His to Love (Fireside #1)(17)

“It was.” I smiled fondly, remembering Aunt Eleanor, whom I was beginning to miss dearly. She had essentially been my only friend and confidante for the last decade, and I missed her quiet, gentle wisdom. It always made me wonder what my mother used to be like, before she became fully immersed in the Galecki family role of hostess and high-society socialite. “It was definitely simple, quiet. I’ve only been gone a few days, but I already miss the stars.”

Without missing a beat, Malik pressed a button in the car and began speaking. “Johan. Change of plans. Dinner will be on the Palace’s terrace. Please make the appropriate arrangements and cancel our existing reservation.”

A clear voice responded, “Certainly, sir. We’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

Malik let go of the intercom button. I hadn’t been able to see the driver due to a privacy screen that had been in place the entire time I was in the car. My eyes widened. “What did you just do?”

Malik simply smiled. It was gentle and kind and did weird things to my heart rate. “You will find, Gabriella, that if there is a woman on my arm or in my company, I will do whatever is necessary to see her desires fulfilled.”

His voice had deepened by the time he finished the sentence. My heartbeat went more erratic. All I did was mention stars. And I racked my brain for a restaurant called the Palace Terrace but came up empty. Still, whatever he was doing, he seemed to think it would please me.

“Thank you,” I whispered, my voice thick with unease and surprise.

—

“Your home is called the Palace?” I asked with wide-eyed wonder as the car pulled into a wide, curved drive.

Not that I didn’t get why. It was massive, with peaks, gables, and gray stone that gave it the appearance of a castle. His home must sit on acres. I couldn’t see another home or even a streetlight anywhere in the vicinity as we drove up his driveway. I realized that I hadn’t seen any for several minutes before that.

But there was one thing I clearly saw as my eyes scanned around me after he assisted me out of the car.

Millions of things, actually.

Stars. Millions of bright lights danced all over the sky and my stomach fluttered and flipped.

Then it did the strange warm, flipping thing again when he guided me toward his house.

“Some of my men took to calling it that when it was my father’s place, and the name stuck.”

I nodded, only barely listening to him. My eyes flickered between the house and the sky and I was so overwhelmed that I almost felt the need to stop and catch my breath.

Without much fanfare, he opened the front door and ushered me in. He continued guiding me, a gentle hand at the small of my back, through his house. I could barely take in the opulence as I got small, fleeting glances, but everything I saw screamed rich and fabulous and money in an incredibly elegant way. Much like my own home. These men not only had power, they had class, despite the fact they ran the seedy underbelly of Detroit and other cities in neighboring states.

The thought, the reminder, was heady and I almost stumbled over my own feet. Trying to hide my discomfort, I blurted, “Did your wife decorate this house?”

Malik’s jaw went tight, and an indescribable mixture of pain and fury boiling in his onyx eyes made me look away.

Clearly I had blurted out the wrong thing.

“Sorry,” I muttered quickly. “I’m so sorry.”

I was going to apologize again when Malik reached for a sliding glass door, opening it without a sound.

The cool breeze that billowed in helped me breathe again.

“It’s fine.”

It wasn’t fine. I only knew his wife died approximately five years ago, but it was clearly still a sensitive topic. Silently, I cursed my brain to filter malfunction.

The horrific energy continued to pulse off of him while he led me to a beautifully decorated outside dining area on his covered patio. Small, twinkling white lights were wound around wood beams and through an overhead trellis. The table had been set with china and crystal, and there was a set of candles in the center of the table. They were well-used, all melted at different heights and, combined with the glitter of the lights, they created an incredibly romantic setting.

My pulse leaped inside my chest as I took my seat. Behind me, Malik pushed my chair in. I fought for more words to apologize, to get us over my fumble while he sat down in the seat across from me. His square jaw, completely free from any hint of stubble, was still flexed tightly and his hands fidgeted with the silverware before he finally pulled his eyes up and landed them straight on me.

I swallowed, so unsure of what was to come when it seemed as if he was fighting to relax.

