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“I’m a man of my word. I will try. But things aren’t looking good for you.”
I hated knowing this man had so much power over me. He could take away the one thing that actually meant something to me. I used to care about money and women, superficial shit. But now, none of those things seemed important anymore. “Keep in mind that if you don’t try hard enough, you will devastate your daughter. I know how much she loves me…because it’s with the same intensity as I love her.”
He brought his hands together, massaging his knuckles. “If I tell her to stop seeing you, are you going to fight for her? Turn her against me?” He showed a hint of emotion again, just the way he did earlier.
I knew how much her parents loved her. I witnessed it every time he spoke about her. I listened to the way he talked to her, like she was still his little girl even though she was a grown woman. It was the kind of love that I received from my mother when I was young, but I didn’t get to cherish it as long as she did. “No. Not because I’m weak, but because I know how miserable she would be without her family. I never want to be the reason she loses the people she loves. If you felt the same way, you would be giving me a better chance than you are now.”
“It’s different, and you know it. Not only did your father inflict horrible crimes upon my family, but you took my daughter against her will and did terrible things to her. And you wanted to kill all of us until she changed your mind. You really expect me to accept you? To shake your fucking hand and give you my blessing?”
I knew everything was working against me. I knew my past would make this nearly impossible. The odds seemed so stacked that the likelihood of success was a billion to one. But that didn’t mean I would give up—not on Vanessa. “There will never be another man out there who will love her the way I do. Not because she’s unlovable, but because my love is so unbelievably fierce that it’s crushing.”
His eyes narrowed on my face. “You’re forgetting the man who made her and raised her. You think I wouldn’t die for her? That I wouldn’t give her the whole world? You think my love isn’t fierce? I’m sitting across from the man I despise more than anyone else on this earth—because she claims she loves you. So don’t sit there and pretend your love is stronger than mine—her father’s.”
“That’s not what I meant, sir.”
He spoke through clenched teeth. “Seemed like it.”
“You should trust your daughter. She’s a very smart woman. She wouldn’t have fallen in love with me without reason, especially after everything we’ve been through. She didn’t want to love me. She wanted to forget me. It’s like she doesn’t have a choice, that’s how strong our bond is. Trust her.”
“Love is the destruction of reason. She’s obviously not thinking clearly right now.”
“And she’s not supposed to. Did your wife think clearly when she fell in love with you?” I shouldn’t cross the line into his personal life, but I had to.
Both of his eyebrows rose, like the head of a rattlesnake that had just been provoked.
“I know you took Pearl from my father for vengeance. I know you held her as a prisoner against her will. I know you made her work for her freedom by making her—”
“Shut. Up.” The vein in his forehead throbbed, and his face tinted with redness. His jaw was tighter than I’d ever seen it. “Don’t talk about my wife. You can talk about me, but leave her out of it. She’s off-limits.”
I’d already made my point anyway. “Your relationship didn’t start under the best circumstances. That’s all I’m trying to say. But was she wrong for falling in love with you? Does that mean you aren’t the right man for her? No. Vanessa and I aren’t any different. In fact, our stories are so similar, it’s strange.”
“Does my daughter know all of this?” he asked, his voice breaking.
“No…” I’d mentioned some things, but never extensively.
“I don’t want her to know. You understand me?”
I nodded. “She knows that you and your brother have been criminals in the past. She knows that your relationship with her mother is shrouded in mystery because you never talk about it, and I think she can connect the dots on her own. But I’ve never explicitly told her how it started and how you treated her.”
He nodded.
“But she does know what my father did to her mother…” I knew Vanessa didn’t want them to know, but he’d asked me a direct question and I couldn’t lie.
