Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Aria
The encounter from the restaurant stayed with her all through dinner, and the ride home.
It was difficult, reconciling the man with the mobster.
The man who would invest a not-insignificant amount of money into a flailing business—taking only a fraction of the profits for himself as repayment—versus the man who had so coldly walked her through the plan to utterly annihilate his enemy without getting a drop of blood on his hands.
Two wildly different sides of the same dangerous coin.
She was drawn from her contemplation by the slowing of the car, but when she looked out the window, it wasn’t his home looming in front of them.
It was her father’s club.
Panic and excitement twisted around her, squeezing the air from her lungs. “What are we doing here?”
“Tonight is about being seen. Letting people know we won’t be forced into hiding.” Linking his fingers with hers, he met her eyes in the dark. “This seemed like the perfect place for such a statement.”
“We’re supposed to be letting the DeLucas know we aren’t scared of them. Not my father.”
“Two birds, one stone.”
When she didn’t answer immediately, he squeezed her hand. “If you’d rather go home, we can. I apologize if I overstepped.”
“No. No, you didn’t overstep.” Now that they were here, she could see the logic of it. And she really, really wanted to make that fucking statement. “We can go up.”
“Then let’s go.”
He climbed out of the car before turning to help her out.
And if her heart picked up its pace when he settled her hand in the crook of his arm instead of releasing her, it was just because she was about to see her father again for the first time since the man standing beside her had threatened to have him killed.
Maybe this was a mistake.
But she didn’t argue as he led her toward the front door, where he paused to look down at her, his expression somehow both serious and playful. “Before we go in, we need to discuss your rules.”
“My rules?”
“Yes, princess, your rules. The most important of which is that you listen to Daddy at all times. If I tell you to kneel, you kneel. If I tell you not to speak, you keep your mouth closed. You will obey or you will be punished, and if you disobey publicly, you will be punished in the same manner.”
An image of her, bent over his knee while he spanked her ass red in front of a faceless crowd flashed into her mind, and she had to fight the urge to whimper at the molten-hot need coursing through her veins. “I suppose that’s fair enough.”
“Good girl,” he purred. “You will address me as ‘Sir’ or ‘Daddy’, especially when you are responding to a question or a command. So if I tell you to kneel at my feet, what should you do?”
“Flip you the bird and call myself an Uber?”
“Aria…”
A single word, and yet it dripped with warning. “I’m just teasing.” Mostly. Probably. “I should say ‘Yes, Daddy’ and drop to my knees like the good little doormat I am.”
His lips twitched, though he managed to mostly keep his stern expression in place. “Princess, you are the farthest thing from a doormat.”
“I don’t feel like it right now.”
Now he let the smile curve his lips as he placed a finger beneath her chin, nudging her head back. “Would it help to know that I’ve had men killed for disrespecting me the way you do on a regular basis?”
“I’m not sure what it says about me that I actually do feel better knowing that.”
“Good. Final rule… no picking fights with your father.”
“Aw, what’s the fun in that?”
“I mean it, Aria. We aren’t here to antagonize him or cause a scene. Like it or not, he is the owner of this club and as such you will show him the respect he is due.”
“Or?”
“Or, I will be forced to deal with any disrespect you show him swiftly and publicly. Tell me you understand or we will get in the car and go home instead.”
It rankled, more than a bit, to be dictated to about how to talk to her own father. But she could also admit that Killian had a point. Here, he wasn’t just her father. He was Braden Elliott, owner of Club BDE, and disrespecting him in front of his patrons and employees would be… crass.
“Yes, Sir. I understand.” She couldn’t quite bring herself to call him Daddy, not with her own father right upstairs.
“Good girl. Let’s go have some fun.”
Killian
Despite his stance that they weren’t at the club to pick a fight with Braden, he could feel his shoulders tensing with every step they took. Bracing for a fight he didn’t want to have with a man he was still grieving the loss of.
But he was done grieving the loss of his club. Braden would likely never forgive him for the things he’d done, but he wasn’t going to simply roll over and give up the other friends he’d made here over the years just because he was no longer on friendly terms with the owner.
At the front desk in the lobby, Shane, one of the club’s most infamously bratty submissives, looked up. His smile flashed, then faltered slightly, worry creeping into the whiskey of his eyes. “Master O. We… weren’t expecting you.”
