“What the fuck do you care? She’s my girlfriend, not yours.” Ah, now that makes sense, I think. He’s a loser boyfriend, now ex-boyfriend, and clearly thinks he owns her.
“My name doesn’t matter. What matters is that I’m from the kind of family you don’t fuck with,” I say calmly. “So you’re going to start being polite, or you’re going to have your ass handed to you on a silver platter.”
“People like you don’t scare me, Francesco,” he spits, glaring at me.
“So you do know who I am,” I point out. “And yet you still disrespect me. You disrespect me by coming into my club and attacking someone under my protection, and then you speak to me like I’m some piece of shit at the bottom of your shoe. What’s your name?”
“His name is Dave,” my one bodyguard Leroy says, handing me Dave’s ID card. “In his thirties, he lives in Brooklyn. No known connection to any families that we can find, and he’s high as a kite.”
“Fuck off,” Dave screams, trying to thrash around. “If you don’t let me go, you’re going to regret it.”
“The only one who will regret anything is you, Dave. Teach him a lesson, boys, then drop him outside the hospital. I won’t go as far as killing you tonight, Dave. But cross me again, and you won’t find yourself so lucky.”
Chapter 3 - Amelia
I feel like a ton of bricks has landed on me as I slowly try to force my eyes open. Someone is holding my hand, and for a moment, my mind thinks of Frankie and how soft his hands were. They were also big and very nimble. I smile stupidly and then groan. “It hurts everywhere,” I moan out.
“It could be much worse,” my father comments, withdrawing his hand from mine. “Amelia, what the hell are you thinking, dating these guys?”
I crack my eyes open at last to look at his angry face. It doesn’t quite reach his eyes, though. No, I can’t interpret what that look is. Probably disdain. I try to sit up, and he moves to help me, but I quickly push back, “I’m fine. I don’t need help. I’ve never needed your help.”
He clicks his tongue at me, a habit that annoys me, mostly because I find myself doing it too. I just want to be free of Gustavo Fernando and all his controlling ways.
“You date these losers who then attack you. They attack you, Amelia. Where is your judge of character? Where is your common sense not to get involved with these types of men?”
My father paces, only he would be pissed at me while I’m in a hospital bed with a head injury. The head injury! Dave had clocked me on the head with something hard… my memory is a little hazy.
“Who brought me here? Was it Dave?” I ask. “What happened to him?”
“Do you care?” My father spits. “No, he’s in another room. He’s already been dealt with, and he’s lucky it wasn’t by me.” His dark eyes meet mine, and I get his meaning. My father wouldn’t have let him live to tell the tale. I don’t feel sorry for Dave. The dick deserved what he got. I can’t help but wonder, though, if Frankie had something to do with it.
My attention is brought back, once again, to my father. “What do you care about who I date?” I seethe. “Since when do you care about how I feel or who I see?”
I can feel my emotions bubbling over, but I can’t seem to stop myself. Getting attacked and seeing Frankie, it’s too much. “I’m sick of you trying to control my every move as though you own me.”
“You are my daughter. You represent my family, and you will do well to behave like it,” my father raises his voice. Normally I’d back down at this point, but I’m too emotional and sore to give a single fuck, let alone any flying ones.
“Oh, now I’m your daughter. But when you disappeared and left me with Mama, then I wasn’t your daughter. I wasn't your daughter when she drank, did drugs, and prostituted herself. When she used to take me out of school so she could walk me around and convince people to give us money because I was a poor, hungry child, was I not your daughter then? No, not until you just pitched up one day and took me from her and decided to call the shots. Only then was I your daughter.”
My father’s eyes widen with anger, and he roars back, “I had to leave. I had done things, Amelia, things that placed you in danger if I stayed. I would have come back sooner. I would have stopped your mother’s abuse if I had known. I have made mistakes, mistakes like your mother. But I don’t regret having you, and I don’t want to see you make the same damn mistakes I made. Placing your trust in the wrong people all the time.”
“She beat me black and blue almost every day for nothing, but at least I was free to leave, free to live my own life.” I’m sobbing now, but I’m still angry, and I want him to know how I feel. “She didn’t give a fuck about me, and neither do you. You only care about your precious image.”
“We must show a strong front,” my father shouts, although I can see the nurses outside getting agitated at the commotion. “We must not show weakness, or our enemies will use those weaknesses against us. And you, Amelia, you are my greatest weakness. I will do anything to protect you. Yes, if that means I control aspects of your life, so be it. If you hate me, so be it, but I always have your best intentions at heart.”
“Mr. Fernando, this is a place of healing. You can’t be causing a commotion like this,” a brave doctor says from the door.
My father looks at him, and the doctor withers, reaching to close the door instead. My father whips back around to me. “I know you are not scared, that you are brash, a bit like me, and impulsive. But don’t become an addict like your mother, especially to the kind of guys that treat you like a piece of shit.”
“Like you do?” I say, wiping my eyes on my bed sheet. “Your cold, calculating decisions about who and what I can see and do. I’m tired of it, Papa. I’m tired of being ruled over as though I have no thoughts of my own.”
“Mia,” my nickname, he never uses my nickname, “you have such a strong spirit that the gray in my hair is from trying just to get you to stay on some sort of path, let alone the one I want you to take. I’m glad you think you listen to me.”
“I do listen to you. I’ve listened to you my whole life, all I ever wanted was your approval, your love, and all I ever got back was the coldness you give everyone.” I look away, crossing my arms. My head is aching now, and I want the conversation to end so that I can get more painkillers and go back to sleep.
There’s a momentary pause before my father moves forward toward me. “Mia, do you know how terrified I was? When the hospital called me saying you’d been attacked. I felt awful. I thought my whole world was crashing down around me. I didn’t know if you were going to be okay, if you would have permanent damage to your brain, or if you would need care. I knew, though, that I would provide you with whatever it is that you need.”
I look at him, finally, and I notice how disheveled he appears. His clothes aren’t pressed straight like they normally are, and there are bags under his eyes. Even the gray in his hair is more prominent. I soften a bit.