Chapter 78
Edmundo
There was a soft knock at the office door, and I looked up to see Ana standing there. She smiled, and my heart stopped. I waved her in, watching her, as I listened to Clive talk about the new fashion house that he wanted to bring on board under the Genovese umbrella.
Back-to-back meetings all day had kept me holed up in here.
I hadn’t left other than for dinner, which had been…
unusual. I was still struggling with the idea that any of this was real, and Lilya seemed to be having the same issue.
I caught her staring at her mother more than once, like she might wake up at any moment to find it was all a dream.
Ana stalked the room, her movements slow and deliberate as she came around my desk to stand behind my chair. She was like a guardian angel and a sexy devil at the same time. I sucked in a deep breath as her hands touched my shoulders and slid down my chest.
Closing my eyes, I tried to focus on the call, but Ana made it very difficult. Not that I minded.
“Yes, I agree. We must think about the changing industry and a younger demographic. I browsed the designs. They are certainly edgy, and exactly what we’ve been looking for,” I said, smirking as Ana tugged at my tie, loosening it.
My heart pounded wildly, like it always had from her touch.
“Yes, you have my permission to make an offer. Be sure to hire a team that focuses on social media and influencers. To promote the brand properly, we will need to use the marketing pathways that are trending,” I said, biting my lip as Ana kissed my neck while her hand toyed with the buttons on my shirt.
The first button popped free, then a second, and then her hand slipped inside.
“I want my husband,” she whispered in my ear.
“Listen, Clive…do me a favor, put it all into a proposal for me to look over. I have another call to take and need to go. Yes, that works, thank you.”
Hanging up, I tossed my phone on the desk and grabbed Ana’s arm, drawing her around until she was sitting on my lap. I cupped her cheek.
“You work crazy hours, my love,” Ana said, and a ghost of a smile crossed my face.
“It used to be what kept me going. It will take a bit of time to adjust to having someone waiting for me to finish,” I said. “This feels like a dream. I still can’t believe you’re actually here.”
I kissed her, unable to wait another second. We’d talked, argued, and made love, repeating the cycle all week. The one thing that never wavered was how much we loved each other and how much we wanted this to work.
“Believe it, I’m not going anywhere. In fact, I’m going to be here so much that you’re going to get sick of me,” she teased, but I could see the hint of sadness in her eyes.
“What’s wrong? Are you still thinking about Sabastian?”
She looked down, her hand playing with my shirt.
“Should I have considered taking him back then? I never even contemplated it. Now I’m second-guessing everything. Was Christov a mean father after I left? Did he poison Sabastian so badly against Ren and me that he’d want to hurt us? I just have so many questions, and…”
“You don’t think he belongs in prison?”
“I don’t know,” she said, sadly. “Nash thinks he does, and honestly, I haven’t seen him in so long that I simply don’t know anymore. But the betrayal that was in his eyes…Eddie, between him and Ren and you, I feel like all I’ve done is hurt those I care about.”
“I’ll talk to Nash. I may have some information that will buy Sabastian a lighter sentence, but it should come from Nash. He and the local sheriff have a…complicated relationship, but he does trust him,” I said, and her eyes lit up.
“You’d do that? For Christov’s son?”
“I’d do it for you.”
Ana cupped my face and consumed me like I was water in a desert. I wrapped my arms around her and held her tight.
“I prayed to God every night to hold you like this again. This is a miracle, no matter how it happened,” I said, against her lips, smiling as I glanced at the door. “Has everyone left?”
“Yes, they left not long after dinner. You were on a conference call,” Ana said, pulling my tie off over my head and slipping it on instead.
“I’ll text Lilya and say goodnight. It’s been a crazy day.”
Ana slowly stood and sat on my desk. The dress she had on rode up just enough to tease me. Showing me nothing but promising the world. She placed one stocking-clad foot on my thigh as the devil danced in her eyes.
“I think we should break in this desk,” she said, running her foot up my leg.
