Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The Hero
Iopen the door to my father’s study and enter the four-hundred-square-foot space that I’ve always hated.
He’s sitting in his throne-like chair and I know I’ve shocked him with my sudden intrusion.
I’ve actually never seen him shocked, now that I think about it.
I’ve seen him happy and gleeful and furious and in the fucking throes of passion but no, I’ve never seen him shocked. His gray eyes, so much like mine, flare slightly.
And I realize his eyes are too big for his face.
Thank God or whoever the fuck is responsible for these things that I didn’t get this trait from him, cartoonish eyes.
He opens his mouth to say something but I’m not interested. And I’m not staying long anyway.
So for the first time ever, without reservations or hesitations, I stride over to his desk and throw something at it. It skids all the way over to my father’s side, loose papers spilling across the polished desk.
It’s the file he gave me.
Like before, I put both my hands on his desk and look him in those eyes.
Eyes that have never been warm or affectionate.
“You wanted to teach me a lesson about keeping secrets, yeah?” I begin. “Well, here’s a little secret for you: I’m good with cars. Pretty fucking good. Fantastic, actually. Have you ever wondered why I love my Mustang so much?”
His features tighten up but I don’t give him a chance to speak.
“You probably haven’t. Given how amazingly self-absorbed you are.
I love it so much, Dad, because I built it myself.
With my own hands. I didn’t buy it at a showroom, didn’t buy it with your money.
It’s completely mine. Surprised you, didn’t I?
Yeah, me too. Never thought I had that sort of talent.
I mean, soccer’s easy. Soccer’s a piece of cake, but this stuff takes some real genius.
And as I said, I’m pretty fantastic. So I’ve come to a conclusion: If I love it so much, building cars I mean, I should probably do it for a living, don’t you think? ”
His malice-filled eyes narrow. But again, I don’t give him a chance to speak.
His speaking days are over.
“So here’s another little surprise for you: I bought the garage.
On that piece of land that you wanted. That’s mine now.
That I unfortunately had to buy with your money, or the money I earned working for you so technically it’s mine, but still.
It made my skin crawl. But I guess it was for a good cause, huh?
And now I think congratulations are in order, aren’t they?
Because you’re never getting that piece of land. ”
Now I give him a chance to speak. And he does, with clenched teeth. “You’re a little piece of shit, aren’t you, son?”
“I am, yeah. But I don’t think I can take all the credit for that.
Some of it goes to you.” Then, “Oh, and that guy we usually use to mess with people? Who was going to fuck with Pete’s bank accounts?
Yeah, he’s indisposed. Somebody broke into his house and broke all his bones.
Now who would do such a cruel thing? I’d say a real piece of shit. ”
“Looks like you need a little reminder about who’s the boss, don’t you?”
“I leave that up to your judgement, actually. If I need a reminder or not.”
My father leans toward me. “You sure you want to? Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you’ve got a lot more to lose this time.”
I clench my jaw, showing him all my hate, all of the pent-up loathing inside of me, all the fury, all the mayhem I’ll rain down on him if he dares to talk about her.
My Fae. Or Halo.
Yesterday I choked on my fear. I choked on what he could do.
But I never thought about what I could do.
What I’m capable of.
“Yeah, I do,” I tell him, keeping my gaze steady. “I do have a lot more to lose. And I thought about it last night. And I think I’ve got another little surprise for you.”
“What’s that?”
I press my hands on the desk harder, my fingers almost digging through the expensive wood.
“You don’t want me to lose those. The things I’ve got to lose now.
Because those are the only things standing between you and me.
Between what I can do to you if you so much as even think about hurting her and my baby.
Which is ironic. Don’t you think? The things you want to hurt in order to make me your bitch are the very things keeping you safe from me. ”
“Are you fucking threatening me, Roman?”
I expect my skin to crawl again.
I expect to feel the phantom noose around my neck tightening up as it has in the past two years.
But nothing happens.
My breaths are harsh but it’s my fury, my anger, my own violence that’s making them so.
“No, of course not. This is not a threat. It’s a fact, and I mean it in the sincerest way possible.
If you even look at my family, I’m going to rip your heart out.
