Chapter 2 - The Ghost of Southie
The silence inside the archival room felt heavier than lead. Cormac had seen violence his entire life. He had grown up in an empire built on broken bones, shattered kneecaps, and cold harbor water. He knew what a bullet did to flesh; he knew the purple bloat of a beating. But the marks on Quinn’s back were different. They were ritualistic. They were the product of weeks, perhaps months, of systematic torture designed to break a human soul without killing the body.
Quinn meticulously buttoned every single mother-of-pearl fastener on her fresh white shirt. She did not hurry. Her fingers remained steady as she worked her way from her stomach all the way up to the very top button beneath her chin, locking her neck away behind pristine cotton once again.
"It is an old personal matter, Mr. Sheridan," Quinn said, smoothing her cuffs. "It has no bearing on my job performance or the release of your containers at Pier 4."
"A personal matter?" Cormac’s voice rose, the velvet facade of the corporate executive cracking to reveal the dangerous predator underneath. He stepped into the room, kicking the fractured door shut behind him. "Those are whip scars, Sutherland. And that brand on your spine—that’s the O’Malley seal. Don’t lie to me. My father wiped that family off the map twelve years ago."
Quinn met his gaze without flinching. "Your father believed he wiped them out. Men like Silas Sheridan rarely look closely at the bodies when they're finished burning the house down."
Cormac felt a cold sensation slide down his ribs. "Who are you?"
"My name is Quinn Sutherland," she said, her voice unwavering. "My mother was Maureen O'Malley. She was your father’s half-sister, born out of wedlock, hidden away in Dorchester. When your father decided to cleanse the bloodline and take sole control of the waterfront, he didn't just target the rival bosses. He targeted anyone who could make a claim on the Sheridan trust."
Cormac took a slow, deliberate breath. His father, Silas Sheridan, had been a monster wrapped in bespoke suits, a man whose paranoia had eaten him alive before lung cancer finally finished the job two years ago. Cormac had spent the last twenty-four months trying to sanitize the family business, turning extortion rings into legitimate shipping docks and cutting ties with the violent cartels his father had welcomed.
"Silas did that to you?" Cormac asked, his voice barely above a whisper. The thought made a sickening knot tighten in his stomach.
"Not directly," Quinn replied, adjusting her glasses. "Your father was far too refined to bloody his own hands. He outsourced the dirty work. He gave my mother and me to his enforcers. They kept us in an abandoned cold storage warehouse in Fall River for four months until my mother stopped breathing. I escaped through a ventilation shaft when I was sixteen. It took three surgeries and six months in an underground clinic just to close the skin on my back."
"If you hate my family so much," Cormac asked, his eyes narrowing as suspicion battled with shock, "why the hell are you working as my secretary?"
Quinn took a step toward him. For the first time in eight months, the mild-mannered, quiet woman vanished. Her posture straightened, radiating a terrifying, focused intensity that matched Cormac’s own lethal presence.
"Because your father didn't act alone," Quinn whispered, holding his gaze. "He was fed the names of every hidden heir by someone on the inside. Someone who wanted your father to clear the board so they could eventually take the crown from him. And now, that same person is preparing to put a bullet in your head, Cormac."
Cormac stared at her, the paper manifest still clutched in his hand. "Who?"
"Your uncle Declan," Quinn said simply. "The man who runs your southern shipping lanes. The man who currently controls the private security at Pier 4."
Cormac let out a dark, humorless laugh. "Declan is a drunk. He spends half his time at the track in Saratoga."
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"That is what he wants you to think," Quinn said, reaching into her pocket and producing an encrypted flash drive. "While Rory was spilling coffee, I was intercepting an offshore manifest. Declan just signed a deal with the Bratva out of Brooklyn. They aren't shipping agricultural equipment, Cormac. They're shipping heavy munitions. And they're planning to use your dockworkers as collateral to trigger a federal raid that will put you in supermax for the rest of your life."
Before Cormac could reply, the intercom speaker on the wall crackled to life. Rory’s panicked voice echoed into the room: "Boss! Boss, you there? Uncle Declan just walked into the lobby with six guys from Brighton! They’ve got heavy coats, and they aren't smiling!"