“Is that so?”
Growling, I grabbed her calf, and Ana sucked in a ragged breath as she nodded.
Standing between her legs, I could hardly think straight.
She’d always had the power to do this to me.
Wiping my mind of anything but her. The rest of the world could be falling around us, and I wouldn’t care as long as we had each other.
Ana leaned back on her elbows, my tie pointing like an arrow between her thighs.
God help me. She could walk me to the edge of a cliff and tell me to jump, and I’d do it.
I had done so to have her, to save her, to protect her, and I’d do it all over again.
True love never died, and Ana was the love of my life.
“You look beautiful,” I said.
My phone rang, and I glared at it. It came up as Mikhailov Industries. Ana saw the ID and sat up. She grabbed the phone, hit talk, and then speaker.
“What the hell do you want, Vadin?”
“Just the person I wanted to talk to. I’m done running from you, daughter,” Vadin said.
His self-satisfied voice filled my office, and my blood instantly began to boil.
I’d fantasized about putting a gun to Vadin’s head and pulling the trigger all during my birthday dinner. When Ana had first burst through the doors, I thought it was just part of my elaborate daydream.
“It is about time you stopped being a coward and faced me,” Ana said.
“You mean like how you’ve faced me all these years? Oh, that’s right, you were the one running and hiding.”
“That was different, and you know it. I loved you and trusted you. You were my hero, and you crushed all of it for money, power, and favors. And for what? For you to die alone and unloved?”
“Your mother might have been angry with me, but she loved me,” Vadin said.
Ana stood from the desk and began pacing the room.
“No, she hated you in the end and only stayed because she knew you’d destroy her if she left. She hated what you did to our family, what you did to me. What you did to your grandchild, your flesh and blood.”
“You know how the world works. I do regret not making an effort to get to know Lilya, despite learning that Edmundo is her father. But I don’t regret marrying you to Christov.”
My fists balled, but where I was contained rage, Ana was a volcano. Her long hair bounced behind her as she stomped back and forth across the floor, her face red with anger that burned like lava in her veins.
“You did your job and gave me a grandson.”
Ana stopped walking, her face neutral, and I wasn’t sure what was happening. She burst into laughter.
“Oh my god…do you still believe that Sabastian is my son?” There was silence on the other end of the line.
“Christov really had you fooled. No father, Sabastian is the bastard child of Christov and Alina. You remember her, the nanny Christov moved in as his mistress? The prostitute. You are such a fool.” She laughed again.
“Lies,” Vadin hissed.
“No. It was the truth that mother took to her grave because she was the only one who knew. In fact, she was the one who made sure the birth certificates were doctored so you didn’t know Eddie was Lilya’s father.
Lilya is your only heir. You really thought Mom loved you?
No, we both hated you. How does it feel to know that the woman you loved couldn’t stand to look at your face?
You poisoned our family and turned us against you. ”
Ana paused and took a deep, steadying breath before continuing.
“Know this…run or not, I don’t care. I don’t even care if you came here with good intentions, I’ll never let you near my daughter again. I will find you, and I will look you in the eyes as I take your life and never shed a tear,” Ana said and ended the call.
Seething, she looked at me, her body shaking.
“It’s going to be okay,” I said. “I’ll find him, and then we will take him out together.”
She nodded as I walked toward her.
My phone dinged with a text, and she handed it back to me without looking at it.
“I need a drink,” she said, marching to the bar in the corner.
Opening the message, I read over the strange poem.
Unknown: Rub-a-dub-dub, a Little Queen and her crown,
too late to save her, the King watches her drown.
Water stays calm while the prowler is near,
but seconds dissolve into silence and fear.
Rub-a-dub-dub, no echo, no sound,
blood sinks slow where secrets are found.
By the time love reaches where she’s been,
the water has already claimed her then.
I snarled at my phone as I read it a second time. I’d promised Lilya that I would let her handle this, but no one sent me a text threatening my family. No one.