“No one speaks of her anymore.”

Blinking rapidly, I—again—stupidly said, “Why?”

Gah! Shut up. I reached for a glass of ice water and took a large sip. Perhaps I could choke on an ice cube and die.

With a heavy sigh, Malik looked away from me into the darkness of his yard behind me. I felt him go to another world as his eyes glassed over and his features softened. Even at forty-three, his attractiveness was certainly undeniable.

I had only vague memories of his wife, when she had accompanied him to events I was allowed to attend or dinners at my house. I remembered she was beautiful and refined, with a hand always on Malik’s forearm and a smile that seemed more slick and calculating than warm and loving.

But it wasn’t for me to judge someone else’s relationship when I’d had so few of my own.

“Analise passed in her sleep, in our bed, of unexplainable causes.”

I gasped and my fingers pressed against my lips. “I’m so sorry. Malik, truly, I had no idea, and I’m so sorry for bringing her up.”

“Yes.” He nodded, still looking somewhat forlorn—perhaps confused that he said so much. But he quickly shook off whatever he was thinking about and smiled sadly at me. “No one speaks of her, as if she didn’t exist. I’m not angry with you, I was just surprised.”

I licked my suddenly dry lips and took another sip of water. “I’d like to move on from this, if you’d like.”

His smile grew wider, slightly more genuine. “Please. Tell me about Colorado.”

I normally could speak of Colorado all day long. There was so much; from the farm, to the animals, even my online college classes at CU. I knew this because yesterday, the words had flowed so easily with Tyson. But when staring into this man’s eyes, a man who still seemed sad, a little bit angry, and a whole lot intimidating, my memories simply didn’t come as easily. I fumbled through them and began telling him about working on the farm, and then watched as his expression morphed into something that appeared to be disgust.

“Does your father know you were doing this?” he asked abruptly while I was in the middle of telling him about collecting eggs from the chicken coop.

My head jerked back. “Well, he’s never specifically asked what I spent my time doing,” I replied, thrown by the question.

“I can’t believe your father, the man he is, would want his daughter digging in dirt and doing manual labor.”

The words dripped from his lips with disdain. I could only think that I was sure my father didn’t give a damn. But to say that to Malik would certainly not go over well.

I was saved from having to answer at all when a server, an older woman dressed in black slacks, black shirt, and a white apron appeared on the patio. She pushed a silver cart, loaded with a bottle of wine, chilled in ice, and two dome-covered plates.

Everything sparkled and gleamed in the lights and I was suddenly bothered by all of this.

The show.

The formality.

The romance feigned for a stranger.

It was all a seductive dance by Malik to secure his spot as leader by having a Mafia princess on his arm, and I realized I didn’t care if he didn’t like what I spent my time doing. I didn’t care if he found me acceptable. As he thanked the server, a woman whose name I didn’t catch because I wasn’t introduced to her, as if either she—or I—was insignificant, I forced my lip not to curl when he spoke to her in Italian.

Based on his accent, and his fluency with the language, it was clear he had lived there at some point in his life and for quite a while.

Still, it annoyed me. It felt as if he was brushing me off by not even attempting to include me in a conversation. She strolled from the patio and, in an effort to calm myself, I reached for the wine he poured for me.

“It’s delicious,” I said, trying to get away from emotions coursing through me. This whole night was a waste of time.

I no longer cared if this request was from my mother, or my father. I didn’t particularly care that this man could fill my wallet, closet, and jewelry boxes with more riches than I could possibly dream of.

Through Eleanor, I had learned those things in life didn’t matter.

Through my mother, I had learned that love mattered most.

I blinked away the thoughts, unwilling to show my frustration and my anger. It was not a revelation that I was being used. It was simply one that hit home as I took in an elegance that was completely…not me. Not at all. My name may have been Gabriella Galecki, but I’d always been more Blue or Ella than my given name. I fought it for the first twenty-eight years of my life, and I refused to give in now.

Not when I had come so close to being able to live free.