Chapter 28
The door clicked shut behind my father, the sound like a death knell.
He left a trail of tension thicker than the expensive cigar smoke he always seemed to carry with him.
I pushed a stray lock of hair from my face, the gesture feeling more frantic than usual.
Over the years, he had threatened my life, but this time .
. . I could see he meant it. Things had been unraveling around here, and I didn’t know how to stop it.
The FBI agent, the missing product, the mysterious shipment from Colombia . . . they all weighed heavily on me. My father had placed all those problems on my shoulders, whether I’d known about them or not. Today was my final warning.
“I can’t have my heir failing over and over again. You will reign as one who has kept his word and not lost shipments or let the government get the better of us. One more fucking failure, Gavriel Azzaro, and I will personally put a bullet through your skull.”
Goddess. I need to see my Elin.
Your Elin?
Mine. I knew I was irrevocably in love with her, and while there was a part of me that wanted to push her away, I couldn’t.
“Are we done?”
He waved me off with a flick of his hand.
Refusing to overthink my need for her in this moment, I stood and drove on autopilot to the club.
Traffic was light at this time of day, so it wasn’t long before the elevator doors opened to the office level.
I knocked quickly before pushing the cracked door open.
Elin was standing next to her handbag hanging on the wall, where she dropped something into it before she looked at me. Instantly, I knew something was off.
Her usual snark was muted, replaced by a stillness that felt heavier than any Don Azzaro-induced drama.
“Elin?” My own voice surprised me, hoarse, uncertain, scraping its way across the room. “What’s wrong?”
She straightened, her shoulders up, face already set in the stiff lines of denial—yet her hand lingered in the bag. “Nothing.” The air was full of things not said, and the room suddenly felt too narrow for the both of us.
I stepped closer, watching as she turned and too quickly went back to her desk.
“Something’s different,” I pressed, softer this time.
There was a dull echo in the words, as if I’d spoken them to my own reflection.
She’d always met me head-on in the past, eager to trade barbs, to challenge the way I saw the world.
Now, she seemed to have walled herself off.
The silence carried, and I heard the tick of the clock hanging just over the doorway of her office. She did not look up, but after a long moment of silence, she did, her expression the careful, practiced indifference of someone who’d spent years mastering the art of emotional camouflage.
“You’re imagining things,” she said, her tone dismissive but shaded with a tremor that gave her away.
I wanted to believe her, to accept the diversion she offered, but she’d forgotten who I was.
I wasn’t just some random guy she dommed.
I was the heir to the Azzaro family and had been well versed in reading people and situations.
The tension in her arms and the deliberate steadiness of her breathing told another story.
She was disturbed, shaken, maybe by something I’d done.
I braced for a blow, a fresh revelation, but she only sat back at her desk.
“Was it my father?” I asked, voice barely above a whisper, the taste of smoke and fear still thick on my tongue. “Did he—”
“No,” she interrupted too sharply. “It’s not that. He hasn’t . . . He’s not . . . It’s not him.” Her eyes flicked to mine, and for a fleeting second, the mask slipped—anguish, raw, and undisguised—before she yanked it back into place.
“Then what?” I asked and hated how desperate I sounded.
More silence. Then, as if she’d rehearsed it, she managed a tight smile, her gaze skittering away from me. “You look like you wrestled a vulture and lost, Gavriel.” Her words, though light, carried an undercurrent of concern, while she not so subtly changed the subject.
“Close,” I admitted, slumping into the chair in front of her desk. I’d let her have this one for now. “Just left a meeting with my father.” She nodded, waiting for me to finish. “He’s not exactly thrilled or quiet about it. Shit is going sideways in the family business.”
Her head tipped to the side slightly as she read between the lines. “And that’s why the Owl’s Talon looks like he’s aged ten years in an hour?”
Chuckling, I met her gaze. “Maybe twenty.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
Not unless you know how to get the FBI off my ass and foresee the future on any shipments that I fuck up that I didn’t even know existed.
“Nah.”
We sat quietly for a long moment before she stood, circled the desk, and as she lifted my chin, she met my gaze. “What does my pretty boy need from his Goddess?”
How was she able to shove aside her concerns to focus on me?
