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“Paraphrasing from the Bible, are we?” I offered a provocative yawn. “Pretty sure there were a few commandments written there you have broken once or a thousand times.”
“Leave her out of this, Keaton.”
“Beg for her, Arthur. On your knees. I want to see you stripped of your pride and dignity over your silver-spooned daughter who has never known hardship. The apple of your eye, the belle of every ball in Chicago, and, quite frankly, the runner-up to be my lawful wife.”
He knew exactly what I was asking—and why I was asking it.
“She is nineteen; you are thirty.” He tried to reason with me.
Big mistake.
Once upon a time, when I tried to reason with him, it didn’t work.
At all.
“Still legal. A wholesome, well-mannered beauty on my arm is exactly what the doctor ordered to clean up my rather dirty reputation.”
“She’s no arm candy, and unless you want your first term as senator to be your last…” He balled his fists so tight, I knew they’d draw blood from his palms.
I cut him off midsentence.
“You will do nothing to harm my career, seeing as we both know what I have on you. On your knees, Arthur. If you’re convincing enough, I might let you keep her.”
“Name your price.”
“Your daughter. Next question.”
“Three million dollars.” The tic of his jaw matched the rhythm of his pulsing heart.
“Oh, Arthur.” I cocked my head, chuckling.
“Five.” His lips thinned, and I could practically hear his teeth grinding against one another.
He was a powerful man—too powerful to yield—and for the first time in his life, he had to.
Because what I had on him could jeopardize not only the entire Outfit, but also his precious wife and daughter, who’d be left penniless once I threw him in the slammer for the rest of his days.
I rolled my eyes. “I thought love was priceless. How about you give me what I really want, Rossi? Your pride.”
Slowly, the man in front of me—the smug mob lord whom I hated with ferocious passion—lowered himself to his knees, his face a cool mask of hatred.
His wife and our respective attorneys looked down at their feet, their deafening silence ringing in the air.
He was beneath me now, humble and lost and undignified.
Through gritted teeth, he said, “I am begging you to spare my daughter. Go after me in any way you want. Drag me through court. Strip me of my properties. You want war? I will fight you clean and honorably. But do not touch Francesca.”
I rolled my mint gum inside my mouth, resisting the urge to lock my jaw.
I could unleash the secret I’d been holding over his head and get it over with, but the anguish Rossi had put me through stretched just like the thing in my mouth. A gum that dragged achingly slow across the years.
An eye for an eye and all that bullshit. No?
“Request denied. Sign the papers, Rossi,” I pushed the NDA in his direction. “I’m taking the brat with me.”
Back in the present, Bishop and White had somehow managed to raise their voices to heights that would deafen whales, bickering like two schoolgirls who showed up at prom wearing the same Forever 21 dress.
“…should have been alerted months ago!”
