I lean forward, watching, observing, dreaming of what this evening could end up like if only I hadn’t made a certain promise to Atlas. But it won’t be just my oath that will keep my hands free from Mason’s blood. While my promise is a border I could never cross, my conscience on the matter of killing the father of the man I love nowfeels like an electric fence surrounded by miles of minefields.
“What would you do for him?” Mason asks halfway through his cake.
Not kill you,even when every fiber of my being screams for it.
Not kill you,even when I might die by your hands any minute now.
Not kill youbecause that’s what Atlas asks of me.
“I would serve food to the man who killed my dog.”
The room goes still, not even a single fork daring to clink against the porcelain plates, while Atlas’s palm squeezes my thigh in another warning. A warning I’ll ignore.
Mason’s eyes crinkle in amusement.
“That’s not what you’d dofor him.That’s called knowing your place.”
The periphery of my vision catches Link cutting himself one more piece of the cake. Even the fact that the room reeks of tension couldn’t make him keep his hands away from that dessert.
“Would you kill for him?” Mason continues, eating the rest of the cake, asking that question in a casual manner.
Staring straight into that monster’s eyes, I note the exact moment all reason packs its bags and leaves me charging headfirst into a suicide quest.
“You—in an instant!”
The clatter of Jacob’s fork is a sign my threat lit the fuse of a bomb, and now shit really is about to hit the fan. Dead silence returns to the room, only for Mason’s maniacal laughter to rip through it, sending a shudder through me as the sound slices straight through my bones.
I draw an under-the-radar deep breath, trying to pull myself together.
“I like her.”
Mason glances back at Atlas with those words. Then he sets his fork down and pushes the plate forward, with barely any cake left init.
“When I met your mother, I used to look at her the same way you drink up your girlfriend here. My father was the one who told me that’s a sign of weakness.A living and breathing weakness.I never stopped loving my wife, but I had to change the way I looked at her in front of people. You should, too, son.”
His fingers push against his temple, a pause loaded with nothing good to come.
“Let me tell you the three pieces of advice your grandfather offered me before I married your mother.”
He talks to Atlas like the rest of us aren’t there, not sparing a single glance our way.
“Your woman should be beautiful, because beauty on your arm signals power.” His attention shifts to me for a moment. “You’ve outdone yourself in that department.”
Then it’s back on Atlas.
“Your woman should be smart, because at the end of the day, you’ll want someone you can talk to. Threatening me is not what a smart girl would do.”
“She’s the one behind all those new ideas we implemented, which raised our profits significantly. She’s brilliant.” Atlas looks back at me. “Sometimes, too brave for her own good.”
“Too brave gets you to an early grave, Summer,” Mason says to my face, and my stoic mask slips for a moment, showing him a glimpse of my hatred. Just a moment, before I rein myself in, leaving him gloating with satisfaction, believing he’s breaking my will with his threats. Then his attention shifts back to Atlas. “Finally, she shouldn’t be ruthless, because such a woman can easily decide she doesn’t need you and run your empire alone.”
I expect him to ask Atlas if I’m ruthless, but that’s not what comes out of Mason’s mouth.
“He was wrong about that last part.She has to be ruthless. That’s a requirement in our world. Your mother saw it in me, and piece bypiece her love vanished. Until I woke up one day, to find out the woman I still loved like the very day I had married her, was planning on leaving me, running away with my children.” Mason halts abruptly, aware he slipped by answering a question no one would’ve dared to ask. If he knew his wife was going to leave, he wouldn’t have let her, which heavily implies I was right in assuming he was behind her death, and Noah was an unexpected collateral. “I’m not going to let you repeat my mistake, son.”
He takes a gun out of the holster beneath his jacket.
Was this it for me?