Her ability to navigate the whirlpool of emotions was incredible.
She didn’t speak, but I could see the wheels turning in her head.
Yes, she was waiting for my reply, but she was also giving thoughtful consideration to what I needed.
To see if she could find a way to help me relax.
It was strange to see someone put their focus so wholly on me, despite their own turmoil.
As I held her gaze, there was only one thought going through my head. I felt a bit like a child but asked, “Can I just hold you?”
A soft smile was her only response as she crawled into my lap, laid her long, beautiful legs over the arm of the chair, and wrapped her arms around my neck.
She let me hold her for over an hour before my phone went off. I ignored it the first time, just squeezing her tighter, but when it immediately rang again, I sighed and she climbed off my lap and stood, legs wide, and crossed her arms over her chest.
Answering the phone, I growled, “Talk, and it better be good.”
“We have a lead on Hillabrand.”
My attention snapped to Elin. “Pick him up and take him to my favorite hiking trail up the road.”
“Yes, sir.”
After hanging up, my Goddess’s chin was still high as she asked, “I’m assuming you need to go and handle a family matter?”
“I do, Goddess.”
“Very well. Is there anything else you need from me today?”
“No, ma’am.”
She gave me a curt nod as I stood, but then grabbed my chin. “Remember who you are.” The statement was hugely out of context considering what she knew, but it resonated with me deeper than she could ever know. “Now, kiss your Goddess goodbye.”
I didn’t hesitate. My lips crashed onto hers, and I pulled her close. She opened for me, allowing me to deepen the kiss. Fuck, this woman was going to destroy me. I was so completely hers, and she didn’t even know it.
Pulling back, I rested my forehead on hers, both of us breathing heavy. The words were on the tip of my tongue, and I was physically straining to hold them back. Her eyes were closed, so I gave her one more quick kiss on the lips.
When I was halfway to the door, she said, “I’m heading home in about an hour, and I think I’m going to take tomorrow off. Check in with me in the morning?”
Worried I would say something I really shouldn’t, I simply nodded and walked out. Five minutes later, I was straddling my bike, slipping my helmet on, starting it with a thunderous roar, and speeding down the road.
The sun shone through the branches, and the wind rustled the leaves outside, but after we walked into the old, abandoned building, the cold concrete walls and floors sent a chill through the room.
Slowly, we made our way down the rickety stairs to the basement, where right in the middle, was Barry Hillabrand, the FBI agent ruining my life, tied up like a present under the Christmas tree.
I strode across the basement floor until I towered over him, watching as his lips curled into that insufferable grin, his eyes dancing with amusement despite his current situation.
“Gavriel Azzaro. The Owl’s Talon himself.”
“Agent Hillabrand. It appears I need an exterminator for a rat. I’d like to take care of that sooner rather than later to keep from having an infestation.”
His throat bobbed. “I’m not telling you anything.”
“But see, Harley here tells me you’ve been cooperative. So, how did you find out about all of our dealings?”
“I’m not giving up my informant.” Harley walked over to a bag he had brought over, and when metal clinked inside, the agent continued, “Besides, they had a change of heart. They haven’t fed me anything in ages.”
“Who?”
He shook his head as Harley handed me a bottle of carbonated water. I shook it as Harley went to stand behind the agent, to hold him in place. “I’ll ask one more time.”
“And I’ll tell you the same thing. They said something about a change of heart, and I haven’t gotten anything from them in months.”
Harley’s hand went to Hillabrand’s forehead and pulled his head back just as I put the bottle up to his nose and twisted the cap off. The pressure from the carbonation sprayed the soda up into his sinuses.
Agent Hillabrand jerked and sputtered. When I stepped back, liquid was coming out of every orifice in his face. He caught his breath after a moment and just glared at me.
I reached for another bottle and smirked. “I have a twelve pack of these. We can go ahead and blow your sinuses out if you’d like.” His only answer was to lift his chin and give me a defiant glare. Shrugging, I shook the bottle in my hand. “So be it.”
He glared at me, face wet and red, breathing hard through his nose like he was going to try to spit in my face, but the only thing he managed was to drip more sparkling water down his chin.