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That’s when my father got to his feet and cast his plate aside with a crash. He jabbed a finger at me across the tabletop, and his face was pure fucking spite.
“It’s not your concern when we take a stand against the Constantines, boy. It’s mine. It’s always been mine.”
“Stop,” my mother said, but Father gestured her away.
“This isn’t for you, Sarah. Leave, please.”
She hovered, a maternal fear in her eyes as she looked at me across the table. Still, it didn’t stop her bowing to my father’s will when he cursed and pointed to the doorway a second time.
“Leave!”
I watched my mother’s exit and wished that I could somehow feel something inside me.
I wished I could feel more. I wished I could embrace a hint of love, or warmth for the woman who’d given birth to me and raised me to my place in this world. I wished I could look over at my father and his rage and feel the true belt of shame gripping me tight. But I didn’t.
I didn’t feel a thing . . . and Father knew it. I never had.
He walked around the table and kicked out a chair at my side. He turned it to face him and dropped himself down to straddle the seat.
“Believe me, Lucian, if violence were an option to knock some sense into you, I’d be taking it now. You’d be feeling my wrath with your skin and bones.”
I didn’t react, just kept my eyes on his until he spoke again.
“Trenton told me you’ve been asking questions about Elaine Constantine. He said that you met with her.”
“Trenton Alto is a piece of shit who has no business telling anyone any of mine.”
“Trenton has every business telling me about anything that concerns me,” Father snapped. “Tell me now, boy. Have you met Elaine Constantine?”
I tipped my head to the side. “I met Elaine Constantine at Tinsley Constantine’s masked coming-of-age ball. I went there to investigate the Constantine compound and work out a route to their destruction. I enjoyed the thrill.”
As usual, I hadn’t lied. My stance was faultless as I stayed still in my seat.
Father would have punched me straight in the ribs if there had been any point. Instead, he leaned in close, and his voice was a river of shards.
“I’ve always been very proud of you, Lucian. You’ve made an excellent son with excellent prospects. You’re every part the Morelli heir I created, and I’m very proud of that. Very proud.”
Every statement like that always comes with a but, and Father’s came loud and clear.
“I’m telling you now though, boy, you go anywhere near that Constantine bitch again, and you’ll be dead to me. Our family will never live with that betrayal to our name. Do you understand?”
He was giving me more leeway than I would have expected. A pleasant surprise.
I smirked at him. “Yeah, I get it. I go near Elaine Constantine again you’re going to wipe me out. Blow my brains out and kiss goodbye to your heir in a heartbeat.”
He smirked back, coldly, and for once inside I felt something. I felt a shiver of fear.
“Maybe it’s not you who will be wiped out, son. Maybe you’ll be confined to darkness in a cellar, not in the ground. One thing you can be sure of, though, I’ll be wiping out Elaine Constantine if you so much as set a foot in her direction, and I’ll make sure we don’t take the credit for her demise.”
“Trenton told you I have feelings for her, did he?” I scoffed.
Father stayed smirking. “No. He didn’t say that, actually. He told me you were hunting her down in a way he’d never seen before, and he had his . . . suspicions. I’d have killed you by my own hands by now if I believed for a second you would ever care for a Constantine bitch.”
He wasn’t lying, and I didn’t blame him.
I should kill myself by my own hands for even contemplating I might want anything more from that bitch than her blood and pain.
“I’d never love a Constantine woman,” I told him, and my voice was seething.
“I damn well hope not.” With that, my father pulled his knife from across the table and offered it to me. “Swear it, then. Swear on the Morelli oath. Swear to God and the Virgin Mother above.”
I shouldn’t do it. Even with that shiver of doubt and sin inside me, I should never have taken that knife from him. I was damning myself to hell for all time.
But I didn’t care.
For once in my life, the Morelli oath meant less to me than a woman I should despise.
I ran the blade down my palm, slicing deep and true. The blood dripped, running a vein of a river as I squeezed my fingers closed tight.
