Chapter 4 Jamie #2
I trusted none of my father’s men, and I was sure they trusted me about as much as they liked me—not at all. It was a lonely way to live, I thought, with a hint of melancholy.
I shook my head. I wasn’t usually so… emotional.
I didn’t stop to talk to any of them.
I headed straight for the back, my hand touching the handle of the door before I thought better of it, and paused. I raised my hand and knocked. It didn’t take long for the door to open and my brother’s huge frame to fill the doorway.
He didn’t seem surprised to see me standing there, but he didn’t move out of the way either.
It could only mean one thing—he didn’t want me to see whatever was going on inside the room. I worked hard to keep the grimace off my face. I didn’t want to see what was going on behind the door either.
“What do you want?” he asked, not unkindly. But I wouldn’t say there was any warmth in his voice either.
“I want to talk to Dad.”
He didn’t respond right away. Then he grabbed my arm and led me away from the door, closing it behind him before I could really see inside.
He led me to another room on the side. I went over to the couch and sat down while Caine moved over to the small makeshift bar in the corner and poured himself a drink.
“Isn’t it a little too early for a drink?” I asked.
He turned and looked at me. “It’s never too early for a drink.”
Before I could say anything to that, the door opened and Dad walked inside the room, taking us in.
I looked down at his hand out of habit, relieved to find it clean.
Seeing blood there wouldn’t be a first for me, but I didn’t think I would ever get used to that.
“Hi, Dad,” I said when his eyes found mine.
He frowned at me. “What are you doing here? You know I don’t like you driving around this part of town.”
I shrugged. “Who’s going to shoot at me?”
His face hardened, but it was Caine who spoke. “Lots of people who want to mess with the Caparelli. You know better than to say something as careless as that.”
I didn’t bother arguing with him, mostly because I knew he was right. I didn’t know why I said that.
Dad came over to me and sat down, the look he reserved only for me was very much present. In a world of monsters, where having a weakness could get you killed, I knew I was my dad and brother’s one and only weakness.
What a heavy burden that was to carry.
“I just… did you find anything more about Etta and… and Kingston Mahankov’s relationship?”
Dad’s eyes instantly shuttered. “I already told you, Jamie. There’s no record of their having had a relationship in the first place. And even if there was, my men wouldn’t want us to go to war over—”
His lips pressed together in a thin line before he finished. It didn’t matter. I knew what he was going to say.
Go to war over an insignificant woman.
“She’s not insignificant,” I said, looking down at my lap.
He grabbed my hand and waited until I was looking at him. “I didn’t say she was.”
“You don’t have to. But she wasn’t insignificant. Not to me. And I know she wasn’t to her dad.”
“Tomas agrees with me. He doesn’t want to go to war with the Bratva. Not for this. We have to wait for the correct time.”
“I don’t want us to go to war.” I blinked and looked off to the side, not wanting either one of them to see the tears there. “I just want Kingston’s head.”
“You don’t mean that,” Caine said. I wondered why he would think so. After all, I had the Caparelli’s blood running through my veins.
We were capable of a lot of things.
We were capable of some pretty terrible, unimaginable things.
“Yes, I do,” I gritted out. I had never wanted another person dead as much as I wanted Kingston to be.
“Jamie—”
I stood up when I saw him move toward me out of the corner of my eye. I backed away from them. The tears I was trying so hard not to let them see fell anyway.
Caine watched me with an emotionless expression on his face, even though I knew he was anything but that. How I wished I could be more like him and not this emotional mess I couldn’t help but show.
“It’s not fair. How come men like him get a pass for abusing women? Why is he allowed to do that to her, to hurt her enough that she—”
I closed my eyes, unable to finish the sentence.
Dad stood up.
It felt as if they were trying to crowd me into a small corner, even though I knew that wasn’t the case.
“No one said he is getting a free pass,” Caine tried to reason.
I shook my head. “No? Then what do you call this? Would you have sat around and done nothing if it had been me and not Etta?”
Caine’s eyes hardened at the possibility.
And I had my answer.
“I miss her,” I said, feeling as if I were breaking from the inside out. “Every moment of every day. I just miss her so much. And it just hurt so much, yet there is nothing I can do about it. Do you know how that feels?”
“Sweetheart…” Dad made a move toward me. I backed off until I was against the door.
“Save it. There is nothing you can say that would make this any better. There’s nothing you can do… at least nothing you’re willing to do anyway. You’re just going to let the Bratva walk all over us.”
My lips curled back in disgust, and I turned and ran out of there, ignoring them when they both called out my name.
It was a waste of time.
I should have predicted that, but I still came here, throwing away my last Hail Mary, hoping, expecting a different outcome.
There was only one thing left to do.
If Dad didn’t want to react because he didn’t think Etta was significant enough to go to war with the Bratva, I’d give him a better reason.
I was going to make Reign Mahankov fall in love with me.