Chapter 22
Ethan
An hour later, Jamie is in the passenger seat of my Aston Martin. I’m driving, something I don’t do often enough these days. I enjoy it, even though I’ve gotten used to being driven around and never having to worry about parking.
Jamie drums her fingers on her thigh as she gazes out of the window. Her restless energy means she’s always in motion, and I smile whenever I glance at her tapping fingers. I’ll never get tired of watching her move. I love how athletic she is.
Forcing my attention back to the road, I turn off West Jefferson Boulevard, take a right, then pull up outside a modern, four-story apartment building.
Jamie frowns at it, then turned her puzzled gaze to me. “Why are we here?”
I shift the car into park but leave the engine running.
This is the start of the story I promised her. It’s not an easy story for me to tell, but coming here, where it began, makes it a little easier. This way, I can explain properly. I can tell her the whole history, to help her understand.
“There used to be an old bungalow on that lot,” I say, nodding to the narrow building.
“My mother and I moved into it when I was fourteen. We had the back rooms and shared the bathroom and kitchen with the other tenants. The rooms were bigger than where we’d been living before, and Mom thought it was a step up. ”
“You grew up poor?” Jamie sounds surprised.
I shrug. “We didn’t have much money, but we got by.
We always had enough to eat, though we lived in some shitty places.
This one was better in some ways, but the roof was a sieve, and the electrics would fry every time it rained.
Any food in the fridge would spoil, and we never had hot water.
The landlord refused to fix the roof leaks, and the tenants either didn’t care enough to do repairs, or like me and Mom, they didn’t know how. ”
“That sounds awful.” Her tone is sympathetic, and I shake my head, giving her a rueful smile.
“You had plenty of your own problems growing up, so don’t feel bad for me. Mom took good care of me. She used to do clothing alterations. Her bedroom in this place was big enough for a table, so she could sew all day.”
“It’s hard to imagine an old bungalow here, where that building is now.” She stares out the car window as though trying to picture what it used to be like.
All these years later, the old house is still so clear in my head that I could draw her a picture.
But my clearest memory is the way it used to smell.
Not just the stench from the leaking toilet, but the musty aroma of damp, rotting wood that was always there, impossible to disguise even when Mom wore perfume, or something pungent was cooking on the stove.
“A lot later, when I’d made enough money,” I say, “I bought the old house and pulled it down. Built that apartment building in its place.”
She blinks at me, then at the modern apartments. “You built it?”
I nod. “My first construction project.”
“Wow. You didn’t start small.” She gazes up at the structure.
“But tell me something. If you grew up in a dump, why did you let the Crystal Heights building get that way?” Turning her face to me, she frowns.
“When Kayla and I went there and spoke to your tenants, we were shocked by how run down that place was.”
“I didn’t let it get that way. I’d only just bought that building. The first thing I did after I bought it was to ask the tenants to leave so I could pull it down.”
“But that’s just as bad! You made the tenants homeless.”
“They’ll find somewhere else to live. Somewhere better.”
Her frown doesn’t ease. She doesn’t understand how complicated my building projects are, and how much work is involved.
“I can’t be responsible for every single tenant’s personal situation,” I add, frustrated that she can’t see how impractical that would be. “The important part is that I’m getting rid of those leaky old buildings.”
“The important part for them is that you’re throwing them onto the street.”
I rub my forehead. It’s true that I’ve always been solely focused on the end result. But I couldn’t make it work if I had to worry about the existing tenants.
“Anyway,” I say. “Mom and I had always lived in cold, drafty houses, so her health wasn’t great to start with.
But in that place, her bedroom was so damp that mold grew across the ceiling.
She worked and slept in that room, breathing in the spores all day and night.
Her eyes were always red and sore, and she was constantly blowing her nose.
I had symptoms too. But Mom’s coughing got so bad, we had to move out.
Only by then, it was too late. She had a lung infection and couldn’t breathe. The day after we moved…”
I trail off, swallowing hard, trying not to remember how she’d died.
The agony and terror carved into every line of her face as she’d wheezed and spluttered, trying desperately to draw in air.
My own helplessness as I crouched over her, holding her hand while I prayed the ambulance would arrive in time.
Usually, I’m pretty successful at keeping the memory from flashing into my head, and it only revisits me when I wake in the early hours. But talking about it brings it back, and I’m dimly aware of the ache of my jaw from how tightly it’s clenched.
Understanding crosses Jamie’s face, and she lets out a long breath, her outrage vanishing. “Oh,” she says. “I’m sorry.”
“Putting a wrecking ball through that bungalow didn’t change the past,” I say. “But it made me feel a little better.”
“I get that.” Her tone is gentle.
Putting the car back in gear, I pull away from the curb and watch the building get smaller in my rear-view mirror.
“Right,” I say with a relieved exhale of breath.
“That was the start of my story. Now it’s time for the next stop on the Relive-Ethan’s-Fucked-Up-Past tour. Hope you’re ready for a lot more fun.”
“Can’t wait.” She gives me a smile, warmth shining from her eyes.
And despite the painful memories stirred up by talking about Mom’s death, my own lips lift in response. “I knew you enjoyed watching me suffer.”
Her eyes crinkle. “What gave it away?”
“By the hundredth squat jump, I’d figured it out.”
