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“In the garage. It should be totaled. The thing is junk.”
“Not all of us grew up with a silver spoon in our mouth,” I retort back, feeling offended on behalf of my car. I scrimped and saved to buy that hunk of junk, and I love it.
“Is that what you think my life has been like?” Connor asks, suddenly putting his papers down and turning his full attention on me.
I don’t like it. I wasn’t thinking he would engage me, but now, here we are, and I can’t escape—unless I want to tuck and roll out of a moving vehicle.
“Yes,” I say, sticking to my guns. I fidget with my hands, trying to figure out what to do with them before sticking them underneath my legs.
His mouth twitches but not like he’s going to smile; it’s an angry twitch, if there’s any such thing.
“So, you haven’t had everything you’ve ever wanted handed to you?” I widen my eyes, waiting for him to deny it.
“No, my family has always been quite wealthy,” he says, his jaw flexing as he grinds his teeth down. “But that doesn’t mean I’ve always benefited from that, and I’ve not been coddled. The means provided by our family’s wealth doesn’t lend itself to a carefree lifestyle. I definitely wouldn’t have chosen this life.”
“Only the rich can say that. You don’t know what the other ninety-nine percent live like,” I shoot back because it makes me angry when he says he wouldn’t have chosen this life. It’s a lie. Literally everyone would choose a rich life over one where they didn’t know if they were going to eat that day.
“Did your own father have you strapped to a chair and burned with cigarettes after you openly cried the first time?” he asks, and I freeze, imagining what that would be like. “I was eight. And I’ve still got the scars. Five of them—from each of the men in the families. They circled me and got to burn me to teach me a lesson.”
“Did it?” I whisper. “Teach you a lesson?”
“I haven’t ever cried again.”
We remain staring at each other, neither willing to break eye contact first. I can see his pulse pounding in his neck, telling me how hard it was for him to admit something like that.
“I don’t want you feeling sorry for me. But don’t judge other people when you know nothing about them.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you. I feel angry,” I say honestly, and he sucks in a sharp breath. “Are you sorry your father is dead?” I shock myself by asking. This feels personal, this whole conversation, and it sends an alarm blaring through my brain. I don’t want to get close to him. I want to get away from him.
He doesn’t answer me. Instead, he shuffles his papers and looks back down at them. I take that as a sign to shut the hell up, so I do.
The service is being heldat St. Frederick’s Catholic Church, the most prestigious and beautiful church in Heywood. I’m surprised that half of those attending didn’t erupt into fire as soon as they entered, myself included.
I can hear the whispers all around us, no doubt wondering who I am.
“Why does Connor have a strange woman sitting beside him along with Lilliana and Sylvia?”
“Who is she?”
“It’s in poor taste to bring a stranger to a funeral.”
These people would really shit bricks if they knew I was his fiancée.
The word sounds strange in my mind as I toss it around.Fiancée, fiancée, fiancée.
I glance down at my finger where a ring would normally sit and consider the bare flesh.
Will he even bother with one? Is this strategic, not giving me one yet?
Of course it’s strategic, you idiot. He told you that you were business to him.
Connor has ignored them all, sitting straight and proud on the front pew, listening intently. I notice neither him nor Lilliana are crying. Only her mother has a tissue held to her face, quiet sobs shaking her shoulders, but oddly, her eyes seem to stay dry. This family is screwed up, but what family isn’t?
A few men stand, saying words that mean nothing to me, but I know their faces. I’ve studied their faces. Four of the five bosses. The men who burned scars into Connor’s skin.
I want to leap at them, stick knives in their throats as well, but I can’t. I have a plan, and it doesn’t involve killing them. Connor elbows me in the side as I start to fidget, glaring at me, and I still. I feel like I’ve been reprimanded by a parent.
How does he manage to make me feel small with one look?
