Devil of Dublin: A Dark Irish Mafia Romance Read online

  Copyright © 2022 by BB Easton

  Published by Art by Easton

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 979-8-9850730-4-1

  e-book ISBN: 979-8-9850730-3-4

  Cover Design by Damonza

  Cover Photography by Regina Wamba

  Cover Model: Jered Sternaman

  Content Editing by Traci Finlay and Adele Halpin

  Copyediting and Formatting by Jovana Shirley,

  Unforeseen Editing, www.unforeseenediting.com

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. While many of the locations mentioned in this novel are real and several situations were inspired by actual events, all of the characters and scenes depicted in this book are fictionalized products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to specific persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  The publisher acknowledges the trademark status and trademark ownership of all trademarks, service marks, and word marks mentioned in this book.

  The excerpt at the beginning of chapter twenty-two is from the poem “Leda and the Swan” by W. B. Yeats, originally published in 1924. It is within the public domain.

  “Whiskey in the Jar” and “Finnegan’s Wake” are traditional Irish folk songs dating as far back as the seventeenth century. They are within the public domain.

  The proverbs at the beginning of chapters eleven and thirteen (one of which is also the tagline on this book’s cover) are traditional Irish sayings. They are not the intellectual property of the author.

  For Grandpa Pat and Aunt Kate

  CONTENTS

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  Playlist

  Praying for Rain

  Books by BB Easton

  About the Author

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Dear reader,

  I’m so happy you’re here. Together, you and I are going to frolic through the sheep-dotted meadows and mystical forests of County Kerry, Ireland. We’re going to fall in love with someone forbidden. Mysterious. Dangerous. And we’re going to follow our hearts instead of our minds, all the way to the cutthroat, urban underbelly of Dublin. It’ll be the journey of a lifetime, a romance for the ages, but it will not be safe for everyone.

  If you are a sensitive reader or find certain topics to be emotionally triggering, please exercise self-care and select a different book. While this story is deeply romantic and exaltingly beautiful, those intoxicating highs are only made possible by first exploring some of the darkest aspects of humanity, including secrets that were kept buried by my family, as well as the Catholic Church, for decades.

  To avoid spoilers, I’ve placed a comprehensive content warning on my website. Please consult it if you are unsure whether or not to proceed: https://www.artbyeaston.com/devil-of-dublin-content-warning

  Devil of Dublin is intended for mature audiences who enjoy dark subject matter, tortured anti-heroes, explicit sexual content, graphic violence, heart-pounding suspense, fairy-tale worthy love, and gorgeous Irish scenery. If that sounds like you, then welcome to Glenshire!

  XO,

  BB

  CHAPTER 1

  DARBY

  I sank my fingers knuckle deep into the spongy wool, trying not to squeal as I closed my fists around two satisfying handfuls of fluff.

  “Darby,” Mom snapped in that stop it right now tone. “Be sweet.”

  “But, Mama, he can’t even feel it.” I beamed. “Look!” I squeezed the sheep’s wool again.

  The animal continued to ignore me, finding the grass in my grandfather’s pasture much more interesting than the annoying American girl who’d come to visit.

  I’d never been to Ireland before. I’d never even been on a plane before, so the entire trip to attend my grandmother’s funeral was full of new sights and sounds, but the one that delighted me the most wasn’t the view from the clouds or the rainbow-colored shops and houses we’d passed on the bus to Glenshire. It wasn’t the musical accents or old-timey clothing of the people we’d met along the way. It was the big, colorful dots spray-painted on every fluffy white sheep in my grandfather’s village.

  “Grandpa, why do all your sheep have blue spots on their butts? Is it so they’ll match your blue house? Is blue your favorite color? My favorite color’s green. I like it here. Everything’s green, green, green. Mama says that’s why they call it the emerald eyeball.”

  “Emerald Isle,” my mom corrected. “Isle means island.”

  Her eyes were red and puffy that day, and her mouth was frownier than usual. It made me anxious whenever she was upset about something. Or when she got sick. Or when she was too tired to play with me.

  My mom was all I had.

  While she stood there and scowled, my grandfather snickered at my emerald eyeball comment. He was sad about my grandmother, too, but that didn’t keep him from smiling when he spoke to me. I hadn’t seen him since I was a baby, so I didn’t remember him or my grandmother at all, but as soon as I’d gotten there, he’d acted like we were already best friends.

  Grandpa bent forward and sank one knee into the grass, making himself as short as I was. He did that a lot. It made me feel special, like he was on my team instead of the grown-ups’.

  “I do paint their wool to match my house. Yer very smart,” he said. “Sheep are wily creatures. Even though they look fat and none too nimble, they’re skinny under all that wool, and they can jump like a billy goat. I seen a sheep squeeze through a gap in the fence no bigger than yer arm. But spray paint is a lot cheaper than a good fence, so the other farmers and I paint our sheep to match our houses. That way, when one gets out, everybody knows who the little bugger belongs to.”

