Max narrowed his icy blue-green eyes. "Why are you so convinced you had nothing to offer them? Why would you ever feel that way about yourself and how the hell did you come to think you had so little self worth?"
"It isn't about how I feel about myself." She looked down at her phone, Swype'd a reply to someone and then put it back into her Kate Spade nylon oversized handbag. "I would have been considered broken . . . used goods. I've never been the most outgoing or friendly person, even when my life was ‘normal.' What could they have done for me when all the death and destruction I've witnessed over the years has made me what I am today? I didn't want to inflict my emotional turmoil on them simply because it wouldn't be fair to anyone involved."
"I see," he began in a voice that barely carried over the latest country song playing on the jukebox. "You honestly believe Angelo is a good man?"
Her pale green eyes didn't flinch as she looked at him head on. "He always took good care of my mother and considered her his princess."
"They were close?"
"Yes, very."
Max chuckled again though this time, his voice lacked even the faintest shred of humor. "So you had no idea how upset Angelo was when your mother married a biker thug?"
"My father left the club for my mother," Mags replied flippantly.
"Is that what you were told?"
"No, it's what I witnessed. He never had anything to do with the Knights except in a business sense. They would often give him stuff on discount to sell at the pawnshop. Then again, he also dealt with gangs, the mafia and other nefarious types who needed to unload goods for quick cash so it wasn't exactly a secret or anything."
Max almost felt bad about shattering this poor young woman's noble picture of her perfect family but it had to be done. It was the weapon he needed to use against her so she could agree with his plan.
"No, my dear, that is not how the situation worked out at all."
Mags swallowed half her beer in several swallows before she placed the mug on the table. "I'm not sure I follow."
"But of course you do." He paused to allow his words to sink in past the soft, boozy haze she probably felt at that moment. "Your father never left the White Knights. As a matter of fact, he was a member all the way up until the night he died."
Max watched as her stormy green eyes shifted and her mouth fell open in sheer horror but it took everything in him from smiling.
If they were playing Chess, she'd done a beautiful job. She'd captured several of his pawns, bishops, knights and rooks but it was he who had captured her queen and was only one step from taking her king.
The ball was now in her court before she'd lost the game entirely.
Checkmate.
Chapter Three
Magnolia
If God was an absentee slumlord who allowed his kingdom to fall to ruin long before I'd graced my sorry ass on his decrepit earth, I found myself on the worst drug infested block in the whole universe.
Max had played me this whole time and not only did I willingly flirt back with him, I'd allowed him to trump me in every way. To say I was not a happy camper was a gross understatement. I felt like a fool for thinking this man with the most gorgeous blue-green eyes and the face of Adonis come to life had a bone in his body that wasn't steeped in downright duplicity and evil.
He might not have been the devil but he certainly was capable of being one of the dark prince's most loyal servants.
What a fool I'd been.
"I'm confused," I began slowly, enunciating my words only to buy time to think. "How was it my father was still a member of the White Knights MC? They executed him and my mother for Christ's sake!"
Max breathed deeply and shrugged his shoulders apathetically. "That they did but the two million dollars worth of missing money had nothing to do with your father. He was flush from his pawnshop and the reality show on cable television. The Knights stole from the Abandonatos and the price of payment is blood."
I shook my head as I spread my fingers along the cheap Formica tabletop. "Angelo would have never gone along with my mother being raped and murdered-"
"It had to be someone high in the organization. Riggs was Treasurer of the WK Vegas chapter. They thought it was adequate enough payment. Your mother was collateral damage but by that time, Angelo figured she dug her own grave. She knew she was marrying trash and did it anyway. No one holds a grudge like the Italians . . . although maybe I should take that back. Perhaps the Russians and the Irish do too. He was pissed at his cousin, and believe me, at her hour of death, she finally understood the consequences of her decision to marry your father."
"Okay," I muttered more to myself than anyone else. "If what you're telling me is true, why weren't any provisions made for me?"
Max stared me at me directly. "The Knights lied-said you fought and they had to kill you too but it happened away from the crime scene. Angelo was upset of course and doubled the amount of money they owed him for their negligence. However, he accepted you were dead and moved on with his life."
"Was the debt paid back?"
"Yes, with drugs. It was settled within a month of your parents' untimely death. What Brad and Nel did to you was just for kicks."
My head began a slow spin but I wasn't nearly drunk enough and my appetite was gone. Our waitress walked over with our food and I ordered two more straight whiskeys and another beer chaser.
All this time, I truly thought I had a Plan B if everything went to shit. Angelo would take me in and perhaps I could fake it enough to pretend to be normal. My mother's family would accept me and perhaps I would have that simple kind of life I'd once dreamed would be so perfect at the age of thirteen.
The situation was beyond complicated and yet, I knew Max wasn't lying to me. This had nothing to do with my growing attraction towards him or being blinded by uncontrollable hormones. This was all fact.
I knew every telltale tactic in the book human beings used to be untruthful. Looking away, clenched jaws, white-knuckled grips, blustering-if the trick could be used, I'd witnessed it in my line of work. Not only had Max managed to look me in the eyes the whole time he spoke but his words were methodical and cold, as if he were telling me about the weather.
"Why my father? What did Brad and Nel have against him? They murdered both my parents like they were dogs," I said in a hushed tone as the waitress approached us.
Max swigged from his beer as she set my drinks down and walked off again. I pushed my plate of food aside after munching on a crisp French fry.
"They were upset with him because he married your mother. Yes, the race thing played a small part. After all, she was Italian with a mother who was Creole? Not exactly desirable ethnicities for a club that worships the Nazis and hates anyone who isn't Northern European."
"Yes, it's true-my grandmother was Creole. She came from a well to do family and acted for a while but decided it wasn't for her. She died giving birth to my mother so I never knew her . . . " I trailed off before I downed a shot of whiskey.
"But my grandfather is from northern part of Italy. As a matter of fact, most of his family was of Austrian descent and from the area annexed by Mussolini during World War II. It's no secret the Abandonatos aren't exactly buddy-buddy with some of the Mafia families whose lineage comes from Sicily or anywhere south of Rome to be honest. Italy is an extremely regionalist country and people identify with the place they were born before they identify with being Italian per se."
"Semantics aside, Brad and Nel were a bit upset about that situation but that wasn't why they eliminated your father. He was getting to be too high profile and they were afraid the media would get a hold of who he really was and what he did. The Knights like to stay off the grid. They hated when he signed that deal for the cable network show. In fact, they told him to turn it down," Max explained after swallowing the rest of his beer.
I downed my second shot of whiskey, the burn consuming my throat until the fire reached my belly and instantly wrapped me in its warm embrace. "So, basically you're telling me it wasn't exactly personal and all of this shit that has happened in my life was because of chance? Random crap that cost me my family, changed the course of my life forever, and yet . . . it wasn't the least bit personal for Brad or Nel? I don't buy that."
"Why not?" Max questioned though his voice lacked any real emotion. "Does everything have to happen for a reason? Life dealt you a shitty hand-move on and accept it. You've been doing pretty good until now so why the change of heart and what's up with the act of indignation?"