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As the doors opened for me, I realized no one else would be here tonight. The place had been locked down specifically for Kai and me—no one else except a chef and our guards.
Kai was behind the bar when I arrived, and he held up a drink, giving me a smile.
I almost faltered because it was rare for me to see that side of him. Some of the tension in me eased up a little, but not completely.
Since he and Riley had their second little girl, Kai had been smiling more and more. I should’ve been used to it, but considering the way we’d grown up, it’d take a while.
I met him at the table he’d selected for us. It was near the window, and Lake Superior spread out beneath us.
“I always forget how pretty it is up here,” he said.
I grunted. “Hilly, though.”
“That, too.”
Kai had been cautious moving into the state. He was less cautious with the legitimate businesses, though, and this was only one of his many restaurants around the state. I didn’t know the reason for his caution, but I didn’t ask. I wouldn’t until something happened and I needed to be more directly involved. Until then, I was still a surgeon—except I had guards disguised as extra hospital staff around me. So far it was working, and there hadn’t been an incident, not since Melissa and Carson.
Carson.
The thought of her sliced through me.
I’d turned that side of me off. The caring side. The feeling side. It’d been only work for the last six months.
Work.
Family.
The basics like eating, resting, exercising.
But back to work.
Always work.
That was my routine.
No women.
Everyone had been Melissa after Melissa. Then Carson came, and I couldn’t.
If I couldn’t have her, I’d have no one. I was fine with that.
“How are you?” Kai asked.
I knew the question was genuine, but I wanted to snarl. How did he think I was?
I looked at him, knowing he could see my pain. “Fucking great.”
His eyes grew speculative, but he nodded and reached for the seat next to him. He pulled out a file, tossing it in front of me.
“What’s this?”
“You asked me to find your father.”
I jolted. I had asked, but it’d been months ago. “You found him?”
He nodded, taking a sip of his drink before his eyes fell back to the file. “He’s alive.”
“I thought you were here to give me an update on Carson. I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to see you.” I focused on the file as I said that.
I’d reached for it, was about to open it, when he said, “I’m here for her, too.”
I froze. The pain tore through me, gutting me.
He was here for her, too?
I forced myself to open the file, and ice ran through my veins.
He had round cheeks. Blue eyes. Golden umber skin. There were laugh lines around his eyes, around his mouth. He looked like me, but he didn’t at the same time. I moved to the next picture of him. He had a little stomach, but not much. He looked under six feet. I knew Kai would have all the facts, but I wanted to see it for myself.
His name was Gabriel Alfonso.
5’11”.
He was an engineer.
There was a picture of him with two elderly people, my grandparents. I could see the resemblance.
My grandmother was Black. My grandfather was white.
My dad was biracial.
There was a picture of him with a young woman. She was Black, too.
A picture of him, her, and a younger girl.
“You have a sister,” Kai noted.
She looked like me, with the round cheeks, though mine weren’t so round anymore. I’d grown out of that a few years ago, but I couldn’t stop smiling. She had straight, dark hair.
“They live in Boston.”
I looked up at Kai, who spoke as he was looking at the file. “She goes to Boston University. Fluent in German and Spanish. She’s studying to work as a translator. I know that’s all in the file. She’s doing college and works part-time as an EMT.”
“An EMT?”
He nodded, a faint smile showing. “You get the medicine from your dad.”
I looked over the other things in the file, reading up on my grandparents. They were both alive, both in a nursing home together.
Gabriel’s wife was a music teacher. Her name was Cierra.
“What’s my sister’s name?”
“Angela. They call her Angel.”
Angel. “Brooke will flip out. She’s not my only sister now.”
Kai chuckled before taking another sip. “I asked Tanner if he wanted me to find his dad.”
“He said no?”
He snorted, which sounded so odd coming from Kai. “He told me to fuck off.”
I put the file down, leaning back in my chair. “You? Brooke?”
None of us was certain who our real father was.
“Brooke and I are both from Anthony.” Anthony Bennett, the father who raised us.
I nodded. “So it’s me and Tanner who have different dads.”
