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My stomach twisted. I hated this rift between us, hated his lies that’d slowly crushed me over the last several weeks.
I took a breath and stepped out of the cab, keeping my head high as Max wrapped his strong arm around my shoulders. I was done with doubts and tears. I was done feeling weak and helpless. Only yesterday, I’d held a gun on Nikolai Ivanov, the heir to the Bratva in New York. If I could stand my ground then, I could face my father now.
I walked through the familiar halls, my hand a vise around Max’s.
“Daddy?” I called out, heading in the direction of his home office. My voice was too high, like I was ten years old again. I cleared my throat and braced myself.
“Sweetheart?” he called back, confirming his location.
I quickened my pace, ready to get this over with. We burst into his office just as he was about to walk toward the door. He caught one look at Max’s ferocious scowl and dropped back into his chair, face pale.
He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. After a few heartbeats of tense silence, he managed to croak, “Get out of our house, or I’ll call the police.”
Max scoffed. “The police? Or your Russian friends who came to kill me last night?”
His cheeks flushed a dangerous shade of red. “Get away from my daughter!” he barked, rage giving him the strength to surge to his feet.
“Max isn’t going anywhere, Daddy,” I said sharply. “We’ll both leave once I say what I came here to say.”
He blinked, and the aggression drained from his body as his eyes shone with desperation. “Honey, he’s dangerous. You don’t know what he’s capable of.”
“Yes, I do,” I snapped back, a bit too harshly. I squeezed Max’s hand in apology, and his thumb rubbed over my knuckles in a pulse of comfort.
I tipped my chin back, composing myself. “I know what you’re capable of too.” I reached into my purse and pulled out the file that damned him.
His brow furrowed when I placed it on the desk between us. “What’s this?”
Max spoke up, his deep voice gravelly with barely suppressed anger on my behalf. “It’s your wife’s autopsy and the arson report. I pulled them off Kelvin McCrae’s private server.”
All the blood drained from his face, and his shoulders slumped. He glowered at the man I loved. “You showed this to Allie?”
“I went looking for them myself,” I asserted. “You made them disappear. But Max found them, and now we have copies. I’ll share them with the press if you don’t agree to retire.”
His jaw dropped. “What? But you…” He glanced at Max’s face, shuddered, and looked back at me. “Mikhail told me you’re dropping the blackmail. He’s agreed to leave you alone because of it.”
My heart sank at the words, at the confirmation of his collusion with the Bratva.
I firmed my resolve. All the more reason for me to see this through.
“This isn’t about the Bratva.” I gestured at the documents. “This story is about how you covered up Mom’s murder at the hands of the Mafia. All because it would’ve slowed the momentum of your political career.” My eyes burned, and I angrily dashed the tears away. “You sent the Russians to kill Max’s mom instead of risking that your association with the Bratva would come to light. When they murdered Mom, you could’ve gone to the police, but you chose revenge instead. You allied yourself even more closely with those Bratva monsters, and you wanted to force me to marry one of them.”
Max placed one big hand on the small of my back, grounding me.
“These documents don’t say anything about the Bratva,” he said, giving me a chance to breathe. “We won’t be breaking our word to Nikolai; I gave him the only copy of the recording of Allie’s confession. But these documents do reveal that you’re a piece of shit who would lie to his own daughter about her mother’s murder in exchange for power. The public would eat you alive. Either you retire, or we’ll force you out of office in disgrace.”
Daddy’s genial features were twisted with contempt. “Mikhail will kill you for this.”
“Only if you tell him,” Max replied coolly. “Do you intend to put your daughter in their crosshairs again? Because that’s what you’ll risk if you tell them the real reason you’re retiring.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “What am I supposed to say to them?”
“That’s your problem to work out,” Max retorted. He applied pressure to my lower back, steering me away. “Let’s go, Allie. We’re done here.”
“Wait!” Daddy cried. “Don’t leave like this, sweetheart. I love you.”
Something burned at the center of my chest. I wasn’t sure if it was love or hatred.
“It’s done,” I told him, voice shaking with volatile emotion. “I’m going with Max.”
