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But this isn’t court.
This is my life.
“Yes.”
I don’t have to think about it. I just know it, as surely as I know the sun rises in the east.
“Yes,” I growl. “I love your daughter.”
Hideo smiles. “Good. Then let me tell you a few things I’ve learned about you.”
My brow cocks as he steeples his hands.
“You’re a good man, Gabriel.”
I scoff. “I think that might depend on your perspective.”
“I don’t think perspective enters into it. It’s a fact. Look what you did for me.”
“Let’s be honest, Hideo. I needed your daughter?—”
“But you didn’t need to move her old cancer-ridden father into a multi-million-dollar penthouse with a live-in nurse and bodyguard.”
I arch a brow. Hideo sighs.
“Which brings me to my next argument, counselor. You know who and what I am.”
I shake my head slowly. “Your past doesn’t?—”
“Yes, but it could have. Maybe it should have. You’re running for Governor, Gabriel. And your father-in-law was a Yakuza oyabun. Which, by the way, is how I know Tate is more than just a nurse with ‘some army training’.” He stares long and hard at me. “Taking care of me, even keeping me in the picture at all, was a huge risk for you. And yet…” he shrugs. “Here we are.”
I nod slowly, turning to stare out the window.
“You don’t need to tell me precisely what’s bothering you,” Hideo says quietly. “But I’m going to tell you one other thing I know about you.”
When I turn back to him, he’s eyeing me coolly.
“You’re a wolf, Mr. Black.”
I stiffen. “Excuse me?”
“A lone one, without a pack.”
“Mr. Yamaguchi?—”
“And once a wolf…” His eyes lock with mine, and I realize the man is more of an equal than I could ever have dreamed. “Always a wolf.”
The room goes silent.
“And the thing about lone wolves, Mr. Black?—”
My fucking phone chooses that moment to go off. I scowl as I glance at it. “Mr. Yamaguchi, I’m terribly sorry. Hold that thought. I need to take this.”
“Of course.”
I stand, walking to the doorway into the kitchen area before answering Ares’s call.
“Takato Ito is still on a non-entry list into the US. His passport is still showing him as being in Japan.”
