Now it’s my turn to shrug.
“Dating opportunities were pretty thin on the ground. Daddy scared the guys away and he didn’t approve of a lot of them. He liked Rafael, though.”
Tony would know all about the traitorous New York boss, who was killed by his own crew for mob justice.
He leans back into his chair and swallows hard. His gaze flicks toward mine and away. “I’m sorry about your dad. I know what it’s like to lose a father.”
Somehow I see that. Something deep stirs inside his eyes: the jagged pain of losing someone too young, or some long-ago horror.
“You’re the first person who’s said that to me. Isn’t that—isn’t that funny?”
It’s not, really, but he makes a valiant attempt at a smile. His hand slides over the rough wooden table and seizes my hand, squeezing it.
Why is he being so nice to me? This wasn’t what I expected at all. A lump rises in my throat and my hand trembles inside his.
I bite my lip hard as images of the poorly attended funeral run through my mind, everyone’s lack of sympathy, my mother, crying. It buries me.
“You should be glad I even came,” Rafael said, his mouth curled. “Your father was a coward—”
“Don’t you—don’t you dare talk about my father like that!”
It hurt me to hear those poisonous accusations from my boyfriend. He was supposed to protect me, and instead he tortured me.
“I’ll say whatever the fuck I want.” Then his voice dropped to a whisper as his fingers cruelly pinched my waist.
Tony looks at me, at a total loss for words. I want to talk to him about it. I want to talk to someone. I want to tell him how horrible it has been. Everything had to be locked tight inside, because I wasn’t allowed to grieve for my worthless, rat-bastard father.
He was always my daddy.
Bury that shit, damn it. Just be like a fucking stone.
I look into his impassive gaze as I freeze over my facial muscles. “Sorry, this is not what I—I don’t want to bring you down.”
“Why don’t you just tell me what you want from me?”
My cheeks burn when I realize how transparent I must be, but he doesn’t look angry. I open my mouth to tell him, and my guts clench.
God, this is a lot harder than I thought it would be.
“What makes you think that I want something?”
An unpleasant chill wafts from his eyes. “Cut the bullshit already and ask.”
I hate that I have to look across the table into his heavy eyes and ask him for something. The men back home wouldn’t have lifted a finger for me because I no longer mattered to them. The moment my dad became a traitor, I stopped existing. And they call it a family. What fucking family?
“Well, you’re right. I did want to ask you something.”
“Tell me.”
“Uh—well…” I was just wondering if you would maybe like to marry me in exchange for money. But don’t worry, it’ll only be for a little while.
Oh my fucking God, this is going to be a disaster.
My face feels as though I have a sunburn, and he laughs at my discomfort.
“Jesus, what the hell is it? Just tell me.”
Yeah, just tell him.
He’s going to laugh in my face.
“I want to—to pay you to do something for me.”
“Okay…” he motions with his hand. “What?”
“To—to marry me. I have fifty thousand dollars in cash.”
It sounds just as stupid as I thought it would, and I want to evaporate on the spot.
A strange expression suddenly contorts Tony’s face. It takes a moment before I realize that he’s actually scared of me. Because he thinks I’m nuts.
Then the irony of a six-foot-something Mafioso actually fearing me hits me hard, and I nearly burst.
He shifts in his chair. “Uh—”
This is life and death.
“This is the only way to get Rafael off my back,” I say quickly, my face a shade of fuchsia, I’m sure. “I can’t get rid of him.”
He looks at me as though he’s concerned for my sanity.
“That’s the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard of. It is fucking ridiculous. Marry you? Are you fucking crazy?”
His indignant tone pisses me off.
“Since you’re a genius, you tell me what to do.”
“Get a fucking gun and just kill him.” He mimes with his fingers. Pop-pop.
I give him a hollow laugh. “And when Vincent finds out, then what? I’m just as fucked, and that’s assuming I can actually kill him and get rid of his body.”
The very idea fills me with revulsion. As much as I hate Rafael, I’m not a violent person, and blood disgusts me. I wouldn’t even know how to get rid of a body.