Page 122 of Ruthless Claim

Finn is still on his tablet.

He’s curled into the couch cushions, his tongue jutted slightly out as he focuses on his game or his video, his shoulders hunched up to snuggle more into the soft interior.

Claire studies him for a long moment.

The practiced composure she’s been wearing slips just a fraction, but enough.

Something unguarded flickers across her face: her eyes soften, the tightness around her mouth loosens, and for the first time since she sat down, the expression isn’t measured or rehearsed.

It’s instinctive, almost involuntary.

Whatever else she’s been pretending, this much is undeniable. When she looks at her son, the feeling there is real.

“He’s fine,” she insists, but there’s a hint of uncertainty in her tone.

“Of course he is,” I say, warmly. “He looks like a wonderful kid. Really, he does.” I pick up my mug. “I just think he deserves someone in his corner who’s thinking about what he needs. Not what everyone else needs from this situation.” I take a sip, watching her over the rim. “But that’s just me.”

Claire looks at me as if she’s seeing me for the first time.

She came here today with a plan and she’s currently holding the pieces of it together and trying to figure out where it went sideways.

14

CILLIAN

The meeting is in a back room at a restaurant in Midtown that Connor uses because the owner owes him big time and is willing to look the other way.

I hate this place.

It smells overwhelmingly like raw garlic and something being braised.

It’s an old school Italian joint with dark wood paneling on the walls and a dark carpet that looks like it hasn’t been replaced since the restaurant first opened in the eighties.

How the Health Department hasn’t shut this place down is a miracle.

Oh wait, I know why they haven’t. That’s part of the reason why the owner owes Connor big time.

It’s me, Doyle, and a man named Kristoff, who handles Connor’s interests on the eastern waterfront. I’ve met the man twice before and don’t particularly like him.

He has the aura of a man who was always told he was the smartest person in the room and never had anyone push back on it.

He’s arrogant as fuck but he’s also—annoyingly—really fucking smart and a complete asset to the Brennan clan.

He spreads his papers across the table like they’re important. Most of them are.

We’re going over numbers. Container schedules, delivery windows, a discrepancy in the March figures that Kristoff is attributing to weather delays but I’m not convinced.

This shit is dull but necessary; the kind of thing that requires attention if you don’t want to get screwed six months from now.

I have a coffee I haven’t touched because I’m not convinced the coffee pot is always cleaned.

There’s always a weird film on the top of the drink, and one time I fished a hair out of my cup.

The chair is slightly too low for the table and I feel like I’m back in elementary school.

But I’m giving Kristoff my undivided attention.

My phone buzzes in my jacket pocket.