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Nolan holds his hands out, laying them on the desk. “Obviously we’re kind of alike in features,” he says. “But when I saw your hands, I just knew.”
I stare at his hands on the desk, then at mine, back and forth. The width of our palms, the length of our fingers, the shape of our thumbs. “Well, I’ll be damned,” I whisper, taken aback. I look up at him, and he smiles. How the fuck did I not see this before? Even his teeth are the same as mine. His smile. The cheeky glint in his eyes. “You’re a lot like me when I was your age.”
“I am?”
“Yeah.” I stand. “Fucking stupid.” I pick up a pen and throw it at his head, and he ducks too late. It ricochets of his forehead and hits the desk. “We need to work on your stealth skills.”
“I’m incapacitated,” he protests, outraged, rising from the desk with too much effort. So I help him, and he stands on one leg before me, his gaze lifting up my chest until he has my eyes. I see tears in his. Feel them in mine.
Fucking hell.
I swallow down the lump in my throat and reach for his cheek, cupping it, nodding mildly. “Hey, son,” I say quietly. “Nice to meet you.”
Tears run down his cheeks, a small snivel escaping. “Hey . . . Dad?”
Dad? Fuck, I never thought I’d get that word tossed my way.
I haul him into my chest and hug the shit out of him, making sure he knows he’s wanted, feeling an incredibly intense instinct to protect him. And an insane feeling of peace mixed with sorrow. I missed the first twenty years of his life. How will I ever make up for that? I’ve always had an inexplicable soft spot for the kid. Now, I can’t help but think it was the universe talking to me. “You good?” I ask, keeping hold of him.
“Yeah, I’m good.” He eases away from me, and I roughly wipe at his cheeks.
“Sit the fuck down,” I say, pushing into his shoulder, watching him struggle to remain standing on one leg. He falls to the seat, and I prop myself back on the desk, lighting up as I answer a call from Otto.
“How’d it go?” I ask.
“You should buy a hat.”
I smile. “Congratulations. What do you have for me?”
“I’m on my way to the boatyard. I’m dropping him off and leaving, okay?”
“Thanks.” I hang up and get back to Nolan. “We need to talk about Ella,” I say, blowing out the smoke over his head. “You know she can’t keep working the stage, don’t you?”
“I can’t make her quit.”
“You can and you will.”
He looks up at me, alarmed. “It’s all she knows.”
“It’s all she knew. Now she knows you, and you are my son. I can’t have clientele drooling over my son’s girlfriend.” I stand. “Pearl’s quit the bar, so Ella can fill for her.”
“What? You’d do that for her?”
I study him for a moment, thinking. Then lower to the desk again. “You’re serious about her?” I ask. “Because in this world, Nolan, you only take a woman if you’re serious about her. And when I say serious, I mean a lifetime. Forever. You would die for her. Kill for her. You pull a woman into our world, you vow to protect her from it.”
He nods, his face straight and serious, and I return it, rising from the desk again. “Don’t go far. We have somewhere to go.” I walk over to the door that leads up to the hidden office.
“Where?”
“It’s a surprise. Now go get Ella off that stage.” I push in the code and make my way up the stairs, the small space filled with clouds of my smoke. I relish it, pushing the door open. Danny’s on the couch, a Scotch in his hand, James is at the window with a vodka, looking down on the club, and Ringo and Goldie are playing chess. Fucking chess. They both look up, hunched over the board.
Danny nods mildly, impressed by the state of me. I go to him. “Stand up.”
He frowns, flicking questioning eyes to James, before slowly rising to his feet. I remove the glass of Scotch from his hand, holding it out, and James is quick to take it. “What the fuck are you doing?” Danny asks. “I was enjoying that.”
I swing at him, cracking him on the jaw, trying to aim for an undamaged part of his face, but that’s easier said than done given what his face has been through recently. The noise is piercing. He flies back, landing on the couch, his arms sprawled out, his face a picture of shock. “You ever lay a finger on my son again,” I say calmly. “I’ll fucking kill you.”
He stares at me, slowly taking his hand to his mouth and wiping, licking his lip, tasting the blood. I’ve upset the old wound. He laughs under his breath in disbelief, then looks at me, and the slow formation of a smile spreads across his evil face. I put my hand out, he takes it, let’s me pull him to his feet, and then drags me in for a manly hug.
