“You want to lecture me about the girl I’m seeing? Meanwhile Arman runs around the city being led by his dick?” I want to laugh.
“Arman doesn’t bring his flings to my birthday,” he counters.
“She’s staying with me. At least for a little while.” I lift a shoulder. “It’s not serious, no, but she’s going to be around for a bit.” I don’t want to be here anymore. Now that we’re talking about Charlotte, my thoughts go straight for her. I want to be home, with Charlotte. No, not with—in Charlotte.
He crosses his arms over his chest. “Do you think I don’t know what goes on?”
Of course he knows. Arman has a big fucking mouth.
“She made the offer. I accepted.” It’s as easy as that. “It wasn’t my idea. It was hers. And you can feel free to ask her when you see her next.” I can already imagine the brightness of her red cheeks when he does. I should prepare her for the possibility.
“And the money her brother owes?”
“He’ll be back asking for more loans. We’ll double the interest.” I tell him the same thing I told my brother. The cash will be recouped.
“She has a business, right?”
“A sandwich shop. She owns the majority, but her brother has some rights to it.”
“She can sell it to pay the brother’s loan.”
“His debt isn’t her sin.”
“And yet she sleeps in your bed to repay it.” He points a long finger at me, having snared me.
“Like I said, she offered, I accepted. If she had said she would sell the shop to pay it back, I would have given her the time to do it. But she didn’t.” I’m lying to my father, straight to his face, and worse, by the look in his eyes, he can tell.
“And when you’re done playing with her, you’ll just toss her back into her old life?” Ivan interjects.
“She’s aware of the situation. There are no expectations here.” Clear lines have been drawn. One month. That’s all I get. It’s all she offered.
“It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world,” Dad shrugs.
“What wouldn’t be?” That little sense you get when something horrible is about to said or done starts to shoot off warning flares.
“Getting married.” He tilts his head. “I wouldn’t mind having grandchildren running around before I get too old to spoil them.”
I look at him, really look at him. This man has ordered the extinction of entire crews, tried to kill off an entire family in Boston; every ounce of power he has right now is because he was ruthless in the way he took possession of it. And yet, here he sits talking about spoiling his grandchildren.
“I’m not marrying Charlotte,” I finally say. Better to put a stop to those thoughts before they overdevelop.
He stares at me for a long moment then shrugs. “So, you’ll just use her all up and then toss her to the side. A well-deserved punishment for having a deadbeat brother.”
“You’re getting dramatic in your old age.” I push up from the chair. “If you don’t have anything else you want to talk about, I’m heading home. You can get back to your Yankees; maybe they still have a chance.”
He waves his hand through the air, gesturing for me to go. “Just do me a favor, Nikolai. The next time you feel the need to punish your girl and fuck her senseless, maybe use the bedrooms upstairs instead of the garden.”
With one foot already out of the living room, I turn to look at him.
“Like I said, I know everything that goes on.” He laughs. “Now go. I have things to do.” He gestures for Ivan to turn the television back on.
I leave his house and decide to take a cab instead of waiting for Viktor to come back for me. Charlotte would probably dissolve in a pool of humiliation if she knew my father knows what went on in his garden. While I love that blush of hers, this would be more death by mortification—and I want to do many things to Charlotte, but killing her isn’t one of them.