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Even if I were available, she wasn’t my type.
He dropped his napkin across his lap and started to eat.
I didn’t have an appetite.
“My company is really that unbearable?” he asked, his eyes down on his food as he cut into his meat.
“We haven’t spoken for a decade. What does that tell you?”
“Well, you made a deal, and you’re just going to make it unbearable unless you put some effort in.”
“Effort?” I asked. “It’s hard to put any effort into the man who killed my mother.”
He raised his eyes from his meal. “That’s insulting.”
I didn’t take it back.
“You know I was devastated when I lost her.”
“But you didn’t care enough to quit your bullshit to keep her safe.”
“You know I would have died for her—”
“You fucking failed.” I still heard her screams in my head. Still heard the way her weak body resisted the men on top of her. Still heard the creak of the bed as they rocked her lifeless body. “Because she was raped by three men and then slaughtered like a goddamn pig.”
Most of the people in the restaurant turned to look at me.
My eyes were glued to his. “And where were you? Off making money…like we didn’t already have enough. What if they’d found me too? What if he offed me the way they did with her? Would that have mattered to you?”
He dropped his utensils on the plate, as if he was suddenly sick.
“What kind of man are you…?”
“I tortured and killed those bastards—”
“Did that bring her back?” I snapped. “Will she be joining us for dinner this evening?”
Now his face started to redden.
“And then you married that bitch who had it out for me from day one.”
“I didn’t see her for what she was—”
“Because you didn’t listen, old man. She tried to kill me, and you forgave her.”
“I didn’t forgive. I just didn’t believe she was capable of it.”
“How many times is that?” I asked. “Twice? Twice you failed to protect your first son.”
He stared, his face still red.
“I bet you regret this dinner now…” It was hard to look at his face and not feel pissed off. It was hard not to scream anytime we were in the same room.
“No.”
My eyes narrowed.
“We have to start somewhere. We need to bury the past if we ever have any hope for a future.”
It was past midnight when I made it home.
The scotch on the plane didn’t rid me of the taste of the wine on my tongue. The cigars didn’t cleanse the rage from my lungs. I walked into my house just as pissed off as I always was. I made it up the stairs and spotted Camille’s open door at the end of the hallway.
Like she was waiting up for me.
The only person more pissed off than me was her. And I was the one she was pissed off at. Guess I knew how my father felt.
I stepped into her bedroom and found her asleep on the couch. The TV was on low, and the blue light flashed across her limp body, bundled up because she’d become cold at some point.
The blanket on the opposite side of the couch was obviously too far for her to reach, so I grabbed it and draped it over her little body.
The touch made her stir, and she opened her eyes.
Right into mine.
We stared at each other.
It seemed to take her a couple seconds to realize it was me, to remember why she was asleep on the couch. “How’d it go?” she asked in her raspy voice. The sound alone told me she’d been asleep for hours.
I gave a shrug. “It was fine.” I sat on the edge of the couch.
She sat up, her long hair a mess from rubbing up against the couch. “You reek of booze and cigars.”
“That’s my natural scent at this point.”
“What happened to our no-cigar policy?”
I looked away. “Didn’t think you cared anymore.”
“Just because I’m mad at you doesn’t mean I don’t care.”
I stared at the fireplace. There were still glowing embers at the bottom, as if Hugo made her fire after dinner and it went cold after a couple of hours.
“Where did you go?” She leaned against the armrest, her knees pulled to her chest under the blanket.
That gave me room to sit back. “My father gave me your location. He was the only one who knew your whereabouts, so if I didn’t give him what he wanted, it would have taken much, much longer for me to find you. And waiting any longer would have killed me…imagining what Grave might be doing to you.”
She stared at the side of my face. “What did he want from you?”
“For us to have dinner.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound so bad.”
“It is when you despise him.”
“He gave you what you wanted in exchange for one dinner. The price is paid, so you can move on.”