The only reason I haven’t done that yet — and believe me, I’ve thought about it a million times in the last two years — is because I thought I had no choice.
I had no choice but to do your bidding. I had no choice but to be like you.
Because we’re both assholes, aren’t we? But whaddya know, I do have a choice.
And I would very much like to see where that choice takes me.
If I get to fuck you up in the process, it would be icing on the cake.
So be very careful about what you do next.
You don’t want me to turn into a man who’s got nothing to lose.
Because then there’d be no stopping me.”
With that, I straighten up.
I watch his furious eyes, so much like mine, that have a hint of terror in them.
The terror that I felt all day yesterday.
Ever since he found out about Halo and Fae’s Juilliard.
Not going to lie, I love seeing that.
I love seeing my father, sitting in his throne-like chair, afraid of his own son. I memorize it, that look and file it away for future use as I walk out of that study for the last time.
As I breathe the toxic fucking air of that toxic fucking space for the last time.
And Jesus Christ, I’ve never felt lighter.
I’ve never felt more… relieved. More like I could breathe now.
And it’s all because I’ve got a choice.
I never thought I had a choice, actually.
I had a shitty father who wanted to control me, who wanted to treat me like a possession. Who never cared about me or my sister or my mother. Or people in general. So I had no choice but to hate him. I had no choice but to rebel, to fight. To stick it to him.
I had no choice but to go to war with him.
Every action, every reaction in my life has been born out of the fact that I never had a choice.
But then… then she said that I did. That you always do.
No one’s ever said that to me before. No one’s ever said to me that I had a choice, that I could pick the life that I wanted for myself.
So I thought about it. I thought about if I had a choice, what would I want?
What are the things that I want?
Turns out, I want a lot of things. And they were buried inside of me just waiting to come out.
I’d want a mother who cared about me and Pest. Who didn’t love a villain like my father. Who was happy and carefree.
I’d want Pete as my father.
The man who taught me everything about cars and showed me what my passion was.
The man who I went to last night, after driving around for hours, and told everything to.
And his response was that he was done with the garage anyway.
That he wanted to travel now, visit all the places he went to with Mimi, and he was ready to give it up but only if I’d promise to take care of it.
Well, his exact words were, I was waiting for you to wake the fuck up and get your head out of your ass so I could hand you this damn shop and retire.
So I took it. Because if I had a choice, I’d pick working in a garage over playing soccer any day.
It’s mine now. My dream.
Because a dream is something that gives you peace and sets your soul on fire at the same time.
That’s what she said to me.
The girl because of whom all of this is happening. The girl who showed me that I could take my life back from my father, if I wanted. I could build my own life. The kind of a life, the kind of a father that my baby girl would be proud of like I was never proud of my own father.
The girl who showed me that I could be different, good, someone I like – but wait a second.
Wait a fucking second.
She isn’t the girl who finally made me realize that I do have a dream and what it means to have one, no. Or that I could choose to be a different person.
At least, she’s not just that, is she?
She’s more.
She’s my… She’s my dream itself.
Because she gives me peace. And she sets me on fire.
Holy fucking Christ.
Fae does that for me. Every time she smiles at me. Every time she touches me. Or she tells me something that she’s read in a pregnancy book or she bakes for me. Or looks at me with her pretty eyes or blushes for me.
Every time she lets me inside her body so I can worship her, ruin her, sate myself in her.
Every fucking time she dances.
That’s why I used to be so eager to watch her spin on her toes in the woods or back at Bardstown High. Because she gave me peace. Because she took away my stress of soccer and rivalry and my dad.
Because when I saw her, all I could think about was her.
Jesus Christ, Fae is my dream.
The biggest one I’ve ever had. The most precious one.
Isn’t she?
My tight little ballerina who’s glorious and gorgeous and pregnant with my baby.
I’m outside now, in the driveway of my posh house and I have to take a second. I have to plow my fingers through my hair and just breathe.
At the realization.
At the fact that I’ve been such a fucking idiot.
All this time, all this fucking time, Pete kept telling me. My own fucking father kept telling me and I…
I’ve been too bogged down and wrapped up in my own self to recognize it. To recognize that I love her. That I could love her.