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“Hey, now. It’s okay.” I pulled her back to look into her blue eyes. “Are you okay?” Her face was a mask that started to break slightly before she gave me a bright smile. A fake smile that didn’t reach her eyes.
I wanted to dig a little deeper, ask her what was truly wrong, but I knew. I knew why she looked at me with those wide blue eyes that were identical to mine and Gio’s. No, I knew what the issue was. Our father.
She tried to brush it off as if it were nothing as she murmured under her breath, “it’s father.”
She exhaled and stepped back fully. “Father has been a beast since something happened at the wedding, something he refuses to tell anyone.”
I shifted on my feet as nervousness slammed into me, and glanced over at Nikolai. He stood a few feet to the side, a still and imposing form that watched me as if I were the only important thing in the room.
My breath caught.
Although I knew Nikolai could hear what we were talking about, he didn’t act like he did, didn’t show any emotion over what Claudia had just said. I looked back at my sister, glad she didn’t know about Eduardo. My father had clearly cleaned it up efficiently fast so no one but a small team of his men knew what had gone down.
“I’m sure it’s just work stuff.” I finally found my voice to say to my sister.
She exhaled but nodded and I was thankful that she accepted what I said, even if I didn't know if she believed me. I was glad she didn’t make me lie even more. I didn’t want to tell her about any of the horrors or darkness that happened in our world even if she was surrounded by it. Even if I knew she was fully aware of it all. I wanted to keep her safe and innocent and protected from it all.
Gio and my mother stepping into the foyer drew me out of my thoughts and I embraced both of them, answering their conversational questions automatically. I could hear Gio talk about “safe” topics with Nikolai. Sports. Stocks. The fucking weather. It was awkward, and it was evident my brother didn’t like my husband.
But all I could think about was my father, how he’d make Claudia’s life even worse because of the situation with Edoardo. How my father no doubt blamedmefor Edoardo’s death, and because I was now a married woman and out of his house, she’d take my place for his wrath.
It was those thoughts that had me moving away from my family and walking toward a place I had no business going.
My father’s office.
All conversation behind me dimmed and I glanced over my shoulder to see all three of them watching me. Nikolai’s eyes were hard set, his jaw clenched, his hands tight fists at his side. But he didn’t move closer. He didn’t stop me. Maybe he knewI needed to do this, to talk to my father, to try and smooth out the wrinkles and calm the rough waters. I was the only one who could protect Claudia. Not even Gio would go against my father. He was too busy, always on errands by our father, learning the “family business”.
I knew it was all strategically orchestrated by Marco, that he was being molded and brainwashed and shaped into what our father wanted. The perfect heir. The perfect soldier.
I walked down the hallway and stopped in front of my father’s office doors, reaching out automatically and digging my fingers into my palm before relaxing it and lifting it up to bring my knuckles down on the wood.
He made me wait a solid minute, standing behind that closed door, before he barked out that I could enter. I pushed the heavy door inward and stepped inside, leaving the door open behind me. A survival instinct.
I smelled faint hints of cigar smoke and a fire that had burned long ago in the mantle, charred wood tinged the air and clinging to the books that lined one wall. He sat behind his imposing, massive oak desk, his reading glasses pushed up the bridge of his nose as he brought his pen down across a sheet of paper.
“What?” he said in a bored tone without looking up at me.
I didn't say anything for a second as I picked at the edge of my shirt, a lone thread barely hanging on. Just like me. Just like Claudia would be if I didn’t fix things.
“I–I…” I couldn’t manage to say anything else, couldn't find my words.
My father set his pen down, removed his glasses, and leaned back in his chair. And only then did he look up at me. No expression on his face. No happiness to see me. No love that his daughter was here, that she was a married woman and starting her own life now.
Nothing.
He lifted an eyebrow and steepled his hands in front of his face. Waiting. Waiting. The silence stretching out between us, making me on edge, making me even more scared. But he did that on purpose. It was a tactic,his tacticto make me even weaker than he already saw me.
“I was wondering if we could possibly discuss Claudia visiting me once I'm back in Desolation?” The thought of leaving my sister here and traveling so far, all the way across the country, had my belly tightening. “ Maybe she could help me get settled? I’ll be alone over there, and I’m sure Nikolai will be busy with work.” I swallowed.
He stayed silent. Still kept those fingers steepled in front of his face.
“Just a thought,” I whispered.
“Hmm,” he finally said. “Just a thought?” He placed his hands on the table and drummed his fingers. “You made quite the mess last night with Edoardo.”
I opened my mouth and snapped it shut, smoothed my hands down my thighs over and over again. “It’s unfortunate about Edoardo, but–”
My father slammed his hand down on his desk so hard his lamp shook from the force. He slowly rose, his palms braced on the smoothed wood. “There are no excuses.” His eyes narrowed. “What exactly were you doing with your guard, hmmm? Being a little whore?”
