“I don’t want to marryher.”
Matti’s expression softens. He’s a hard man, my brother, but right now he’s looking at me like he understands everything I’m feeling without me having to say it.
“Then don’t,” he says. “We’ll find another way to the ports. We’ll fight for them if we have to. If you want Soph—” He stops himself. “If there’s a different path you want to take, we support you. Fucking always.”
I look at Tommy for his input. His gaze is locked on mine but I know his brain is processing at high speed.
“Tommy,” I say.
He sets his hands flat on his knees. “You’re not going to like what I have to say.”
“Pretty much fucking never do. Tell me anyway.”
He nods once. “It’s true you don’t have to marry Ashlyn MacCuinn. Matti’s right: we’ll back whatever you decide, you know that.” He pauses. “But if you break this contract, the Irish will take it as a signal that you’ll break any contract. That’s how they think, how they operate. Their word is everything. A man who breaks a contract is a man who can’t be trusted, and a man who can’t be trusted—”
“Is a target,” I finish.
“Is a target,” Tommy confirms quietly. “Which means Sophie would be a target too. And potentially our women and children.”
The room is so fucking quiet. Matti drops his gaze to the ground.
“And the odds,” I ask.
Tommy meets my eyes, spinning his ring absently.
“Hard to say,” he says. “We’ve built a lot in the last few years, and we’ve made up a lot of ground that Aurelio lost. But going to war before we have time to build a strong foundation, train all the new guys, position everyone, come up with a strategic offense—” He shakes his head once. “I don’t know if I’d bet on us, and I always bet on us.”
I nod. Fuck.
I stare at the folder with Aurelio’s name on it, and my headachekicks into overdrive.
I want to fucking break shit. My fucking father is dead and he’s still fucking up my life—and with a deal he made when I was 20 fucking years old. I didn’t even know Sophie existed then. I fucking hate him all over again, the ten thousandth time since I put a bullet in his head, I hate him.
But I won’t be him. I won’t be selfish and put what I want in front of what the family needs. That’s what he would do. He would break any contract that didn’t suit him and watch his men die for his pride and call it loyalty.
I’m not him.
I look up at my brothers. Matti, who has a daughter now, who has Siena. Tommy, who has Giovanna, who would burn the world for her and nearly did, and his twins on top of that. Both of them are watching me, and I know without a doubt that they’ll do whatever I ask.
But I cannot bring my war to their doorstep. I cannot ask them to fight that fight. Not when we don’t have the odds. Not for my pride. Not even for my Sophia.
“You’re right,” I say to Tommy, and his jaw eases slightly. “I’ll set the date for the funeral.”
Matti crosses the room and drops into the chair beside me. He doesn’t say anything. He just reaches over and grips the back of my neck briefly and lets go. I know he gets it. He would never give up Siena, and I’d never ask him to. That’s what being the boss means: you make sacrifices so your men don’t have to.
“How will you handle things with Sophia?” Matti asks carefully.
I look at him.
“Ordinarily, that would be none of my business. But I was there on New Year’s Eve, Vin. I saw you drag her away from Gavin, and more importantly, Ronan saw it, too. I don’t know how he’s going to feel if you marry his sister but try to keep Sophie on the side.”
I do. Especially since he asked me pointedly to avoid humiliating his sister. And I don’t want to just keep Sophie—not that she’d let me do that if I tried. I want to make a life with her.
“I’ll handle it.”
“Vin—”
“I said I’ll handle it.” I stand up, the chair scraping back. “I just need to figure out how to keep her in my life without making it worse than it already is.”
