I came here braced for monsters. I keep not finding any.
Afterward, when the family spills out into the side hall, the wives descend on me.
"Maeve." Nora, a woman with hazel eyes and a warm, open smile, reaches me first, both hands out like we're old friends. "I've been dying to meet you.”
Declan’s other two sisters-in-law come to stand beside Nora.
I look between the three of them, waiting for them to size me up, find me lacking, and turn up their noses. I can handle it. I’m used to it.
But it doesn't happen. They just smile welcomingly.
"Okay, important business." Nora leans in. “Wednesday afternoons, we O’Rourke wives have a standing date—coffee, gossip, the bookstore on Clark, then lunch and more gossip.”
“We expect to see you there since you’re one of us now,” Saoirse says.
“And bring the juiciest gossip you can,” Prudence adds.
These three women want to drink coffee with me on a Wednesday for no reason except that I'm family now.
I’m flattered. I can't remember the last time I was invited somewhere that wasn't a work shift or a school meeting. I genuinely cannot remember.
"I'll think about it," I say.
"That's a yes," all three of them say, in unison, and then look at each other and burst out laughing, and God help me, I almost join them.
Across the hall, Kathleen is helping Oisin devour a plate of cake without most of it ending up smeared on his face and clothes. Cara sits beside them, munching on a sandwich.
And Jamie… I locate my brother and stop.
He's with Lorcan. NotnearLorcan, shooting him glowering looks. He’s trailing half a step behind as Lorcan moves through the room shaking hands. As I watch, I notice Lorcan keeps folding Jamie into the brief conversations, introducing him as his brother-in-law. Jamie's mirroring Lorcan's stance. Hands in pockets the same way. Chin at the same angle.
My stomach tightens. Because I know what this family is. The men in this room are criminals. And my fourteen-year-old brother is currently mimicking a made man.
That should terrify me. It should. But Cillian, the most dangerous man in Chicago, currently wears his son's spit-up on a suit that probably costs more than an average car. Declan holds his baby nephew like he’d tear the limbs off of anyone who dared threaten the child. Ronan looks at Prudence like she’s the moon in the sky.
My father carried a badge for twelve years. On therightside of the law. Task force, commendations on the wall, the whole nine yards. Yet I never saw him display so much as an ounce of the type of love and loyalty these men show.
I’m suddenly wondering if maybe the lines I drew my whole life were always in the wrong place.
"You've got the face again." Lorcan materializes at my elbow as Jamie saunters off toward the dessert table. His finger hovers near the crease between my brows, not quite touching.
He hands me a plate—cake, finger sandwiches, fresh vegetables, crackers, hummus, and a few types of cheese.
"Good day?"
I look around the hall. At my siblings, fed and safe and folded into a large Irish family as if they belong. At the three women who just drafted me into their coffee clutch likeIbelong.
"Weird day," I say. "Good weird."
"That's the family motto. It's on the crest. In Latin, of course."
Later, as we’re preparing to leave, Nora catches my arm, baby Sean asleep in her arms.
“Don’t forget Wednesday,” she says. "I'll call you.”
I open my mouth to do what I always do. To explain about the four hundred reasons why my life doesn't have room for such things, and settle on one. “I have work at the pub.”
"Your boss says you have Wednesdays off." Lorcan doesn't even look over from wrangling Oisin into his jacket. "Your boss is extremely generous. Handsome, too."
