Page 32 of The Celtic Resolution

“That man claimed it wasn’t just the Italians feeding into this black market ring. It’s us too.”

“Us?” The pain in his tone hits me like a blow to the chest. After all the good work Cormac’s done to scrape his reputation out from the shadow of our older brother and the man who nearly burned the city for his girl, something like this could break us.

“He didn’t give names but he made it pretty clear that Irish blood is involved.”

Cormac’s gaze falls to his joined hands and he nods slowly. “This is serious.”

“I know.”

“And you know we can’t act on it.”

Nodding slowly, I sigh. “I know. Either we listen and investigate openly and then alienate every Irish who thinks we’d believe Triad over them, or we investigate quietly and risk creating unrest that we’re looking into our own people.”

“But we can’t ignore it.” Cormac’s frown deepens. “We’ve never been involved in the skin trade. I can’t even think of a family fucked up enough to even try.”

“But,” I say cautiously, “there are a lot of families under us and we don’t know them all.”

Cormac nods. “I can trust you to take care of this delicately?”

He’s not asking me directly just in case this comes back to bite us, and if it does then I will happily take the fall. I nod. “Of course. Same as always.”

“Thank you. We need it to be watertight.”

“I know.”

“And Saoirse—” His voice makes me pause as I stand.

“Mmhmm?”

“Are you alright?” Gone is the tough mask of the Irish Captain and in its place sits the worried look of my brother. “You look a bit…”

“I’m fine,” I assure him as he searches for the right word. “Honestly, I’m just tired. This is keeping me up, but I’m working on it.”

“Hmm. Alright. I don’t want Cian biting my head off for working you too hard. And keep an eye on Bruno,” Cormac says, not sounding entirely convinced by my excuse. “I don’t know him so I don’t trust him.”

“Don’t worry,” I reply softly as I turn away. “I’ll keep a close eye on him.”

He’s the first person I call as I leave Cormac’s place.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Bruno says as he answers, sounding out of breath.

“What are you doing?”

“Jogging.”

“You jog?”

“Well, technically, I’m on a treadmill, so it’s more like ambling because this thing only has three speeds, but what can you do?”

“Never pegged you as a gym rat.” I slide into my car and start the engine.

“Kept me sane in prison. Sort of working the same now.”

“Fair. Listen, I think we need to put our heads together and start from the bottom. Since our lead tossed himself out of the window, our next best bet is finding out who took our women from the hospital.”

“Sounds good. Meet for drinks?”

I’ve never realized just how often alcohol gets involved in my life since I can’t have it. Shaking my head briefly, I keep my tone light. “Sure, Black Ox?”