Chapter 58
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Alexei
Father was many things but the biggest thing that he was, was an asshole. I’d always known it growing up, but I knew it even more now as I got the phone call that Father was ready to meet an hour before I was supposed to pick up Audrey for the fundraiser we were attending. The last thing I wanted to do was see my father before I had to be with my girlfriend. I still couldn’t believe I was calling her that.
I’d honestly never felt so good. It felt weird. I honestly had no idea what I was doing but I was trying my best to be what was good for her. I’d never been in a serious relationship before. The closest thing I’d ever gotten to one was fucking the same girl more than four times and that didn’t include dinner or a movie first. With Audrey, I was experiencing many firsts. We actually talked about things we liked, what we wanted our futures to be, anything. It was weird but it was good, it was new and I didn’t want it to end. I craved talking to her, I craved touching her, tasting her, fucking her. But lately, it wasn’t fucking… it was more.
Lightning flashed across the massive floor-to-ceiling windows in my father’s office. I checked my watch for the fifth time, he said an hour before I was supposed to pick Audrey up, but he wasn’t even here yet.
At least it was here in the city and he hadn’t forced his hand to have me go to him in their northern estate. I wouldn’t have been able to take Audrey out at all tonight if that had been the case. I could still see her and touch her when I was finished dealing with this fucker.
My knee bounced as I waited for him. He always loved his dramatic, late entrances. I should have known better. Didn’t he understand that people had things to do? Oh, he understood, he just didn’t care. Good ole Pops for you.
“Thank you for meeting me today, Alexei,” he began as he unbuttoned his sports coat and sat down behind his chair. “I know it was a bit last-minute but unfortunately with how much I have to oversee, I can’t plan too far in advance. I had several meetings this afternoon and one ran over.” He smiled, the motion not even meeting his eyes. The heartless bastard didn’t have meetings all afternoon and giving me an explanation was just a part of the manipulation that was about to come or he wouldn’t have smiled. He was trying, unsuccessfully, to butter me up. “I’ve always had your best interest at heart and it’s time we talk about it.”
The folder flashed into my mind. My knee stopped bouncing and the anxiety over being late to see Audrey tripled into something else. We never talked about my future, in fact, we never really spoke at all. Everything that needed to be discussed was with Ace, besides that one stupid conversation we had in their estate, in what felt like a lifetime ago.
He leaned back in his dark green, wing-back chair and stared at me with his soulless, calculating eyes. The same eyes that stared back at me in the mirror every day. They were cold, distant, and menacing. The last thing I wanted to do was remind anyone of my father but I was the spitting image of him, so I tried my hardest to be nothing like him. If they saw it in my looks, they sure as hell wouldn’t see it in my personality.
“It’s time we talk about your future,” He assessed me silently and I prayed I didn’t portray what a ball of nerves I was at this topic, at this meeting in general. Where was Ace? He was usually our father’s shadow. I would have done anything to have him as a buffer tonight. I hoped Father would wrap this up quickly so I could be with Audrey. I couldn’t even let her know I was going to be late. If I pulled out my phone, it would only make this worse. “It’s about time you start thinking about settling down.”
I blinked. I’d done my best to show him that was what I was trying to do. It was why my picture with Audrey was in the tabloids. It was why I was attending fundraisers with her. “What?”
“You’re the second oldest to the Cristof fortune, you know the ins and outs of this business almost as well as Ace does. If something were to happen to him, everything would fall to you.”
Yes, I’d been groomed as a second my entire life. I knew this, what was he getting at?
He slid a familiar navy blue folder across the mahogany desk. I didn’t bother with even touching it, I knew what it held. “In this folder, you will find a handful of suitable women for you to choose from.”
“Excuse me?” He knew I was seeing Audrey. Everyone knew I was seeing Audrey. This was a sick joke, it had to be.
One of his dark brows inched up his forehead. “I understand that this isn’t exactly ideal but you’re extremely fortunate that I’m even giving you a choice.” He shrugged as if none of this mattered. Like my future was just some thing he could toy with because he was bored. “My marriage to your mother was arranged.”
I could no longer hold back my words. My lips twisted with them. “And look at how that turned out.”
He sighed and steepled his fingers in front of him. “I’ve allowed this to go on long enough. Audrey Wilde is nothing. Has nothing. Will never be anything.” His voice wasn’t loud or harsh but it cut like a knife. It was just as cold as his eyes—his heart.
I pushed the folder back toward my father’s side of the desk and shook my head. “I’ve made things official with Audrey. I want to be with her, long-term. I don’t need this folder. I don’t need who you’ve chosen. She is the best that there is for me. She will be something. She is already everything.” I laughed. I couldn’t believe I was laughing in his face. I thought this time would come a lot later down the road. When I envisioned telling my father to fuck off it wasn’t like this. I wanted more time so I could establish more money, but I had enough. I didn’t need anything more.
He leaned forward and sneered. “Like I said, I let this go on for long enough. I should have known better than approving a girl like her to be allowed around this family. I should have known better than to allow you to act like a spoilt child all these years but here we are. You have a responsibility to your family—to this fortune.”
