Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
L iam
“Hey, I hate to do this right now, Elisabetta, but I really need to make an important call.” She hesitates for a few moments before looking up from the menu. I watch as she shakes her head slightly, and I can tell she’s taken aback. She just told me she wants me and now I need to make a call.
“Okay, whatever.” She presses her lips together like she doesn’t want to say something that will make her sound like she cares.
“I won't be more than a couple of minutes.”
“Whatever. If you have to work, you have to work.” She shrugs. She looks at me, and I can tell by the expression on her face that she's not happy. I wish she would be open with me about her feelings. It strikes me as ironic that she can be so open about some things and so closed off about others. Like when she talks about her father. She makes it seem like she understands that he couldn’t be in her life, but there is a pain in her eyes. A rejection that she’s experienced that she hasn’t yet processed.
“Hey, is something wrong? Did I do something wrong here?”
“No,” She shrugs, and I think she’s going to look away, but instead, she looks forward. “I mean, I just told you something pretty major about my life, and I thought you would have said something in response that indicated to me that you were excited or happy.”
“What do you want me to be excited about?” I stare at her, slightly flabbergasted. She just told me she’s going to get engaged to a man she’s never met. “Am I supposed to be honored by the fact that you said you want to sleep with me before you lie in another man’s bed? I’m sure that may sound reasonable to you, but it’s ridiculous, Elisabetta.”
“Are you calling me ridiculous?”
“I’m saying that this entire situation is messed up. Do I want to sleep with you? Well, of course, but not because you want to have your last hurrah before you get married off to some man you don't even know. I don’t want to be your last fuck before you get married.”
“Who said you’d be the last?” She glares at me, and I glare back at her.
“Well, that makes me feel special.”
“Are you saying that you need me to make you feel like a Prince Charming?” She rolls her eyes. “Do you need to feel like a white knight before you slide my panties off?”
“I’d rather not have to think about the fact that I’m thrusting into a woman whose pussy is about to be owned by another man.”
“My pussy is owned by me. Period.” She almost snarls at me, her brown eyes edgy and annoyed. “If you don’t want it….”
“I never said that. I’d take you right now if I could. But we both know that's not going to happen. However, what's going to happen is that you are going to marry a strange man because your dad says so. Are you out of your mind?”
“I’m not out of my mind, but there is such a thing as family commitment, and sometimes you have to do what you have to do. This is my family. This is my well-being. This is their lives. They have needs and wants, and I don’t know if they can survive without my father helping them.” She juts her chin out in defiance. “So, if I need to marry a man to save my father’s business and my family, I will. That’s the least I can do.”
“Are you doing this because you can't stand to be poor?” I ask her, and I can tell from the irritated look on her face that this is not the case.
“No, Mr. Money Bags. I don’t give two shits about how much money I have. If I didn’t have any money, I would be okay. I would survive. I don’t need a fancy apartment or fancy clothes, but this isn’t just about me. There are other people in my life who depend on my dad, and this is about them more than anything else, people who have loved me, people who have raised me, people who have given their lives to make sure that I had a childhood, that it was as close to normal as could be.”
“I mean, I don't think it's really normal to grow up with three aunts, do you?”
She stares at me for a couple of seconds. “I wouldn't know any different. I wasn't lucky enough to have a nuclear family. I didn't have a loving mom and dad who were there for me every second of the day. I didn't grow up in an environment that was normal by any means, and you might not be able to understand that, but that's my reality, and in my reality, if someone in your family needs help, they get it. Do you understand what I'm saying?”
“I do. I feel like perhaps I would do the same thing for Daisy and Harriet.”
“You would marry a strange woman for them?” she asks, looking surprised. “Really?”
“I mean, I don't know about strange, but sexy. Yes.” I smirk, and she just rolls her eyes.
“It's not a laughing matter. Liam.”
“I’m not laughing either. We'll discuss this further in a little bit, but I have to go ahead and make this call.”
“Okay, if it's that important, fine. I mean, we've got time before the flight.”
“I know. I'll be right back.” I stand up and head out of the restaurant bar and down the walkway, I pull out my phone and call Lucinda, “Hey, boss, the files are nearly done. I just…”
“It's not about that. Get Franco on the line.”
“What?”
“What? Lucinda, I didn't stutter. Get Franco on the line. Now.”
“You're not gonna ask him about what we found out, are you? The private investigator has not come back with any verification yet, and if you bring it up, you might…
“That's not what I want to speak to him about. Get him on the phone.”
“Yes, sir. One second.” I wait as she places me on hold and listen to the goddamn awful opera music that we have. I'm gonna have to tell her to change it if it annoys me. I can't imagine how much it must annoy our waiting clients.
“Sir, are you still there?”
“Yes,” I snap.
“I have Franco on the other line. I'm gonna patch him through now.” “Sounds good.”
“Mr. Franco, I have Liam Gallagher on the line. Liam, I have…”
“I know. You can get off the line now, Lucinda.”
“Yes, sir.” I wait for her to click off and then let my anger out. “Franco, you're gonna listen to me right now.”
“Liam, how are you? Haven't heard from you in a while.”
“Cut the bullshit. What's going on?”
“What do you mean, what's going on?”
“I just had a very interesting conversation with your daughter.”
There's silence on the other line. “Very interesting,” I repeat.
“You didn't tell her.” He’s panicking now.
“No, I didn't tell her that we have an arrangement,” I say, cutting him off. “But you also didn't tell me that you were planning for her to get engaged.”
“Look, Liam, it's a family matter, and it's really none of your business what goes on.”
“Well, I will have to let you know that it actually is my business, because you chose to get me involved in this project, and once you chose to get me involved, that meant that I had a vested stake. So listen to me?—”
“Liam, the only reason you got involved in this project is because you want to get your hands on my resorts in Italy and Greece, and I wouldn't sell them to you unless we came to a deal.”
