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“Honestly, I was, Thomas. This all came about well before you offered your help to me. I thought I had nowhere else to turn. Now if you’ll forgive me, I will do anything to prove my loyalty to you and to the pride. Anything at all. I respect and adore you as I did your mother. And my loyalty will always remain with the pride.”
Thomas smiled down at Lorena. “All is forgiven, Lorena. At least I caught this game of his in the nick of time. What we need now is you out of Sonny’s clutches.”
Lorena’s eyes lit with hope. “Yes! Yes! That’s all I want, Thomas. Beyond my father’s life, that’s all I want in the whole world. My father knew both you and your mother well, and he’d be devastated to hear about any of this.”
“Dry your eyes, love. I know Sonny’s game plan now. And I can be the one to protect you and your father. It’s my fault I didn’t step up to the plate sooner. And it’s my inexperience that had me forgetting that Sonny would try to take over. He’s ruthless. He waits to sniff out the dying and the weak, and he goes for the jugular every time.”
“Maybe it was my pride, Thomas. Maybe I should have come to you asking for money. But you were burdened with the responsibilities of the takeover and still grieving the loss of your mother. I worried you wouldn’t understand. I made more trouble for you in the end, didn’t I?”
Thomas flashed a warm smile.
“Maybe we both made mistakes, huh? But we both can learn from them and move on, right?”
“Right. The Leone pride, above all else. So how do I get out from under Sonny’s control?”
“Sonny tricked you, Lorena. He knew you were between a rock and a hard place and took complete advantage. Well, two can play that game. I have a plan.”
Lorena watched as Thomas strode with all confidence to his desk.
His half-eaten garden salad was abandoned. Lorena’s tears had all but dried.
There was no more need for tears if they were going to solve this together.
Chapter12
Thomas
“Coming clean was the right thing to do,” Thomas told Lorena. He was proud of her but wouldn’t say it or show it. She took it on the chin too. He confronted her, and her own compromised integrity beat her up with guilt until she exposed her cards.
Lorena had finished her confession only after revealing everything that was said and done so far. He had to respect the fact that she made no excuses for choosing the path of deception. She wanted support for her ailing father, Alfredo, plain and simple. Thomas didn’t enjoy hearing what he already knew, but it felt good to hear her tell him the truth. He wasn’t sure if he was going to tell her this, but prior to her confessing, he had seen the toxic guilt on her face.
Hearing her acknowledge what she’d done was like having an infected tooth removed. It hurt like hell at the start, but by the end, all that was left was relief.
What Thomas also wasn’t going to tell Lorena was that during her admission, she had also let drop her personal feelings for him. The big secret of his feelings for her resonated when he fully sensed how she felt for him. There was a definitive rush of adrenaline and a feeling of safety in knowing the spark and natural synchronicity and building momentum was mutual and not a one-way street.
“Thomas, I’m sorry …”
“I told you, I accept your confession. You were going to fess up without me confronting you anyway. Look at how you’ve been. It’s been obvious these last few days, and it’s pretty clear it was more than just worrying about Alfredo.”
“I hear you when you say you accept my confession. And I don’t believe you are going to hang this over my head or punish me for it again and again ….”
“I get you,” he interrupted. “You revealed a lot of deception and betrayal on your behalf. I accept your apology. But it seems like you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
“Correct.”
“Fair enough. Your intuitive abilities don’t surprise me, but they impress me to no end. I can’t tell if it’s telepathy or if you are just naturally a couple steps ahead of me. This is what I know,” Thomas said to her.
He made sure their eye contact was unwavering as he spoke. “I forgive you. And the forgiveness frees me so I can feel acceptance and then maybe understanding.”
“I see,” she answered him. “That was clear as damn mud. Let me see if I got this straight. You accept my confession. You forgive me. You understand why I did it because you accept my situation of trying to save my father.”
“Close. You are also off on two important points,” he told her. “Point number two is the fact that I want something from you. You are going to do me a solid. You owe me.”
“Fine. I have no doubt you’ll tell me what you want me to do, the retribution that I owe. But what is the first important point that you say I am off on? You lost me there.”
“Point number one is simple. Before the confession, you were emanating guilt. My calling you out and holding your feet over the fire, so to speak, was a favor. You were spiraling downward. Your own guilt was going to kick your ass.”
“Okay, buddy,” she interrupted. “I see where this is headed. We had great chemistry. I ruined it by being a fraud and a spy of sorts. You did me a solid by calling me on the carpet, and now you are going to explain what I can do as penance because I owe you.”
