37. Dom
DOM
Spencer’s laughter rolled across the yard and crawled right underneath my skin — the feeling was only multiplied as Kiera joined her, running around the yard with the dog like they didn’t have a care in the world, laughing like two little kids.
As I watched them, one question drove into my chest like a splinter through my heart: Can I really protect them?
I slammed the trunk and headed for the front door. Of course I could — I had to. I’d already lost too much to Isaac, and every step through this house was a reminder of that.
Now that I’d seen my mother, the scar tissue that protected my memories of her had been ripped right open. Everything in this house reminded me of her.
After all, Isaac had never been one for homemaking. Everything in this house, every restoration I’d made, was a feature my mother had chosen first. For years, I’d been constructing a mausoleum to happier times, the days that she and Kiera had brought life to this house. And now that I had her back…
I don’t.
My lip curled as I strode through the entryway. It wasn’t safe to think like that yet. I wasn’t ready to go back to having memories instead of a mother. But one wrong move, and I could still lose everything.
It was bad enough feeling this way about Kiera for so many years. Things were easier when I’d given up hope on either one of them coming back into my life.
Things were bleaker then, too. On my own, the fight against Zeus felt like a Sisyphean battle of wills. But for the first time, I saw a glimmer of hope for a future beyond ending my father’s reign. And more than ever, I was determined to find a way through this hell.
Isaac wouldn’t make it easy, of course. Taking over his company wouldn’t be enough, or we would have done it already. We needed to hold our cards close until the time presented itself, until we could take down the corporate structure and his underground empire in one fell swoop.
But when?
As I lifted my foot to ascend the stairs, Callahan hustled up behind me in that furtive way that told me she had a question. “Yes?”
She caught up quickly, taking the stairs in perfect stride with me. “I can’t believe we’re actually back. It’s so weird…”
“Cut the small talk, Major. What do you really want?”
She dropped the act with a sigh, “Isaac… Do you buy it? That he gave up the search?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Just seems weird. To be so close to our scent, and then to give up on it entirely.”
Too logical for anyone’s good.
I shrugged. “I mean, he scoped out the house, and it seemed abandoned. I started coming into work while we were at Feverpoint, and his goons never saw me come back here. He has a lot of resources, but he doesn’t like to waste them.
What’s the point in keeping his dogs on a trail that’s gone cold?
He moved on. It was just a hunch, anyway. ”
Leo shrugged, hesitant to accept the explanation.
And as we crested the staircase, I knew that it wasn’t necessarily true. My father was nothing if not stubborn. Despite the riches he’d built for himself, at his core, he was still a starved dog with a bone. He wasn’t going to let go so easily.
Not until he’d drawn blood.
There was no use in speculating though. I might be stuck in a tail spin, but I needed everyone else sharp. Kiera was in more danger now than ever, and it was only going to get worse once the paperwork was filed.
What I’d told Leo wasn’t a lie, either. What we knew right now was that his spies had moved on. We would keep an eye on our perimeters and minimize our chances of picking up a tail when we did have to go out.
Ultimately, all of it was just a waiting game until I could find out more about the IPO. The harder I looked, the more silence I was met with. And the fact that Zeus was guarding that information stubbornly from a C-suite employee told me that it was just as valuable as I suspected.
One way or another, we were going to have to find a way to slip Isaac’s defenses and cut him down — Gabriel too. Then, and only then, would I have my life back.