“I don’t need your fortune.” It was time. “I don’t need you and you can fuck off with all your fortune. I don’t want it.”
“You will be satisfied with having nothing, Son?” He seemed bored. I’d expected more of a reaction with my language but he sat there like I hadn’t said anything.
“I have everything I need. I’ve been buying properties, strip clubs, restaurants, and the like since I graduated from University. I have more money than most people would know what to do with. I do not need yours.”
Father wasn’t phased. He picked up the folder and thumbed through it. He gazed over the papers at me and lifted another petulant brow. “You will go through these women and you will find yourself a bride. If you don’t, I will. And then I will take care of Audrey on my own terms.”
Mother liked Audrey, was this what it was all about? He hated how much everyone liked her and he didn’t have a shred of happiness or joy in his heart? All he cared about was money, he’d made that abundantly clear growing up in his absence and then his wrath.
“What’s wrong with me wanting to be with Audrey if Ace is with Carina?” They were practically sisters, not by blood, but by everything else. If Carina was good enough for Ace, why wasn’t Audrey good enough for me? What was she missing?
He snapped the folder shut, pushed it back toward me, and clenched his jaw. Rage bled into his gaze. “Carina shouldn’t have been allowed to slip through the cracks. I didn’t know Ace was on dating sites, ” He spat. “So I entertained this slip-up. But I refuse to entertain another. Old money doesn’t marry the poor and unfortunate. Old money marries old money or they marry new. It is how it’s done. It’s all about political alliances and if you can’t see that then I failed at raising you correctly.”
“And if I say no?” I’d been rebelling all of my life. What was one more rebellion?
His eyes twinkled with mirth. “Say no and your little Audrey Wilde will disappear from the face of this earth.” My blood ran cold. I should have known better than to think his method of making her disappear was paying her off. No, he would have her killed.
“What do you say, Son?” I pulled the folder off of his desk and straightened from the chair I’d been sitting in for far too long and sneered down at the man I hated more than anything else in the world.
“I will look into these options,” I held up the folder and left my father sitting at his desk.
An arranged marriage wasn’t frowned upon when it came to old money. In fact, it was a very common practice but for the sake of the tabloids and the businesses we ran, arranged marriages were hush, hush. If a real marriage blossomed from it, wonderful, but if it didn’t it wasn’t a harm or a foul. It just was what it was. Expanding reach and money was all that mattered even if you had more of it than you knew what to do with. We didn’t need more reach, we didn’t need more money, but when you lived in greed it was the only thing that filled your dark, rotting heart. My driver opened the door to my right and Audrey slid right in.
The night air blew into the car and I fought the shiver. Winter would be on its way soon. Audrey was wrapped in a thick coat that hid an elegant dress for tonight’s function, leather boots cut off at the ankle, and her hair was curled around her face. She was breathtaking, radiant. I moved the folder to the floor and she smiled. Her nose was pink from the cold and her cheeks were flushed. I wanted nothing more than to lean forward and kiss the rosy color but I couldn’t do that to myself and I certainly couldn’t do that to her, not when I knew I would be breaking her heart. This was easily going to be the worst thing I’d ever done and I didn’t even know how to do it. I’d never broken up with someone before. I’d never had such strong feelings like this before either, but here we were at the end of the rope.
“What’s that?” She pulled her gloves from her fingers and wrapped her hands around mine. I closed my eyes and let myself enjoy the feeling of her skin against mine. I could be selfish for a minute.
“A project my father has me working on, it’s not a big deal.”
But it was the biggest deal. It was monumental.
She made a funny face. “Since when do you work with your father?”
“Since tonight, apparently. It’s why I was late. My father doesn’t care about anyone else’s timeframes.”
Audrey nodded.
“Are you okay?” Her voice broke through all of my thoughts. I didn’t want to do this.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “This has been really fun.” I guessed that was the best way to start.
“Fun?” Her confusion was thick and I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to do this. I had no other choice. Her life depended on it. For anything else, I would have ignored the threats. But this… I couldn’t chance it.
“But I think it’s time we go our separate ways,” I was doing so well until my voice cracked and my emotions started bleeding through. I wanted her. I wanted her so desperately. The wildness in her, the joy, the warmth. When she was gone, I would be a cold dark person, just like my father. That was what he wanted all along, and he always got what he wanted.
She reared back as if I struck her. “What are you talking about?”
“I don’t think we should see each other anymore, Audrey.” I clenched my jaw to keep myself from crying, from taking it all back, from pulling her to me.
“Why?” She whispered.
“Because I got everything I wanted from you and that’s that.”
My driver opened the door for her and she stared at me with glassy eyes. She lifted her chin, blinked a few times, and shook her head. “I want to say I didn’t see this coming, but I guess I did. Have a nice life, Alexei. I hope you end up finding everything you’re looking for.”
When the door shut behind her, I leaned back in my seat and let out a string of curses. My heart, whatever was left of it, was completely shattered.