Page 39 of Sins of Arrogance (Syndicate Sins #1)

The blade is six inches long and so sharp when Wraith tests it with his thumb, a drop of blood wells. He makes a sound of surprise.

"There are no weapons just for show in the mob." We don't do pretty swords hanging on the walls that can't do their job of running an opponent through.

Or beheading him when necessary.

My father's sword has taken more than one finger from his soldiers in punishment.

Brogan prefers other methods.

Namely, sending them to dance with the devil. Me.

He runs his fingertip over the claddagh on one side of the hilt. "My mother has a ring with this on it, given to her by her mother."

"Every element symbolizes something to our clan."

"What?" he asks, his tone low.

"The heart is usually associated with love, but for us it stands for the lifeblood you are willing to sacrifice for the mob."

His eyes meet mine, his unreadable. "And the hands?"

"The hand of your brothers that will always be reaching toward you as yours will reach to help them. A mob is family, not just a group you join."

"Being in the Irish mob is a way of life," he says like he's repeating something he heard.

"Who told you that?"

"One of my Ranger brothers."

That tracks. From fighting for Irish liberation to protecting the country of their birth, there has always been members of the mob in the military. "He was right."

"I thought the Army was a way of life too."

"The crown symbolizes loyalty. No man gets inducted that isn't trustworthy."

"Not even someone born to the mob?" he asks, his tone disbelieving.

"Not even then. Family shouldn't be the weak link in a syndicate. They should be the strongest members." The deadliest. Like me.

Like Fitz will be one day.

He flips the skean over and makes another involuntary sound of surprise.

That side of the hilt is engraved with the Shaughnessy coat-of-arms. Below that is his name and below that is the year of his induction.

This year.

He'll either be part of the mob, or dead by December 31 st .

"That means if you die on a job, we bury you. Properly. If you're captured, we come for you. If you're betrayed—"

His head comes up at that, his eyes burning.

"You are your own instrument of justice and if you can't be, your brothers take the job on for you."

"Luan believed my mom betrayed her husband." Wraith is testing me like I'm testing him.

"If that had happened to the wife of one of my men when he was in prison, I would have sent Rory to settle it."

"Rory?"

"He's our best stealth assassin."

Wraith doesn’t blink. "What about the child she carried?"

"Would have been raised to serve the mob like the other sons of our clan."

"That's not how it is in The Albanian Boys. Pure bloodlines are prized."

And his wasn't considered pure. "The mob has always recruited from outside the clan. Keeps those bloodlines healthy."

Wraith almost cracks a smile at that. "They looked down on my mom before she got pregnant with me, because her mother wasn't Albanian."

"Your Irish blood is not something you have to be ashamed of," I growl.

"What about my Italian and Albanian blood?"

"You're in America, boyo. This country is filled with people whose bloodlines scatter to the four corners of the world."

"Not yours. You're Irish through and through."

"Don't you believe it. My great-grandfather was a Scot. You go back far enough and you'll find a Viking."

"So, you're saying it doesn't matter?"

"The only thing that matters, is if you are willing to bleed for your own."

Wraith inclines his head.

"Being one of ours isn't about bloodlines, it's about brotherhood. Knowing someone has your six in a firefight, that you won't be hung out to dry when the feckin' feds or the Russians come calling."

"The Rangers was a brotherhood."

"But then they loaned you to covert ops for one of the alphabets. Those feckers left you for dead in a country ours denied sending you to."

"Ours?" he asks.

"I'm a U.S. citizen." I still have my Irish citizenship too.

"I won't ask how you know all that."

"Even if you were already mobbed up, I wouldn't tell you." It's a warning.

We keep secrets for the good of the clan. There are things I know that even Brogan doesn’t.

He thinks there are things he knows that I don't. I let him live with his illusions.

"The only question that matters right now, is: do you want to earn that skean ?"

Wraith's jaw flexes and he looks down at the knife again. "I was freelance for a reason."

"Because you didn't have brothers you could trust."

"How do I know I can trust you?"

"That's what training and initiation is for." Trust has to be built both ways.

He slides the skean into its leather sheath and hands it to me. "I'll earn it."

"I never doubted it but remember, when you fucked up in the Army, your CO made you do pushups until you puked or passed out. If you fuck up with us, that'll feel like child's play."

He doesn't look worried. I'd be disappointed if he did.

"And if you betray us, I'll put a bullet through your brain myself."

Wraith's mouth twitches again. "I would expect no less."

"Tell me about Darakov," I order.

Wraith is silent for several long seconds and I let him make up his mind.

Either he's loyal to us, or he's loyal to the man who paid for his services but refused him the distinction of brother.

"He wants the weapon prototype. He thinks you got it after a demo that went bad last year."

"He's right."

"He found the assistant that worked with the engineer who designed it. Darakov thinks he can get the electric gun working."

"That's what he called it? An electric gun?" Not a rail gun. Not a ghost gun.

"Yes. He said, it's like a taser, but it shoots an electric bullet with enough charge to stop the heart."

That is not the base design of the whisper gun, even before Hex got her hands on the schematics.

"That's what the assistant told him?" It doesn't sound like Darakov was at the demonstration.

"I guess."

"What's the assistant's name?"

"Denis."

"No surname?" I press.

"He never used one in my hearing." Wraith wipes his face with the bottom of his t-shirt. "The only other thing I know about the Russian is that he's trying to arrange a marriage with the daughter of one of the Northside Dublin Mob's leaders, but she's disappeared."

"He doesn't know where she is?" That could be useful.

"No. He tried to hire me to find her."

"You refused."

"If she ran, she had her reasons."

Aye. Dierdre wanted to come after me.

Even so, keeping her here will use Darakov's resources. A strategic positive.

"Why does he want to marry her?" I ask.

"He wants an heir, but negotiating the marriage alliance gave him the chance to get information he wanted."

Bleedin' feckin' hell.

Did my da tell Darakov about the Bunker?

And Brogan is probably the bigmouth who told Kelly about the Bunker. Or at least the tunnels used to hide Shaughnessy mob soldiers back in the day.

On the positive side, it sounds like Darakov's intel is both vague and inaccurate. He has no idea how close to production on the Vanta we are.

"Did your intel include information on the Bunker, or just the tunnels?" I ask.

"The tunnels. He assumed if you had tunnels under the city, you had storerooms too."

Gjon's comment that Darakov wanted the whisper gun prototype and anything stored with it makes more sense now.

He doesn't know about the lab.

And because of the way we played with Gjon's brain, he doesn't know any more about the Bunker than he did before sending a team in to steal from us.