  I giggled and squeezed the sheep’s wool again, right on that bright blue spot.

  “Darby, gentle,” Mama hissed.

  Grandpa looked up at her like he was about to do something naughty. Then, he gave me a little smirk.

  “Lass”—his green eyes sparkled—“ya ever been on an adventure?”

  My mom glared at him in warning.

  “No.” I shook my head. “I have been on an airplane though.”

  He laughed, and I thought he looked just like a leprechaun. His once-bright orange hair had faded to a golden blond by then, and he had so many freckles that his face looked like a wrinkly, old, speckled egg, but the twinkle in his eye was just as sharp and mischievous as a child’s. br />
  “Da, where ya goin’ with this?” My mom’s Irish accent had gotten stronger since we’d arrived.

  Grandpa ignored her warning and kept talking to me as if we were the only two people on earth.

  Pointing across the street from his house, he said, “Down the hill, ya got more farms, if ya wanna see what colors the other sheep’s butts are.”

  I turned my head and gazed into a valley as soft and green as a velvet pillow. And adorning the hills—like a scattering of rhinestones and pearls—were the other jewel-toned farmhouses and fluffy white sheep of Glenshire.

  “But up the hill …” Grandpa continued, pointing behind us at the woods that began just beyond his property.

  The trees were shorter than the tall pines I was used to back home in Georgia. Cuter. I could still see the shape of the landscape. The rise and fall of the hills behind Grandpa’s house that changed from green to blue to gray until they rose up into a tall purple mountain off in the distance.

  “That’s where the fairies live.”

  “Fairies?!” I squealed. My eyes darted from the woods to Grandpa, then over to my mom, hoping she would verify this miraculous news, but her expression was more annoyed than excited.

  “Aye.” Grandpa leaned toward me, lowering his voice. “But ya have to be quiet if ya want to see one. Quiet as a mouse. Fairies have excellent hearin’. If they sense a human nearby, they’ll use their magic to disappear like that.” He suddenly snapped his fingers, making me jump.

  Beaming, I looked up at my mom and gave her my best Disney princess eyes. “Can we go see the fairies, Mama? Please, please, pleeease?”

  She was going to say no. I could tell from her scowl, but when she opened her mouth, Grandpa spoke instead.

  “Yer mam’s gonna stay here and keep the oul fella company. It’s been six years since last I seen her. I’d better enjoy it. The next time might be at my funeral.”

  “Da.”

  “G’wan now,” Grandpa said, continuing to ignore his daughter. “Have a bit o’ the craic.”

  I didn’t know what the crack was, but I knew that my mom was less than enthusiastic about it.

  “Da, she’s eight. Ya really think it’s a good idea for her to go play in the woods by herself?”

  Grandpa stood up and brushed the dirt off his knee. “If memory serves, I believe you found a whole village of fairies back there when you were her age. Or was it a kingdom?”

  “A kingdom!” I yelled, bouncing up and down.

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Ah, ya been livin’ in the States too long. There’s nothin’ to fear in these woods ’cept for Tommy Lafferty’s old sheep dog that keeps wanderin’ off.” He looked down at me with a serious face. “If ya see him, he’s likely to lick ya to death, so be on the lookout.”

  “I’m more concerned about her gettin’ lost,” Mom protested, crossing her arms over her chest.

  “Aye, that’s easy.” Grandpa held up two hands, one high and one low, cupped like domes. “Ya go up the hill,” he said, giving the lower hand a little shake, “ya go down the hill. Ya see a lough at the bottom.”

  “Ooh. Do I need a key?”

  “Lough means lake,” my mom corrected.

  “And legend has it, this lough has a spirit in it. A moody oul thing. Can be mean as a snake if ya cross her, but I hear she likes presents.”

  My eyes went wide, but Grandpa just kept talking like it was perfectly normal to have a haunted lake behind your house.

  “On the other side of the lough”—he gave the hand up high a shake—“ya see the mountain. Don’t go to that side of the lough. A witch lives over there, and if the rumors are true, she likes to eat little children. The cuter, the better. So, stay on this side of the lough, and when you get to missin’ me handsome face, just go back to the top o’ the hill, look for the blue house, and you’ll find himself.”

  Grandpa liked to refer to himself as himself. He even had a coffee mug with the word on it.

  I was astonished by all this new information, but my mom just rolled her eyes. “A witch, Da? Really?”

  “Aye, don’t ya remember?” he said with a little wink. “Nobody goes to the witch’s side of the lough, lest they wanna be turned into a toad.”

  “I thought you said she eats children,” I clarified, trying to sound super brave.

  “Aye.” Grandpa tapped me on the head with a smile. Like he knew I was smart.

  I was a bright kid—my mother was a teacher and insisted that I always be above grade level in all subject areas—but it made me feel good to know that Grandpa thought I was smart too.

  “It’s the grown-ups she turns into toads,” he added. “We’re not as tasty.”

