My father was sitting in the living room when I walked inside, a cigar smoldering in the ashtray. He was drinking with one of his men. A bottle of scotch sat in the center of the table, and their glasses were both full of another round.
He looked up at me—dark eyes identical to mine. “You looked a lot better in that suit you were wearing the last time I saw you.”
I took a seat on the leather couch and glared at the man across from me. He was the head of security, but he was chummy with my father. He handled my glare as much as possible before he finished his glass and dismissed himself.
My father pushed the bottle toward me. “You can have that. I’m sure you don’t need a glass.”
I wasn’t in the mood for his games. “You threatened my wife.”
He tilted his head slightly and shrugged. “Not quite. I told her she should go home to her husband. Then I threatened her.”
“Doesn’t matter what the order was.”
“I think you should be thanking me. She’s home because of me, right?”
I had no idea how I would have gotten her back otherwise.
“She needed to be reminded of her station. She needed to remember what she was losing by walking away.”
“She’s too good for me, and we both know it.”
“I don’t know about that,” he said with a chuckle. “But I can tell that woman loves you…and I can tell she means a great deal to you. Whatever your differences are, you could work them out. I doubt she left just because Kamikaze is dead…which means you screwed it up at some point.”
“How would you know if she loves me?” I doubted Arwen blurted that out when he had a gun pointed at her.
“Because I was there.”
I ignored the bottle of scotch he’d offered me. When I thought about the moments when it was obvious how she felt about me, there was no one else in the room. It was us together in the shower, deep under the sheets, or just looking at each other across the table.
“I was there when she played that song for you…in case you don’t remember.”
After everything that had happened with Arwen, the details of that night slipped my mind. I barely remembered the conversation I had with him at the bar. It wasn’t much of a conversation because he didn’t say a word.
“I had more important things on my mind.”
“Clearly…” He shook the ice cubes in the glass and took a drink.
“So you openly admit you want to kill the woman who loves your son?”
He shrugged. “Wouldn’t have to be this way if she hadn’t gotten in my way.”
“You should thank her. She stopped you from doing something you would have regretted.”
“I don’t regret anything.”
“Really?” I asked bitterly. “You should regret getting involved with Ramon in the first place. That’s the reason Mother got killed. All of this happened because of you. You may have lost your revenge because of Arwen, but all of this happened because of you. Stop putting the blame on other people, and put it where it belongs.” I rose to my feet, sickened by the empty look in his eyes. “Stay away from my wife. If I see you anywhere near her, I’ll kill you. And I mean that.”
He lifted his gaze to look at me, his elbows resting on his knees.
“You didn’t protect your wife the way you should have. I won’t make the same mistake.” I turned away and left the living room, knowing full well I could pull out my gun and shoot him right between the eyes. When faced with a loaded pistol across from Kamikaze, I didn’t hesitate to compete in a deadly match of Russian roulette. I certainly wasn’t afraid of anything—like pulling the trigger. But even now, I still couldn’t put a bullet in his brain and watch the light leave his eyes. I hated myself for that.
“Maverick?”
My feet halted on their own even though I wished I could keep walking. I wished this man didn’t have any effect on me, that he didn’t have this invisible power over me. In my eyes, he was still my father, the man who raised me. I slowly turned back to him. “Do what you have to do. Just know I’ll do the same.”
Arwen spent her time in her bedroom for the next few days. She watched TV in her living room, had meals by herself, and rarely ventured out unless she went to work in Florence.
As much as I wanted more from her, I kept being patient.
I spent my time at the gym and working in my office. My thoughts always strayed to the woman living in my house, the woman who wanted nothing to do with me. Ever since she’d come into my life, she complicated things. My relationship with my father was never the same. Even my relationship with myself wasn’t the same either. There was no one else who could make me face Kamikaze in a standoff like that, but she made me do the most unexpected things.