Filthy (Five Points' Mob Collection #1) - Serena Akeroyd Page 0,50

course. You think I’d—”

He laughed. “No, son. No. Just making sure. You ashamed of us?”

Was he purposely trying to piss me off?

Apparently, my expression said it all, and he beamed my way again as he pulled away to clap me on the back. “Good, good. Never be ashamed of your roots, boy.”

“I’m not,” I groused. “I just don’t want to overwhelm her.”

“If she’s the marrying kind, then that’s the only way this will work.” He shrugged, and though it killed me to admit it, he was the only voice of experience I knew.

My father had been a cunt. Handy with his fists and other things. . . . I couldn’t think back to that time.

Wouldn’t.

When I did, the nightmares would start, and I was too fucking old for them now.

But my old man hadn’t exactly taught me the ways of a good marriage, neither had my mother who’d just sat back while her bastard husband had done things to me that no fucker should ever do to a boy.

Be it his son or not.

Aidan wasn’t the best father out there. He was deranged half the time, half-loopy the rest. His moods swung so hard from left to right, it was enough to give everyone in the vicinity whiplash, but the craziest thing of all?

He loved us.

He fucking loved us.

And I was included in that circle.

Aidan was the only one who knew what my father had done to me; was the only one I’d shared that part of my past with. He’d taken my shame and he’d done right by me. Not only had he taken me in, loved me as if I was one of his own flesh and blood, he’d taken the monster that was my sperm donor for a swim among the fishes.

Because of Aidan, I could hold my head up high. I ruled my part of Manhattan. I had millions at my command, and an investment portfolio that would make any entrepreneur envious.

Aidan had given me the world, and he and Magdalena were the only ones who’d given me an example to lead by.

“You’ll be kind to her?” I asked, my tone hesitant.

He scowled at me. “You think I’ll be mean to the first girl one of my boys brings to a roast? Not even Dec brought that Deirdre around,” he grumbled.

I winced. “Not mean, just . . . you know, don’t freak her out?” I was well aware I was pleading with him, and knew that could go either one of two ways.

It would stir his amusement or prick his temper.

“Like me to pretend to be a plumber or an electrician, would you?” he asked, and I was relieved to see the twinkle in his eye.

“Not exactly,” I muttered. “Just don’t mention the time you black-balled Jimmy the Fish, or the time you managed to knee cap two men who were tied together with one bullet.”

He snickered. “Gotcha. I’ll be on my best behavior. Go on with you. Get your lass and bring her to meet the family.”

God, help me.

Or I really meant, God help Aoife.

***

Aoife

I was so sore.

Seriously, my aches had aches and yet, I’d never had a bigger smile on my face. My body felt well used and loved.

Finn was. . . .

God, he was so rough with me. So dirty and hard, but then he could be so tender.

The dichotomy was enough to make me squirm as I stared up at the ceiling in my small two-bedroom apartment deep in the heart of the neighborhood I’d lived in since I was ten. When ‘Dad’ had died, and Fiona had decided to move in with us, we’d gone from the old building two streets away to this one.

It wasn’t much better, but there’d been no black mold in the kitchen in winter, and there had been some room to swing a cat.

When Fiona had died, I’d moved into her room after years of sharing the other bedroom with Mom. Finally having privacy hadn’t been worth Fiona’s loss, though.

It was hard to reconcile the Fiona I knew with the Fiona that Finn had.

Why had he left her?

Why had he never come back to visit with her?

I knew she’d cried every day over him, over his loss—I’d heard her. Every morning after she prayed to St. Anthony—the saint of lost objects—trying to get him to find her son for her, I’d heard her weep.

Yet, Finn had evaded her for all those years. He hadn’t even attended her funeral, and he had to have known. Right?

My thoughts