City on Fire (Danny Ryan, #1)

by Don Winslow

Ned don’t say anything. Ned rarely does. One hard case, Ned Egan. When he was a kid at St. Michael’s, the priests and nuns beat him half to death trying to straighten him out. The sister would make Ned stretch his hand out on the desk, then slam the edge of a ruler down on his fingers, and he’d just look at her and smile. He’d get home, his old man would see the welt on his hand and figure that Ned had done something to piss off the sister, so he’d lay Ned down on the bed and bring a razor strap down on the backs of his legs until Ned cried. Problem was, Ned wouldn’t cry and his old man wouldn’t give up. Those days, no one had heard of Child Protective Services, it wasn’t even a concept, so Ned took some ferocious beatings. He’d go to school the next morning with blood leaking through the backs of his pants legs, which would stick to the seat of his chair whenever he went to get up. The teachers learned not to call him to the blackboard those days so as not to embarrass the boy. When Ned was fourteen, his old man picked up the strap and told him to lie down but Ned swung on him instead, put him on the floor, then ran out and tried to join the merchant marine. They laughed at him and told him to come back in four years. So Ned lived on the streets for a while, until Marty Ryan had a cot put in the storage closet at the Gloc, let the lad sweep up the place for a bowl of lamb stew or shepherd’s pie or whatever was left over at night.