“It is obvious,” I snap, putting on mon visage laid and letting a little sneer crawl across my lips that I have to force back. Anger won't help here. The only real reason it's rearing its ugly head here is because I'm conflicted and confused. Masking those feelings with rage, it's just childish. I take a deep breath. “I'm just surprised it took you so long to figure it out—especially after you pieced together that she was my daughter. How could you think I'd have someone else's baby so soon after you left? I mean, I would've been well within my right to do so, but come on, Gill.”
“That false birthday was really throwing me off. You, Cliff, and Aveline were all giving me the same story. Besides, I thought you'd have told me or at least have had my dad tell me at some point.” His voice drops, heating a little with some sort of repressed anger, probably towards me. I get it. Even if Gill says knowing about Solène wouldn't have changed things, I never even gave him a chance to get to know his daughter. “But you know what the real truth is, Regina? I didn't want to see it. It was right in front of my face and I couldn't be bothered to really look.” Gill clenches his jaw and shakes his head like he's disgusted with himself, glancing over at me with that laser eyed gaze of his. I can feel his stare cutting into the side of my face, but I don't meet it, looking out the window at the rush of traffic and the wet blur of red brake lights.
“All of this … none of it turned out the way we expected it to.”
“No,” he agrees, his voice softening enough that it gets under my skin and makes me want to sigh. I can remember that very same voice whispering sweet nothings in my ear, waking me from sleep with a smile and a hope, a hope that each day was going to be better than the last. Until they just weren't. That first morning, waking up without him, I felt like a hollow shell, like a soulless person with no direction and a shattered heart.
I decide to tell him this.
Fuck it.
It might be therapeutic to finally face the source of my inner demons. Okay, so there's no doubt that I have issues with my father's death, my mother's death, with my sister's abandonment of both me and my mom, but that's all stuff for another day.
“When you first left, I was so broken I didn't think I'd make it to Solène's delivery date, let alone anything beyond that. But then a week later, maybe two, I started to get hopeful again. I started to think that maybe this was just some … I don't know … like a phase or something? I'd wait around at the kitchen table, hoping that the next knock on that door would be yours, that the next phone call would start with your voice telling me how sorry you were.”
“Regina—” Gill begins, but I cut him off.
“No, let me finish. You told me you wanted to talk about your leaving, so let's talk about it. Let's just get it all out there.” I lift my hands, palms out and shrug my shoulders. “I'm tired of tiptoeing around this.”
“So am I,” Gill says, his voice tight and laced with violence. I snap my gaze over to him and find his eyes not on me, but on the rearview mirror. Shit. “But it'll have to wait until later. Regina, take your seat belt off and get on the floor.”
My heart leaps into my throat, but I do what Gill says, sliding down and curling my knees against my chest. It's a tight fit, but I manage. While I'm down there, I take off my pumps and half stuff them in my unzipped clutch. If I have to run, I'll go twice as fast in bare feet.
“What's going on?” I ask, praying that Cliff and Solène are safe right now. I have to believe they are and focus on the situation at hand otherwise I'll let my mind get away from me with worry. I glance up at Gilleon, at the strangely violent calm that's settled over his features. When he gets like that, he almost looks inhuman.
“We've got a tail, damn it,” he growls and then, strangely out of place for the situation, a wicked grin curls his lips. “Shouldn't have stopped to fuck.”
“Especially not now that I have to run for my life with wet panties,” I bemoan and he chuckles. Maybe it's not appropriate to joke in this sort of scenario, but what else do I have to do? “Anyway, if you've only had four lovers in the past ten years, I don't blame you.”
“Are you trying to say that I'm backed up?” he purrs, using that eerie calm to pitch his voice in a way that makes me bite my lip.
“Yeah, actually, I am.”
“You're probably right,” he tells me, and I tense as I feel the SUV slowing down.
“What's going on?” I ask, getting ready to open the door and run if need be.
“There's a red light,” Gilleon tells me, his voice tinged with the slightest whisper of amusement. “We might have a tail, but we're still in the middle of the city and we don't need cops looking our way. Besides, I know they're there, but I don't need to let on that I do.”