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“I had my man Carlo take over so I could be with you,” he told me. He had spent the night with me, and we had awakened late. It was the first time I had seen him so relaxed, and I was looking forward to this kind of days with him, even if they didn’t come all that often.
Managing a multi-billion dollar empire, especially if it ran against the traditional because it was unlawful, was especially difficult and time-consuming. Brody simply asked me to be patient as Carlo was setting up some of the accounts to be under my name.
“You realize this makes you a criminal?” Brody asked.
I smiled. “Look who’s talking,” I said. “Besides, if I can’t have a say in things, I don’t want a part in it.” I gave him a stern look and he beamed with pride.
“Wait till you see the boat you own,” he said.
“Just one?” I asked. I already knew about the fleet of boats, so when he took me on the private architecture tour of the river, I was less than floored.
It wasn’t until Brody started pointing out all the buildings that we owned that I realized how powerful he really was.
“It’s all you,” he said. “Everything that’s mine is yours, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
I knew this to be true and the warm, comforting feeling that everything was right washed over me as we took in the sights of the heart of the city. Large historic buildings, built to last, reminded me that I wanted something that would last.
And so did Brody. I did feel a bit embarrassed at how quick I was to think that he was excluding me on purpose.
“Adriana,” he said. “There’s no one and nothing I want more than you. You’re everything to me.”
Perhaps it was the beauty of the city, the pleasant experience of the boat floating lazily over the river that had me gushing with love, but there was nothing greater than the love I felt for him at that moment.
“And you’re everything to me,” I said. Brody had both hands around my hips, then placed his hand gently over my stomach which had begun to show the early signs of my pregnancy.
“Our child will have anything and everything,” he said.
“What about my father?” I asked. I knew it was going to have to come, but I was terrified of telling daddy that I had gotten pregnant out of wedlock. He was a traditional Irish Roman Catholic, and a child outside of a marriage was out of the question.
Premarital sex was looked down upon, by the church and none other than by my father, who believed his sins were already too great to allow for what Brody and I had done. I wasn’t ashamed though, and I just needed Brody to be with me when I told him. And also, how hypocritical to be so prude and traditional while conducting such illegal activities
“We’ll let him know together," Brody said. I couldn’t be more surprised and pleased with how in line we both were with another. It’s said that when two people are in sync, it’s because their souls and hearts are aligned. I couldn’t feel closer to him.
Brody looked at me tenderly, squeezing my hand, and said, “I have to tell you why I didn’t let you know when I left and missed your doctor’s appointment.”
The pain of the memory still stung, but I was ready to listen. “Tell me everything,” I said.
“The Reeds were planning on killing your father, long before the attack,” he said. “I did everything in my power to stop them but after the attack, I realized that they weren’t going to stop overstepping their bounds.
“I should have asked you for help,” he continued, “but I didn’t want you to become a criminal. I should have asked what you wanted to do, but all I wanted was to protect you. Adriana, I want you to know that if anything would have happened to you, I wouldn’t have ever forgiven myself. I can’t live without you. I’d rather you be alive at any cost, and the Reeds were threatening to kill you.”
I felt a cold chill through my heart when Brody told me that. I wasn’t going to let anyone push me around, and the fact that those lame thugs thought they could do anything to me was an insult to the King gang.
“And what do you plan to do about it?” I asked. If Brody was going to protect me, he needed to take a harder stance on the Reeds.
“I set them up,” Brody said. “They think I gave them one million dollars. Your father thinks I did anyway, but I’m going to let you in on a secret. That money is linked with the FBI. They won’t have it for long, but I’m going to need your help getting justice for what they did to you and your father.”
I listened to Brody’s plan. Since he couldn’t be tied up with the government and certain political figures within the city, he needed me as a liaison to influence the right people. It was a tangled web and I started writing everything down.
“So, if you take on the mayor,” I said to Brody, “then I can take on his opponents to make sure he doesn’t get elected.” It turned out that the mayor was in charge of letting the Reeds get away with too much, and his influence was causing us a headache. He had it particularly in for my father, which wasn’t much of a surprise, since Daddy had gone completely off the rails the past month.
Brody explained what he thought we should do about my father’s incompetence in tact.
“I’ve already asked your father to retire,” he said. “He didn’t like it, but I figured that you should take over in his place. It’s what he wanted all along anyways.”
“He didn’t want me to deal with the violence,” I pointed out. However, it made me beyond happy that Brody knew that I wanted to have a major say in the family business. For years, I had begun to notice a decline in my father’s political tactics, something I knew he had never really had the patience for.
Brody was ahead of me, however, and was the right man for me. “I’ll be the muscle,” he said. “No one will ever cross you again. I’ll make sure of it.