  “Da, stop it. Yer gonna scare her.” Turning toward me, my mom sighed and reached into her pocket. “I s’pose you can go, but”—taking out her phone, she tapped the screen a few times before tucking it into my back pocket and covering it with my T-shirt—“don’t you dare go near that lough. I mean it. And when that alarm goes off”—she pointed at my pocket—“you come straight home. Ya hear me?”

  I hugged her so hard that she made a groaning noise before I took off running straight for the woods.

  “Stop in and grab ya a biscuit ’fore ya go,” Grandpa yelled behind me. “If ya find a fairy ring, put it in the middle and see if ya can lure one out. The good people love biscuits.”

  ☘

  “Heeeere, fairy, fairy, fairy,” I whispered as I tiptoed into the woods, holding that sugary treat out in front of me like a homing device. It took all my willpower not to eat it myself.

  Biscuits, I’d discovered, were just delicious sandwich cookies with vanilla custard cream in the middle that you were allowed to eat if you pretended to like tea.

  In the shade, the air was damp and cool. Much too cool for summertime. I shivered as goose bumps spread across my arms and legs. It felt tingly, like there were soda bubbles bursting all over my skin.

  Must be the fairy magic, I thought.

  Not only was it darker in the woods than I’d expected, and colder, but it was greener too. Even the tree trunks were green and fuzzy.

  Maybe that’s so the fairies can climb the trees without getting splinters.

  The thought made me smile, but then it made me think about my father. He’d been the official splinter-puller-outer at our house. He had this technique with a safety pin and a pair of tweezers that was unrivaled. He’d say something silly to distract me, and before I knew it, no more splinter. But that had been before he got mean. Before my mother made him leave. Before he lost custody completely.

  I tried extra hard not to get splinters after that.

  I bet Daddy could find a fairy if he were here.

  He could prob’ly find that witch too. And beat her up for eatin’ all those kids.

  My dad was the drummer for a one-hit-wonder rock band. He was covered in tattoos and had big, muscular arms that he liked to show off by wearing sleeveless T-shirts all year long. When I was a kid, I thought he could beat anybody up.

  The only thing my mom had told me when he lost all visitation rights was that he needed to go “work on himself,” but that hadn’t made any sense to me. If somebody needed to get their car fixed or their house worked on, it only took a couple of days. Weeks at the most.

  Meanwhile, I hadn’t seen my dad in three years.

  “Heeeere, fairy, fairy, fairy,” I whispered again, bending down so I could look under a fat, little mushroom; a big, tickly fern; and in between the rows of wavy fungus growing up the side of a decomposing log.

  Nothin’.

  I knew I should have asked Grandpa what a fairy ring was before I left, but I’d been so afraid my mother was going to change her mind that I didn’t want to wait around for details. But now, I had no idea what I was looking for.

  When I finally made it to the top of the hill, I had to cover my mouth with my hand to keep from gasping out loud and scaring off all the fairies. There, on the other side, was a sea o
f flowers, their blossoms pointing down instead of up, like tiny, purple church bells.

  This must be where the fairies grow their hats!

  I proceeded with extreme caution, careful not to step on a single flower. I didn’t want some poor fairy to have to wear a smooshed hat because of me.

  I bet they use the stems as slides. I would if I were a fairy. Ooh! I should make them a swing to go with all these slides!

  As I searched the forest floor for something to make a swing with, I stumbled upon an adorably chubby red mushroom with white polka dots. It reminded me of a Smurf house. Then, I saw another one and another one. So, I gently moved the bluebells out of the way and noticed that the mushrooms formed a circle. Or a …

  Ring! Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh …

  My heart raced as I slowly extended my tea biscuit toward the center of the formation. My hand shook, which I naturally attributed to the strength of the fairy magic.

  Maybe they’re home! Maybe I’ll get to see one!

  But before I could set the biscuit down, I heard something that made me go “still as a statue.” That was what my teacher had called it whenever she wanted us to shut up and freeze.

  It sounded like the fairies were laughing. I bit my lip to keep from laughing, too, and put on my best “listening ears.” Then, I heard it again. Maybe it wasn’t laughing, but something out there was definitely making noise. Sniffling? Snorting? But it did not seem to be coming from the mushroom circle.

  I headed down the hill in the direction of the sniffle-snorts, scanning the ground for new mushroom villages to investigate. As the noise got louder and the mushrooms got scarcer, I finally lifted my head and found myself standing right in front of a crumbling stone wall. It was a few inches taller than me, but I could tell it used to be way taller than that. The rocks were all jagged at the top. And it didn’t have sides. The wall was curved. Like a …

  Like a circle!

  The sounds were loud now, and they were definitely coming from inside. I decided that walking around the outside to look for a door would probably make too much noise and scare whatever it was away, so I climbed onto a nearby boulder. It was hard to scale with a biscuit in my hand and slippery moss covering the flat places, but I did it. And once I felt stable enough, I found two good places to put my feet and slowly pushed myself to stand.