I slow down a little so she can catch up, then, when we’re at the car, I grab her and kiss her. “You okay?” I ask when I’ve got her taste in my mouth again.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” She smiles at me. “You totally punched him to defend my honor.”
I shake my head, giving her a crooked smile back. “Yeah, I guess I did. You girls like that kind of shit?”
“I don’t know about girls, but I do.” She looks genuinely happy that I put her supposed fiancé on the ground. “He deserved it.”
“Yes, he did.” I’m not going to argue with her on that one. Romano’s an asshole. I can’t even think about him being with Jess without rage tightening my chest. He won’t treat her right. Won’t respect her. Won’t love her.
What do you care?
And that voice inside my head is right. I don’t care. I can’t care.
I pull the car door open and help Jess inside. “Let’s take you home.”
As we drive, her happiness seems to fade, leaving a pale, sober expression behind it.
“He’s right, you know,” she says.
“About what?”
“I’ll have to marry him. Pop will force me to. And then there’s no way I’ll ever get away from him. And Carmine…” She trails off.
“He’s not a good guy.”
She shivers. “No. He’s not.”
I clench my hands on the steering wheel, wondering what he’s done to her. I wonder how Spada could even think about marrying Jess to him, but it makes sense. He’s not looking for a good husband for his daughter. He’s looking for a good heir for his business. Romano’s definitely that. He’s got that thread of violence Spada’s always had. It’s what you need to be a mob boss. You can’t have a conscience and run that kind of an empire.
She runs a hand over her face, and I’m afraid she’s crying again. “There’s no point to any of it, is there?”
I stop the car on the road in front of the Spada house. I’ll drop her off here; if she’s got a car back at the fight venue, I’ll be sure that gets taken care of tomorrow. I don’t want her driving tonight. She’s too upset. “To what?”
“The classes. The school. Studying. Trying to carve out my own life.”
I don’t answer her. I don’t have an answer. I’m still trying to work that one out on my own life.
“Unless…” She trails off. She’s not looking at me. “Unless I can marry somebody else. Somebody who’s not Carmine.”
If she’d turned then, let her gaze meet mine, I probably would have laughed it off. But she doesn’t. She just stares resolutely out the window, and I know damn well what she’s trying to tell me.
“No.” I say, and she looks down at her hands. “That’s the shittiest idea in the history of shitty ideas. And it’s not going to happen, so don’t get your hopes up.” I lean over and kiss her, a little harder than maybe I want to. She needs to be reminded what this is. It’s not some girly love story. I’m not going to suddenly transform into a knight on a white horse and take her away from her mob-constructed castle tower.
She blinks. Maybe there’s a tear—I can’t tell. But she still doesn’t look at me. “Thanks for dinner,” she says quietly.
“Any time.”
“Right.” The word is clipped. She pushes the door open and heads up the driveway toward her house. To face her father. I fight back an urge to run after her, to protect her against whatever Spada might throw at her next. But this isn’t my business. It isn’t my world.
I wait until I see her go inside, then I start the car and leave her there.
CHAPTER FOUR
Jessica
A pounding on my bedroom door wakes me up the next morning. What the hell? I glance at the clock—it’s barely six in the morning. My brain is befuddled and confused. I’m not even sure what day it is for a few long seconds.
Then my father’s voice comes from the other side of the door. “Jessica! Get the fuck out here now! Right now! You hear me?”
Shit. I sit up. No way I’m going out there in my nightgown. “Just a minute,” I call, hoping the acknowledgement will calm him down a little.
No such luck. “You’ve got two minutes, and then I’m coming in if I have to take the door down.”
I hustle for the closet and grab the first thing I can get my hands on—a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. I scramble into them as fast as I can, my heart thudding hard. I know he really will take the door down if he decides it’s what he needs to do.
Pop yells again. “Is he in there with you?”
“What? What are you talking about?” I’m starting to figure out what’s going on, but it’s still muddled, the pieces disconnected in my brain.
“You know damn well what I’m talking about. “Get your ass out here, Jessica. Right fucking now.”
“Jesus!” I jerk the fly of the jeans closed and manage to work the button and the zipper, and then head for the door. My hands are shaking.
No. No. I can’t open that door. I should go out the bathroom window, run away across the back lawn. Run until he can’t find me anymore.
But that’ll never happen. It doesn’t matter where I go. He’ll find me, or he’ll send someone after me who will. There’s no way out from under him.
And then the choice is taken away from me anyway as the doorknob rattles and he shoves the door open. He used his master key.
A ripple of fury runs through me.
Nothing. I have nothing. No peace, no rights, no privacy. Only what this man will grant me. I belong to him, and no one will dispute that, not if they want to stay alive.
“Pop—” I start, but he’s on me in a half second, his hand twisting in my hair. “Shit! What the fuck?”
“You watch your language. Show your father some goddamn respect.” He jerks me toward the door, then down the hall. We’re headed for his office. I’m starting to cry; I can’t help it. Is this it? Is he going to kill me, right now, right in my own house?
Why, Jess? Why did you do it? Couldn’t just be the good little girl and keep your mouth shut and your knees together, could you?
No, actually, I couldn’t. No one should have to. This isn’t the fucking Dark Ages. I swallow hard, gathering myself. Pop’s grip on my hair lessens a little, but he still shoves me through the door to his office. I lurch, almost losing my balance and toppling onto the floor. My hands reach out, finding the desk before I fall.
And there, next to the desk, his nose swollen and a look of pure hatred on his face, is Carmine Romano.
Shit. Just when I thought this couldn’t get any worse.
I manage to collect myself, straightening, drawing a hand through my hair, adjusting my shirt. I don’t look at Carmine. I never want to look at him again. I don’t want to acknowledge my father, either, but he slams the door behind him and stands with his feet braced, arms crossed over his chest, his face a picture of barely controlled rage.
“You want to tell me exactly what the fuck you think you’re playing at?” His voice is a low growl. I don’t think I’ve ever been so afraid of him in my life.
At the same time, though, I’m hardening inside. The fear is turning into something else. I pull my spine that much straighter and look him in the face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Pop takes a menacing step forward, hands lowering, clenching into fists at his sides. “You know exactly what I’m talking about. McAllister had his hands all over you at the match last night, and after…” His gaze cuts to the side, to Carmine. “Well, you know damn well what happened after.”
“That’s none of your business.” I’m not going to let him run roughshod over me. I’m just not. I can’t. Not anymore.
He takes another step forward and then he suddenly just relaxes, the tension going out of him. His voice when he speaks is very quiet, very calm. And that’s the scariest thing about it. When he does this, I know he’s about as angry as it’s possible for him to get.
“Yes, it is very much my business. You are my daughter. Your actions reflect on this family. And you will do as I tell you.”
I can’t help it; I glance at Carmine, too. His face looks worse than it did last night, his eye swollen, his cheek a purplish color nearly down to his chin. All that with just one hit. The thought makes me absurdly pleased. My man did that to him. To protect me. “I won’t marry him,” I say, and my voice is quiet, too. “I won’t.”
“Jessica. You’re not going to have much choice. Cain’s a dead man. I need him for one more fight, and then he’s going to pay for touching my daughter.”
“It’s my choice, Pop—” But there’s no chance I’m going to get a word in edgewise. My opinions don’t matter here.
“And it was a bad one, Jess. Cain’s being taken care of. Right now. And when he’s gone, then you’ll do what I tell you. You’ll marry Carmine, and you’ll pay attention to this family, the way you should have been doing from the beginning.”
I clench my fists. “I will not marry Carmine. You can’t make me!” I feel—and sound—like a five-year-old. God. How has he managed to turn me into this?