Page 62 of Lawless Sinners

“Sera showed up at our place. I taught her a lesson in manners. She won’t be back.”

“And Eilish?”

She’s a clean arrangement, one made with clear terms and no illusions. Eilish doesn’t claw at the inside of my discipline. She doesn’t know the darker, unrespectable parts of me or need me to spit on her. She doesn’t make me do things that I’ve no business doing.

“What about her?” I ask.

“Marriage usually comes with expectations.”

“Not ours, and she knows it.”

Graves watches me closely.

I take another drink. “Eilish understands the arrangement. I made it clear to her after the party. She gets my name, my protection and my respect. But she doesn’t get me. There’s no feelings involved for either of us.”

“You sure? What if you catch her screwing around like you are?”

“That’s her business.”

He nods. “Is she good with that? With knowing you’re fucking her best friend and the family rival?”

“Graves,” I warn. “I told you already. There’s nothing happening between me and Sera. Don’t ever say that out loud again.”

Graves goes silent, and his eyes narrow as if he’s trying to read me. Probably hunting for a sign that’ll give away my lies. Luckily, I have the best poker face…because he taught me.

“Come to me if she becomes a problem,” he says at last.

I laugh under my breath. “I can handle Sera. She’s nothing to worry about. Her brothers, though. That’s different.”

Graves picks up his towel and drapes it around his neck. “They’re all the same.”

My phone rings from the bench. Lorcan’s name flashes across the screen.

“You got something?” I ask.

“The foreman turned up,” he says, the noise of the yard loud behind him. “He’s dead. And we’re not talking a clean kill, Fionn. Someone butchered him.”

“Where?”

“Inside a Harrington container. We caught it just in time. The guy we suspected as a Crowe associate disappeared."

Graves reads my face and reaches for his hoodie. Our sparring session is over.

The Crowes have placed a body between Harrington cargo and Tallon ground, then they’ve stepped back to see which family reaches for a gun first.

“Nobody touches the container or calls the Gardaí,” I say. “Move it immediately and dispose of the body. We’ll wait.”

Lorcan’s voice lowers. “Saint will think we did it.”

I follow Graves to the door, buttoning my shirt as I go. “If he wants to side with Crowe, then we blow up the fucking dock and build a new one.”

Chapter 13

Sera

The man who owes us money owns a tire garage on the south side of Black Heath and has the personality of wet cardboard.

He’s forty-eight, divorced twice, and currently making the poor life choice of wasting our time.