Chapter 7 - The Man in Room 412
Cormac survived.
June spent fourteen hours believing he might not.
The bullet had entered below his ribs.
Surgery lasted three hours.
June sat in the hospital waiting room wearing bloodstained clothes and refusing every offer to go home.
At 4:12 a.m., the surgeon appeared.
“He's stable.”
June cried.
Not gracefully.
Not quietly.
She cried like a woman who had spent months pretending she hadn't fallen in love.
When Cormac woke, June was asleep in the chair beside him.
“June.”
She opened her eyes.
“You idiot.”
His lips moved.
“Good morning.”
She stood and kissed him.
The heart monitor accelerated.
June glanced at it.
“Interesting.”
Cormac looked offended.
“I was shot.”
“Apparently your heart still works.”
“You're enjoying this.”
“A little.”
Then she slapped his shoulder.
He winced.
“Also enjoying that.”
“You disappeared for two months.”
“You told me to leave.”
“And then you got kidnapped.”
“I wasn't kidnapped.”
“You were tied to a chair.”
“Temporarily detained.”
“By criminals.”
Cormac considered that.
“Fair.”
June sat.
“Why?”
His humor disappeared.
“The man running Doyle's remaining operation wanted Ray's notebook.”
“The government has it.”
“He believed I had a copy.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
June stared.
“Cormac.”
“I gave it to the government yesterday.”
“Before or after you were shot?”
“Technically during.”
She closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
His hand found hers.
“I meant what I said.”
June knew exactly which words he meant.
She looked at their joined hands.
“You don't get to confess love while bleeding out and then pretend that's romantic.”
“I thought it was reasonably effective.”
“It was manipulative.”
“Did it work?”
June looked at him.
“Yes.”
Cormac smiled.
Then June's expression grew serious.
“But loving me doesn't mean controlling me.”
“I know.”
“No locked doors.”
“Unless there's a fire.”
“No disappearing to protect me.”
“I'll work on that.”
“No lies.”
Cormac hesitated.
June raised an eyebrow.
“No lies,” he agreed.
“And no treating me like some fragile old widow.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Old?”
“Forty-eight.”
Cormac stared at her.
“I'm fifty-three.”
“Exactly.”
“So if you're old, what does that make me?”
“Ancient.”
He laughed.
June leaned down.
This kiss was different.
Slow.
Certain.
Not stolen from danger.
When she pulled away, Cormac whispered, “Come home with me.”
Her chest tightened.
“Your mansion?”
“No.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere you are.”
June looked at him for a long moment.
“That's disgustingly sentimental.”
“I was shot.”
“You're exploiting it.”
“Absolutely.”
She kissed him again.
But happiness did not arrive cleanly.
The remnants of Doyle's organization still existed.
The federal investigation continued.
And Cormac faced his own choice.
For decades, he'd built an empire in the gray spaces between legitimate business and organized crime.
Now the same world had killed his daughter and nearly killed June.
One night, weeks after leaving the hospital, he sat alone in the diner.
June placed pie in front of him.
“You're thinking.”
“Dangerous habit.”
“What about?”
“Leaving.”
Her hand stopped.
“Me?”
“The organization.”
June sat opposite him.
“Can you?”
“I don't know.”
“That wasn't my question.”
Cormac understood.
Could he choose another life?
Could a man spend thirty years becoming feared and simply decide he wanted breakfast instead?
“I've started dismantling certain operations.”
“Certain?”
“June.”
“No lies.”
He sighed.
“Most.”
“Better.”
“It creates enemies.”
“You already have enemies.”
“More enemies.”
She took his fork and ate his pie.
“That was mine.”
“Occupational tax.”
Cormac watched her.
“I don't know how to be ordinary.”
June swallowed.
“Neither do ordinary people.”
He smiled.
Then the diner door opened.
Agent Ramirez entered.
He wasn't smiling.
“Mr. Riley.”
Cormac stood.
“What happened?”
Ramirez placed a photograph on the table.
A body had been discovered near the river.
Patrick Doyle.
Dead.
June looked at Cormac.
Cormac looked genuinely surprised.
Ramirez continued.
“We have surveillance footage.”
He set down another photograph.
It showed a man entering the warehouse where Doyle was found.
The timestamp was 2:13 a.m.
June stared at the image.
The man looked exactly like Cormac.
But Cormac had been sleeping beside her at 2:13.
She knew because his snoring had awakened her at two.
Cormac picked up the photograph.
His face went pale.
June whispered, “Who is that?”
May you like
Cormac answered with a name he had not spoken in twenty-nine years.
“My brother.”
