36
Patrena
It was hard to miss that Gemini was staring at me the same way Tywin looked at Arlo. There was a contented twinkle in his eyes and his unwavering smile was so infectious it lured mine to the surface every time. The way his gaze was keyed into my every motion spoke a thousand words.
The knowledge that I had a real blood family put my processing capacity on overload. The idea that Tywin’s son was my cousin was a jaw dropper, but a pleasant discovery. I was also struggling to grasp that I was the daughter of the most powerful man in the syndicate.
Gemini gave me the impression that even though he may hold a lot of power, he was fair in the way he wielded it. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the expressions he’d flashed Sophia when he had mentioned them having to talk. She’d appeared afraid, her body tensing and losing that high-handed sass she had stepped out carrying.
“So, I was named Payton?” I asked for clarity.
“Yes. You were born right here in this house. You got that tattoo when you were three months old. I have all of your birth papers. I had you for six and a half months, the best of my life, before your mother left. I searched for you everywhere, but your mother…” he paused, shaking off an image of her, I supposed.
“Your mother was clever, calculating, and so good at her job that it took me months to find a trail that grew cold. When I learned years later that she’d been murdered, I prayed that you were okay. I never stopped searching for you. I knew that your mother would have had a backup plan for her backup plan, so I kept searching. By the time we located the bodies of your caregivers, you were gone. I thought the government had placed you in witness protection, but when that avenue didn’t give us any insight into your whereabouts, I didn’t know what to think.”
His smile grew wider, but it wasn’t a happy one. “You were so young and alone and so much like your mother in how you managed to keep yourself hidden until a search for our family crest from a member of our syndicate alerted us. However, we also knew that if it had alerted us, it probably also got the attention of others. I’m sorry you had to endure the things they did to you in that facility.”
“I’m okay now. They had really done a number on me mentally and physically. Also, remembering my mother’s promise that if I ever believed my life was in serious jeopardy this tattoo would save me. In that case, it slowed them down, but now, I’m beginning to think it was also a way for your people to identify me.”
“Smart. Your mother thought of everything. A way to keep you hidden from two of the most powerful organizations in the world and also a way to protect you from her people and to protect you from ours,” he stated with a sad smile on his face, one that hinted that he still loved and admired my mother despite her being his mortal enemy. The notion had me thinking that they must have had one hell of a love story.
Sophia was sitting there rolling her eyes at her brother. The one time I had seen the woman cast a genuine smile was when she looked at Arlo.
“Payton…” He cleared his throat. “Patrena, I don’t want to keep you, but I hope that you’ll consider seeing me again. It doesn’t have to be here.”
I nodded. “I think I’d like that,” I told him honestly. I got a good vibe from him and considering I had Sophia to compare him to, I was glad that he was my parent and not her. I leaned in, feeling the need to whisper and he met me halfway. “What about my tattoo and what it contains?”
His smile was a crooked and sneaky one this time. “Thirty days was a long time for you to collect a billion dollars.”
“I can assure you the thought of turning over the evidence for money never crossed my mind.”
Was that pride I saw flash in his eyes?
“You being here right now is why I’ll give you the same freedom as I did your mother when she revealed the truth about who and what she was,” he offered, grinning when I released a low gasp.
“She divulged to you that she was a government spy?” My words were no more than a shocked whisper.
“Yes. Your mother and I loved each other. We also learned to respect each other and in doing so, after she found out she was pregnant, she revealed to me what she was and I left it up to her to decide what she would do with the information she had gathered.”
I lost all control of my facial expressions. “You weren’t worried about what that could do to your organization, to you? Her reputation, I recently found out, was one that many are as respectful of as they are afraid of.”
“I warned him from the start not to trust that, that—”
Gemini pointed an authoritative finger in Sophia’s direction. After a long stare-off that forced her to drop her eyes, he turned back to face me, softening his features.
“I wasn’t naïve about what your mother was or that she could have burned this organization down to the ground, but I was confident in the relationship we built and didn’t believe she would ever do it. In a way, I was right. In another way, I was wrong to be so trustful as to lay the future of this organization on the strength of the connection we had.”
If he was leaving me with a billion dollars’ worth of information, wasn’t he doing the same thing with me as he had done with my mother? His smile, so sincere and penetrating, said he was doing exactly what I was thinking.
The thirty-day test was apparently enough for him to believe I would never betray his trust. He didn’t know me like he knew my mother, so why did he trust me so easily? I didn’t know, but the syndicate was soaked in gas and he was letting me hold the matches.
The idea that he would trust me with such a tremendous responsibility was already beginning to have an effect on what I thought of him. If he placed that much trust in me, then surely, I could give him a chance for us to foster a decent relationship.
I stood and he and Tywin were up in a flash. Sophia, with her screwed-up face and pursed lips, sat mean mugging us. I extended my hand and Gemini took it. I had no idea how to describe what was passing between us, but there was understanding there. When we finally let go, we were wearing wide smiles.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Anything,” he replied.