Page 78 of Mine

My eyes narrowed as I looked at him. “You take me home with you and you introduce me to your wife and your kids. Today.”

Not what he had expected. “What? Are you fucking with me?”

“No. Your wife knows my face, and your kids, and if you ever have to do the whole Michael and Fredo scene in the boat, then you gotta tell Landry and your wife and your kids.”

“Jesus,” he gasped, taken aback. “My family is completely separate from my—”

“Yep. Nope. Not after today, not with us, not anymore. We’re gonna be family or I’ll walk away and Conrad fucks over anyone that tries to stop me.”

“Oh you cocky little bitch; you think Conrad Harris will—”

“Yeah, I do, and you know he will. For whatever reason, that works, it’s there, and it ain’t changing,” I told him. “So, what? Are we going?”

He shook his head.

“No?”

“Fuck.”

I grabbed him suddenly, putting my hands on his face as I had never done, holding tight, eyes locked on his. “I will never leave your side, do you understand? Never. I’m loyal, and that still has to count for something, or the rest doesn’t mean shit.”

He grabbed my wrists tight and stared back at me.

Neither of us moved for long minutes until he finally closed his eyes and exhaled. I let him go because I knew I had him.

“Your sense of loyalty is all fucked up, Trev.”

“Yeah, I know, that’s why I’m gonna go see a shrink.”

“What?” he asked, leaning back, releasing a deep breath as well.

“For Landry, you know. ’Cause he goes a little nuts sometimes.”

“Between the two of you, Landry’s the normal one, you know that, right?”

I nodded as he shifted forward and told the driver to take us downtown.

“So you can see Kady’s restaurant that now belongs to you.”

I smiled as I looked out the window, listening to him as he made a call. He let his wife know that he was bringing home a friend for dinner that night. I liked hearing it.

I GOT home late, stuffed full of Gabriel’s wife Pam’s peach cobbler as the final act of the evening. She was amazing, his kids were cute, and his housekeeper, his two bodyguards, and the nanny were all pleased to meet me. I had stayed with them, the Pike family, from seven on, having spent the day with Gabriel looking at the space that had been Kady’s restaurant and would be re-opening under new management with a new name. After that, we took a tour of the rest of what Gabe now ran. He took me to meet the new runners who had been hired into the fold, and all of them looked at me the way I looked at Gabriel. I understood. He had introduced me as their boss, and that was what they saw. Now that I was Gabriel’s right hand, he shared everything with me, and I found that I liked that more than I would have imagined. To be trusted implicitly, his faith absolute, had made me mute for a while in the car, the emotion welling up within me.

“You’ve wanted this,” he concluded.

“Of course I have.”

And he liked that I confessed to it so he didn’t have to wonder.

“Do you have a nice girl, Trevan?” his wife Pam had asked me.

“I have a nice boy,” I told her.

“Oh.” She made a face like how adorable is that? “Will you bring him next Sunday for dinner?”

“I would love to.”

She was very pleased, and Gabriel just rolled his eyes.