As Mikey keeps himself busy cooking, Conor paces up and down the kitchen. He sits every few minutes and pulls out his cell phone, trying to focus on something, but it doesn’t last long. The tension weighs heavy in the room as we wait for news from Shane.
“She must be awake by now,” Conor barks.
“I’m sure Shane will let us know as soon as she is,” I say.
“You think?” Conor pushes his chair back and walks towards the refrigerator and takes out a beer, twisting off the cap, he throws it into the trash.
“He’s not going to hurt her, Con. He’s not going to do anything without discussing it first. You know that.” I frown at him.
“But he’s not thinking straight, Liam. You’ve seen how he’s been these last few days. He’s so fucking furious with her, what if…” Conor takes a long swig of his beer and then walks towards the window and looks out at the New York skyline.
I look across at Mikey who simply shrugs his shoulders and goes back to cooking. I can’t remember a time in recent years when Shane and Conor have been so at odds. They are usually on the same page about everything and them being on opposing sides on an issue upsets the whole equilibrium of our existence.
Shane is the boss. That is an undeniable and unquestionable fact. Conor is his second.
Mikey and I enjoy being the ones who don’t have to make the difficult decisions, because we are never made to feel like we are anything but equal partners when it comes to our business. I trust both of my older brothers to do a better job of it than either me or my twin can. So, it makes me uneasy when they’re not acting like the cohesive team they usually are.
Mikey will often jokingly refer to them as the folks, and I see what he means. If I had any happy memories at all of my parents or my childhood, I suppose I might compare this situation to the feeling kids must get when their mom and dad argue.
I walk across the kitchen and stand next to Conor. “Why are you fighting him so much on this?”
He turns to me with a scowl. “Why aren’t you?”
“She left us, Conor. After everything she promised us. After everything we said to her. She just fucking upped and left.”
His face softens and he turns back to the window. “She must have had a reason, Liam.”
“I hope she fucking did. And who knows? Maybe she’s down there explaining everything to him right now?”
Conor snorts and takes another drink of his beer.
“You know what it took for him to let her in, Con. You saw how happy she made him. And you know people only get one chance with him. I don’t see how he’s going to get past this.”
“I know,” Conor says with a sigh as he hangs his head low. “That’s what I don’t get, Liam. She worked so hard to get through to him. When she finally did, she was so fucking happy. That morning before she left, she was smiling. She looked at us like we were her whole fucking world. So, if that wasn’t true, what was her game plan?”
“She left the day we put her fingerprints in the security system. That can’t be a coincidence, Con.”
He shakes his head. “But you saw how good she is, Liam. As sophisticated as our security system is, she could have hacked it in a day.”
I put a hand on his shoulder and don’t know how to answer that because he has a point. “So, what could it have been then?”
“I don’t know,” he sighs. “But there must be some reasonable explanation, because if there isn’t, what? She sucked us all in and made us fall in love with her for what? Plain old cruelty? And I can’t believe that.”
I stare at my older brother and see the pain in his face. I understand the place he’s coming from and the need to believe that Jessie is still the same person we thought she was. But what if she’s not? “What if she doesn’t have an explanation, Con? Have you even considered that? What are you going to do?”
He turns to me again and that haunted look in his eyes, the one I hoped I’d never see again, is back. “Of course I’ve considered it. But I can’t think about what I’m going to do because if fucking terrifies me. I’m terrified of what he’ll do to her. Of what I might do to her, Liam.”
I swallow. I have no answers for him. I only hope that Jessie does. But I can offer him something. “I promise I won’t let you do anything that you’ll hate yourself for. Okay?” I wrap an arm around his neck and pull him to me.
“Yeah,” he sighs.
“You two ready for some food?” Mikey shouts across the kitchen, interrupting the moment.
“I’m not hungry,” Conor shouts back.
“What? I just spent an hour making this. And it’s your favorite. You gotta eat, Con,” Mikey snaps.
“Man has a point,” I add.
“Fine,” he snaps as he downs the last of his beer.
We’re heading over to the table when Shane walks into the room and we all look up at him expectantly. My eyes scan his face and his body, looking for any clues as to what might have happened downstairs. He’s not covered in blood, so there’s that.
“Is she awake?” Conor asks.
“Yeah,” Shane says with a nod as he crosses the room to sit at the table.
“And?” I ask.
“She won’t talk,” he snaps.
“She didn’t say anything?” Conor frowns at him.
“She played dumb. Wouldn’t tell me who she was working for. And then she said some shit about the Wolf being here.”
“The Wolf?” Conor interrupts him.
“Yeah,” Shane says nonchalantly as he looks over at Mikey. “What’s for dinner?” he asks.
Conor’s entire body vibrates with anger. “Forget about dinner. What the hell did she say about the Wolf?” Conor shouts.
Shane turns to him and glares at him so fiercely, I almost shit my pants. I haven’t seen him look at any of us like that since we were kids. “She asked if he was here. She is playing the victim card, Conor,” he snarls. “Trying to make us feel sorry for her. She’s probably been fucking the Wolf all along.”
“Fuck you, Shane!” Conor snarls as he slams his fist on the table. Shane pushes his chair back, planting his hands on the table and leaning towards Conor as the two of them glare at each other, and the tension in the room ratchets up from uncomfortable to downright fucking unbearable. I feel like the kid in the middle of a bitter divorce here.
Against my better judgment, I stand by the center of the table and place a hand on each of their arms. “She’s probably still confused by the drugs we gave her. Why don’t we all have something to eat and then one of us can talk to her again?”
“I’ll be the only one doing the talking,” Shane snaps.
“And no-one is going to argue with that. So can you calm the fuck down and sit,” I say to Shane before I turn to Conor who is practically foaming at the mouth, and it fucking kills me to see my brothers like this. Damn, Jessie, better have a fucking good reason for putting us all through this shit. “Con. Let’s sit down and eat, yeah?”
It takes a few seconds but the two of them back down and sit at the table and with impeccable timing, Mikey brings a huge bowl of chili to the table. Hopefully, he’s made his extra special recipe that is so freaking hot, none of us will be able to talk much at all after a few mouthfuls.
