal.”
Una lifts her chin, composure snapping back into place like armour. “Matthew. You don’t understand—”
“No,” I whisper, my voice shaking with a rage I can barely breathe through. “I understandexactlywho you are.”
Da uses his grip on her to force her back against the wall, while Liam drags Antonio up from the table, his forearm locked tight around his throat as he shoves him forward. He doesn’t stop until Antonio is forced shoulder to shoulder with Una, until the last two remaining architects of this ring are lined up side by side, backs against the wall, with nowhere left to run.
Jonathan and Aidan advance in unison, lethal and deliberate, just as Owen and the others come through the doorway. The movement forces Isabella to retreat a few steps farther into the room, her back hitting the wall softly. One glance around the room. One shared look between men who don’t need words, then they close in. No questions asked.
Uncle Bren is covered head to toe in blood—even his glasses have splatters on them—casually twirling his favourite meatcleaver between his hands like this is nothing more than another night’s work. Seamus and Declan exchange dark, satisfied looks as they spot Una, neither of them ever bothered hiding how they felt about her betrayal of Da.
Owen pauses at my side, gently prying Lily from my grip and pulling her into his arms. She goes willingly this time, her strength finally giving out. After a moment, she pulls back and looks at me—really looks at me—then tips her chin toward the line of men and steps away.
Owen and I close ranks as Lily moves toward Niamh, who’s watching everything with wide, frightened eyes. And just beyond her, pressed flat against the wall, I see Isabella—small now. Stripped of certainty. Watching the wreckage of a world she thought she understood.
This fight has dragged on too long.
Too many lies. Too many missing girls.
Too much blood spilled for power and profit.
Every man in this room is done listening to excuses.
Done negotiating.
Done pretending monsters deserve courtesy.
Antonio senses it, the collapse of his empire. His eyes flick across the faces of the men blocking his exit, the guns, the blades, the silence that feels like a noose.
He lifts his hands, voice cracking, “Wait—wait, we can negotiate—”
Bren doesn’t even pretend to consider it.
“You have nothing we want,” he says, tone flat as steel, meat cleaver dangling from his fingers like a promise.
Una makes one last desperate attempt, lunging—not at me, not at the men holding guns on her—but aiming for Lily.
One last pathetic grasp for control.
That seals her fate.
Six guns fire at once. Jonathan. Aidan. Da. Liam. Owen. Mine.