Beside him, Aria stiffened, so he laid his free hand over hers and gave it a reassuring squeeze as he offered Shane a breezy, devil-may-care smile that didn’t at all match the thundering of his heart. “You know me. Always bucking expectations.”
Shane’s grin returned full-force. “True that. But, ah, just so you’re aware, I’m supposed to let Daddy B know if you show up. Especially if you bring a… guest.”
His gaze flicked to Aria then back to Killian, who didn’t even bother to sigh. “Go ahead. Do we need to wait?”
“No, he just said to let him know, not to stop you or anything.”
“Good. We’ll be upstairs if he needs us.”
With Aria tucked beside him, he made for the metal stairs that led up to the restaurant area of the club. “And you were worried about me picking a fight,” she grumbled, and maybe it made him an incredibly perverse creature, but the annoyance in her tone helped to smooth out his own aggravation.
“He’s just doing his job. As the owner of the club and your father. If we’re being honest, I’m a little shocked he didn’t straight up revoke my membership.”
“I would have picked more than a fight with him if he’d tried.”
At the top of the stairs he paused, pulling her hand free of his arm to lift her fingers to his lips as he grinned. “My bloodthirsty little princess. I am rather enjoying this side of you.”
“Yes, well, injustice never sits well with me,” she said primly, but he caught sight of the glow of pride in her eyes before she deliberately turned away.
“So, are we here to mingle and show my father you aren’t afraid of him, or are you going to whisk me away to another of those delightful little rooms and have your way with me? ”
“Yes and yes. We have a room reserved, but we have a few minutes yet.”
She glanced up at him again as they moved through the club. “How did you manage that?”
“A friend. Ah, there she is now.”
Behind the bar, a little pixie of a woman with her dark hair cropped to match her stature grinned. “Was starting to wonder if you’d chickened out, Master O.”
“Never. Tara, have you met Aria?”
“Nope.” Interest lit the bartender’s eyes as she raked her gaze up and down Aria. “Gotta be honest, I assumed those rumors about you and the boss’s daughter were, well, just rumors.”
“Luckily for me, they are not.”
“Killian?”
Turning at the familiar voice, he grinned at the sight of Jacob standing behind him, eyes wide and mouth open as he stared. “In the flesh.”
He was forced to release his hold on Aria when Jacob rushed him, wrapping his arms around him and squeezing. “Missed you.”
Closing his eyes, he let himself enjoy the moment, abbreviated as it was likely to be, and returned the embrace. “I’ve missed you, too.”
When Jacob finally let him go again, Killian reached for Aria, who was watching them with open curiosity. “Aria, you’ve met Jacob, I assume.”
“I have. Cordelia’s boy. I was under the impression they were avoiding the club until my father—” She cut herself off, her cheeks turning pink.
Killian had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at her near confession. “Have you been eavesdropping, little girl?”
“Ah… I plead the fifth.”
“Unfortunately for you, princess, that amendment doesn’t hold up in the court of Daddy. We will be discussing this later.”
He wasn’t mad, not in the least, but it was just so damn fun to watch her blush and squirm. “Well, I guess since I already tattled on myself, I might as well ask. What are you doing here? Did Cordelia and my father make up?”
Jacob winced. “Not exactly. But Ivy really needs her people so Cordelia finally relented and let us come tonight. With the understanding that if we see Braden we’re both to walk away and find Daddy so she can deal with him.”
Grief and guilt tangled in his chest, a messy combination he was all too familiar with. “I’m sorry, Jacob. I never should have put you in the middle of this.”
An uncharacteristic fury lit Jacob’s pale eyes. “It’s not your fault. Braden is being completely fucking unreasonable about this whole thing.”
“Is that so, boy?”
All of the color drained from Jacob’s face before he whipped around to gape at the man himself, looking cold as stone and equally as unbendable. “I-I didn’t mean… I just meant…”
“Jacob.” Keeping his voice low, Killian put every ounce of authority he could manage into those two syllables. Jacob turned, his expression panicked, and the guilt in Killian’s chest threatened to smother him. “Go find your Daddy. Now.”
“But—”
“Now, Jacob.”
With a single sharp nod, Jacob hurried off, leaving Killian faced with his former best friend, and the cold anger burning in those too-familiar eyes.
“Hello, Braden.”