She laughs. “And I thought it would have been the skipping.”
We drive toward Beverley Hills, and the streets get wide and leafy, the large houses hidden behind tall hedges and high gates.
I pull up across the driveway that leads up to a grand mansion. A wrought-iron gate bars our entrance, but through it, we can see landscaped grounds and a wide, circular drive that leads up to an oversized entrance door framed by white marble columns.
“Fancy house,” Jamie says. “Who lives here?”
“This is the Marzoni family home. It’s where Miles grew up.”
“Rich family.”
I nod. “His grandfather started Marzoni Industries, and his father built it up into what it is today. Miles inherited it when his father died five years ago. He’s barely worked a day in his life.
He sits behind his father’s desk and spends his father’s money.
” I don’t bother keeping the contempt out of my tone.
Her brow creases. “Is that why you and Miles don’t like each other? Because he inherited his money while you grew up poor?”
“Not exactly.”
I rake my gaze over the house. I’ve stared at it many times before, imagining the rooms behind those huge, curved windows, picturing the view they’d have over the manicured gardens.
Jamie is staring at it too, taking in the sweeping grounds. These days, I could buy several mansions bigger than this one if I wanted them, but as a kid, I thought it was a fantasy home, straight out of a fairy tale.
“Before I was born, my mother worked here,” I explain. “She was the housekeeper. But when she told them she was pregnant, they fired her. So Mom bought a sewing machine and started doing clothing alterations. It meant she could work from home while she looked after me.”
I stare through the gates at a red Porsche parked in the circular driveway. It’s loud and flashy, so it’s probably one of Miles’s cars. He could be at home.
“Wait.” Jaime’s brow furrows. “Are you saying she was fired because she was pregnant?”
“Michael Marzoni fired her. That’s Miles’s father. He fired her because he was the father of her baby, and he didn’t want his wife to find out.”
Jaime’s jaw loosens. She stares at me in growing realization.
I nod. “Michael Marzoni was my father. Miles is my half-brother.”
“My God,” she whispers.
“Miles does everything he can to spite me, because I remind him that his father cheated on his mother. He won’t admit I’m his half-brother, and he hates that I’ve been successful. He’s been trying to drive me out of LA so he won’t see me around and can pretend I don’t exist.”
“What about your father? Did he own up to his responsibilities?”
“Michael Marzoni had nothing in his chest but a cash register. He never gave my mother a dime.”
A curtain twitches in one of the house’s front windows and someone moves behind it. I don’t care if Miles looks out and sees us here. In fact, I hope he sees us. I hope I haunt his nightmares.
“When I was young,” I say, some instinct driving me to tell her everything, “I thought maybe if I worked hard enough, if I got the best grades at school, if I was the star quarterback, and every other fucking thing, maybe my father would acknowledge me. If he saw me shine brightly enough, maybe he’d admit I was his. ”
Her eyes are soft, deep creases in their corners. “But he didn’t?”
“Of course he didn’t. I was an idiot to think he’d care about any of that stuff.” My voice is hard, and my jaw is clenched. I probably look furious, but my anger is like an old, dull weight, too well-worn to still be dangerous.
She reaches out to cover my hand with hers. “You weren’t an idiot.”
Her hand is warm. It feels good covering mine. I turn my hand over so I can lace my fingers into hers, and that feels even better.
Then I take a breath and tell her the rest. “When Mom’s cough got really bad, I swallowed my pride and paid my father a visit. I watched the house and waited until Miles and his mother were out. Then I barged in and confronted Michael Marzoni, asking him to help Mom.”
“Did he help?”
“He had his security guys throw me out. The next day I got served with a restraining order. From then on, it was illegal for me to get within five hundred yards of him.” I let out a dry, humorless laugh.
A laugh that holds just the right amount of contempt for my past self, the boy who thought his father might react with decency.
“Inhuman,” she whispers, her expression shocked.
“Or all too human.” My tone drips with cynicism.
“Not everyone is like that.” She puts her other hand on top of mine, sandwiching it between her two palms. “Decent people care about others. And I care about you.”
Her expression is earnest. Her eyes warm. I blink back a surge of emotion and offer her a small smile in return.
Then she adds, her voice full of passion, “Want me to kill Miles? Because I will. Say the word.”
My lips twitch, and I’m grateful to be able to swallow the lump in my throat. “Thanks. But I’ll be satisfied if I can beat him in the boxing match.”
“Oh, you’ll beat him,” she promises. “Now I know how important it is, I’m stepping up your training to a whole new level.
I’ll turn you into an unstoppable force.
Together, we’ll crush him.” She gives my hand one last squeeze, then lets go.
Her leg jiggles, her restless energy needing an outlet.
“You’re right. I should stay at your place until the work at the gym is finished.
That way I can monitor your training. Make sure you’re working out enough. ”
My heart leaps, but I fight to keep my expression neutral. “Okay.”
“And we need to work on strategy. He’s bigger than you are, with a longer reach. And strong.” She shakes her head. “Those muscles of his are brutal. When he hits you, it’ll be like running into a wall.”
“When he hits me? I might be too fast for him.”
She grimaces. “You don’t think you’re going to get out of this without being punched, do you? You’re going to take a beating, so be ready for that. We just have to make sure you survive it.”