Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 61942 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 206(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61942 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 206(@300wpm)
“You think that’s a good idea?”
I looked at him.
Bleu immediately dropped his gaze, knowing he’d said the wrong thing.
“I need you to do something for me.”
“Yes?”
“I need you to send a few men to Florence.”
His eyebrows immediately rose. “You’ve changed your mind.”
“No. I need them to tail Laura day and night—and make sure they aren’t seen.”
Bleu wore the same incredulous look on his face.
“We’ve got to put our best guys on this. Leonardo will use his own men to follow her, so they can’t suspect anything.”
His arms crossed over his chest. “I’m not sure if any of the men will agree to this.”
“Not all of them hate me.”
“It doesn’t exactly look good, that you’re willing to send men to protect a woman, but not send men to scout—”
“Just make it happen, Bleu.”
10
LAURA
I walked up to the iron gates of my father’s estate.
The security guys stared at me like they couldn’t believe I’d returned. They made their calls on their radios, and then the gates opened so I could pass. But they conducted a thorough search.
And I mean thorough.
They patted down my breasts, checked my bra for a knife stashed in the fabric, felt my entire pelvis, not just my ass.
“Do I look like a hooker to you?” I smacked one of them when he slid his hand right over my crotch.
Then they made me walk through a metal detector.
I cast them a glare once I finished. “Was the pat-down really necessary, then?” I walked up the steps to the front door, and the butler was there to greet me. He was wary around me, like his neck was on the line.
I wasn’t like my father. I didn’t kill innocent people. “I want to see him.”
“He’ll be with you shortly. Let’s go into the parlor.” He took me into the room where I’d spoken with him many times. He let me take a seat before he exited the room.
I sat in the armchair alone, combing over everything in the room, tempted to look for weapons he’d stashed. I knew they were everywhere. When I was a child, I was told I’d get a horrible beating if I touched any gun that I found. They were strapped underneath tables, on the backs of dressers, hooked behind TVs on the wall.
I wondered if there was one in that very room.
Someone entered the room—but it wasn’t my father.
It was Victor.
His face was strained, and his eyes were annoyed, like he wasn’t happy that I was there. “Laura.” He came close and sat in the other armchair. “What are you doing here?”
“I want to talk to him.”
“Why?”
“Because he shot me. Why else?”
“I-I just assumed you wouldn’t come back. You said you didn’t want to hear from him ever again.”
“Well, I’m still really pissed off, and I want the opportunity to tell him how pissed off I am. And that motherfucker is going to sit there and listen to every goddamn word I have to say.” I lifted my arm. “Look at this.”
His eyes stayed on mine.
“Look.”
He dropped his gaze and looked at the horrible scar.
“That’s why I’m here.”
My father entered the room, wearing a sport coat despite the unbearable heat outside. His eyes locked on mine.
Mine locked on his.
It was a silent standoff, both of us testing the other, the silence growing in intensity with every second that passed. Victor left the room without being dismissed, and then it was just the two of us.
My father studied me from the door, keeping the space between us, as if he didn’t know how to approach me.
As if he was afraid of me.
As he should be.
He finally entered the room, choosing the chair Victor had just vacated.
The rage was indescribable. It was hard to look at his face and just sit there instead of getting out a knife and slicing his nose clean off. The blood boiled in my veins, the pressure so great, they were about to pop. It took all my strength to maintain a calm composure, to stay in my chair instead of launching myself right at him. “Fuck. You.” It was all I could manage. The only coherent thing I could get out.
He took it with indifference, as if he’d expected this reaction.
“You…fucking…shot me.” It was hard to get the words out, because every time I spoke a syllable, I was brought back to that night when the barrel of the gun was pressed right to my skull. It was cold as ice.
“Laura—”
“Your daughter.” My eyes filled with tears, angry ones. “How could you do that to me?”
His eyes shifted away.
Good. He had no right to look at me.
“I had no other option—”
“There’s always another option. You could have killed me.”
“I was careful with my aim—”
“And what if Bartholomew didn’t cave? You would have just kept shooting me?”
“Of course not.” He looked at me again. “I knew he would cave.”