“I am keeping up my end of the bargain. “
“Your end of the bargain is to get my daughter over to Florence this summer. I don't see her here yet.
“She'll be there.”
“Your end of the bargain was to make sure she hated working for you so much that the only recourse she found for pleasure was to come over and spend time with her family in Italy.”
“You didn't tell me it was because you were planning to marry her off.”
“You didn't ask me.”
“I’m giving you money for this deal. That's not enough to keep you afloat?”
“It's not. I'm up to my fucking eyeballs in debt. Do you hear me? Liam, I owe hundreds of millions of dollars. And there's a gentleman, who I will not name, willing to help.”
“You're selling your daughter for money.”
“I’m not selling her for anything. It's business. She wants to get married. She needed to marry a rich man anyway. He's slightly older.”
“What do you mean by slightly older? How old is he, Franco?”
“It's none of your business. “
“I can back out of this deal right now, and I can tell your daughter everything.”
“You wouldn't do that,” he says, sounding alarmed. “She would hate you, too.”
“I would, but…”
“You know, if you did that, I wouldn't sell you the hotel chain, and you've spent a lot of money already on the development of these hotels.”
I'm silent. He's correct. The hotels I was going to purchase from him in Greece and Italy were integral to the plan of my hotel empire for Oasis Paradise Hotel chain, but I didn't know if it is worth selling my soul to attain them.
“So get off the phone with me and go make my life easier and my daughter's life miserable so that she will come and work for me.”
“Work for you.” I pause. “I thought you wanted to get her married.”
“Well, the fact of the matter is that she'll be doing both things.”
“What do you mean by that?” I can't believe what I'm hearing. “What do you mean, Franco? Explain!”
“The man she's getting married to has some investments I'm quite interested in attaining, and I don't know that he's completely on the up and up. So, once Elisabetta becomes his wife, she can find out his secrets and help me to…”
“Are you fucking kidding me right now? You're trying to use your daughter as some sort of spy for business purposes? Are you crazy?”
“How I live my life is none of your business.”
“You know, she thinks you're in the mafia, right?”
“She's always had an active imagination, my darling Elisabetta.”
“You’re a punk, Franco, and I don’t think you have any right to call her darling. You’re a shitty-ass dad.”
“You’d better tread very lightly here, Liam, because I don't really appreciate…”
“I don't care what you appreciate. We're gonna come to a deal.”
“What do you mean, we're gonna come to a deal? “
“You heard me. You and I are going to come to a deal. Because I'll have you know, I know all your dirty little secrets.”
“You what? What are you talking about?”
“I know all your dirty little secrets, every asset you have hidden.” I pause. “ Everything you have hidden.”
“What's that supposed to mean?” There's an edge to his voice.
“It means I know your secret.” The fact of the matter is, I'm not 100 percent sure whether I do or don't know the truth about the situation, but I know by the way that he responds to my statement will tell me everything I need to know.
“I don't know how…” His voice cracks. “What do you want?”
And in that moment, I know it's all true. I don't need the investigator to come back with cold, hard facts, because I already know the answer. I know that this is a secret so devastating that it could ruin Elisabetta’s entire life.
“We're gonna make a deal,” I say, “and I'm gonna come up with the rules. They'll be fair to you, but you're not going to pull any fast ones on me. Okay?”
“And what do I get?”
“You get the money you need to pay off your debts and to survive and to even continue in a legitimate business for the rest of your days. You get to walk away from whatever criminals you're trying to get into bed with…”
“I get to keep my secrets.”
“Franco, I think she has a right to know.”
“Everything is off if you tell her. You hear me?” He is shouting now.“Every fucking thing.”
“I won't tell her.”
“I love my daughter, Liam. I love her with all my heart. I've always loved her. I will not let you ruin her life.”
“Have you ever thought that maybe you already have,” I say cruelly and coldly. “I will personally email you a contract tonight. I will have my attorney work on it.” I hang up and stand there, feeling cold and impassive. I’m about to cross a line I can’t come back from. I’m about to make a decision that will change many lives. And I don’t know if I’m doing it for money or to help Elisabetta. My head pounds as I think about the secret I have to keep from her. Can I really be with this woman, knowing something so powerful? I don’t know. The lines are becoming too gray and blurred. Everything about this situation is blowing up in my face. It was meant to be an easy task. It seemed like serendipity when Franco realized his daughter’s best friend worked for the lawyers who handled all my business. He said she would step up if she thought Skye was being mistreated, and if she didn’t, I was to infiltrate their lives. Which would have been quite easy, now that the friend group was dating all the partners. I wasn’t meant to get personally or physically involved. I was just meant to be a jackass and get Elisabetta running to Italy.
Only she is not her father’s daughter. She is something much more special than that. However, I don’t know if she is more special than four hundred million dollars.
I call the law firm and ask for Remington Parker.
“Liam, I heard you and Elisabetta were going on a trip. What’s going on?”
“I need your help with something,” I say somberly.
“Oh?”
“And you can’t tell anyone.” My voice is firm. “Not Juniper, not Max, not Kingston. For now, this stays between us.”
“Liam, what’s going on?”
“You need to contact Brody Everett in Los Angeles. He’s a guy I know…a good guy. I’m going to call him when we get off the phone. He owes me a big favor, and he’s going to pay it back.”
“What are you talking about? You’re talking in riddles.”
“You’ll understand when I email you later. All the information I send you, I need it written up in an official contract by tonight. Do you understand?”
“Liam, I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“I’m trying to save a major deal…and be a Prince Charming in the process. You’ll understand later. I have to go.” I hang up and squeeze my phone in my hand. I’m likely making a decision I will later regret, but I don’t have time to overanalyze anything right now.