Disclaimer: I don't own The Black Donnellys; I just fell massively in love with them last night.
Sequel to "One Step Forward"
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You gotta understand: Jenny Reilly had run with the Donnelly brothers since she was a kid, but when she got married, that was it. No more mischief. No more practically living at the Donnelly house. Maybe it was 'cause she was scared by how much she loved Tommy. Or maybe she just decided for once to not give the old biddies in the neighborhood something to talk about.
So, when they walked up to the tavern that night, Sal's men didn't know what to think. Maybe, they thought it was a ploy on Tommy's part to keep them from hurting him and Kevin. Sal's people were old school: no women, no children. This business was men's business, and Jenny Reilly had no place in it.
Except on the way over, Tommy had taken the gun he'd gotten off of Jimmy and gave it to Kevin and then made Kevin give his gun (which he'd grabbed from The Firecracker when the somewhat confused cry had gone out that Sean was lying dead on the pavement) to her. See, Tommy didn't want Jenny caught with the gun that been used to shoot Louie Downtown if things went sour. That was Tommy—always protecting everybody.
And never thinking of himself. He walked right in there with nothing but a knife in his coat collar, and I don't think neither Kevin nor Jenny knew about that. They just stood outside the tavern, trying to look cool for Sal's men, and watched as Tommy disappeared into the basement. They had to be thinking that they weren't ever gonna see him alive again. When that first shot went off, downstairs, both of them drew without thinking.
Now, Jimmy had been the one to teach Jenny how to shoot, same as he taught Sean. He'd take the two of them to a vacant lot down the street from where they grew up—about a block from where she lived now—and they'd practice gunning down beer bottles. Sean once shot old Mrs. Tanner's cat, but that was an accident, and they buried it complete with a three-gun salute. Which was more than that damn cat deserved.
So anyway, when they heard the gunshot in the basement and thought they knew that Tommy was dead, their guns came out, quick as anything. Pop, pop, and both of Sal's men were dead, and both Kevin Donnelly and Jenny Reilly were killers, same as Tommy. Because Tommy wasn't dead. He'd just inadvertently taken over the neighborhood.