"It was years ago now," he said, stepping up behind me. The moment his powerful arms wrapped around me I felt calmed, like he soothed the part of me that had always felt a little lonely. "You're my family now." My heart stopped, the words reaching the deepest part of me that longed for that even as my breath caught in panic.
I had my father. I had my aunt. I had my kids.
I'd thought I had my husband.
But my circle was small, and I'd always been uncomfortable in sizable groups of people. I'd never made friends easily, much preferring to stay with people who I could already trust. Even before Chad's death, I'd known that loving people meant you could lose them. That it meant you could suffer the loss of that loved one. Watching my father grieve for my mother his entire life had taught me to avoid attachments, and maybe that was why I'd ended up with a man who might not have loved me.
With a man who kept his distance emotionally.
Because I'd foolishly thought it would hurt less if I lost him.
Ryker never let there be distance between us. Emotionally, he overwhelmed me and filled me with constant casual assurances that I mattered to him. Even if I didn't see how they could be legitimate. He constantly did little favors and kindnesses that made me feel cared for in a way I’d never had. Physically, he dominated me. If I didn't do what he wanted, then he manipulated my body to get what he wanted. Whether that came sexually or in terms of just picking me up and putting me where he thought I should be.
"Calla?" he whispered, and I shook my head with a slight smile.
"That's sweet," I admitted reluctantly, and I knew he could hear the disbelief in my tone. It was only a matter of time before I lost Ryker too. Before he left me, but with Ryker I would know it was because he just didn't want me. He'd gotten what he wanted, got to play house with a ready-made family for a couple weeks, and he'd realized that it wasn't for him. I didn’t want to acknowledge that the thought hurt.
"I mean it, you know. The three of you are my family now. The Bellandis are my family too. You've already met them, and that's the only other family I'll ever have." The backs of his knuckles traced down my cheek lightly, and I forced myself to smile. He still had an arm wrapped around my waist, still held me tight to his chest when the kids and my Dad came thundering down the stairs. Ryker made no move to separate us, and I felt everything in me tighten in stress. Chad and I had never been fond of public displays, but even if we had been my father didn't tolerate them.
He'd always told him if he ever "caught him pawing at his daughter," he'd crush his trigger finger. He hadn't cared the least that threatening Chad had technically been threatening a police officer.
When I finally finished washing and drying my hands, I turned to face my father. Ryker moved with me, keeping himself plastered against my back like he did not understand boundaries where parents were concerned, but my father didn't look the least bit perturbed by Ryker's paw on my stomach. "Those are some bedrooms," he said with a laugh.
Ryker gave a rough chuckle in response. "I wanted them to have rooms they loved. Their own spaces in all the changes we threw at them so quickly."
"We? I don’t recall having a lot to do with that," I said, lifting a disbelieving brow at him as I craned my neck to look up at him.
He chuckled, dipping his head down to touch his lips to mine briefly and a stunning smile overtook his face when he pulled back. "Okay, I threw at them," he admitted. I tried not to let that smile touch me, but I felt it wrap around my heart even with that effort.
I looked to my father, expecting him to admonish us for the kiss, but he didn't. He only smiled at Ryker. "You want to show me this Chevelle of yours?" he asked. Ryker separated from me just enough to grab my hand, dragging me off to guide my dad to the garage.
"I've got to keep an eye on dinner," I said with a laugh. "You guys go on ahead." The second part was much more reluctant. I didn't relish Ryker being alone with my father, and I definitely didn't want to put Ryker in a position where he had to be alone with him.
But Ryker didn't seem to mind in the slightest when he released my hand and turned to the kids. "Who's coming with us?"
"Me!" Axel shouted, but Ines shook her head and looked at me.
"You want to help me put the Oreos on the cake?" I asked her and she raced into the kitchen. I set up a chair for her to kneel on, setting the cake in front of her so she could press the Oreos onto the top. I hadn't thought to go that far with it, but I'd let my baby girl do whatever she could to help decorate if it made her happy.
The grin on her face was worth every smear of Oreo cream cheese frosting that she spread when her fingers slipped all over the place.
✽✽✽
It was safe to say my father was sufficiently enamored with Ryker. If the Maserati hadn't done it, the Chevelle would have.
If the way the kids loved him hadn't, the way Ryker spoiled them rotten with toys and rooms and the endless affection only he seemed to be able to provide them with would have.
Ines's tantrums even seemed like a thing of the past when he was around. A stern, but loving, look from Ryker was enough to dissuade my terrible two from melting down. I might have resented it, if she hadn't started respecting my warnings more too.
The full presence of two parental figures worked wonders for making sure she never wanted for attention, and the change in her behavior was obvious. It made me wonder what she would have been like with her father around, but though I hated to admit it, even I knew there wouldn't have been much difference between just me and the two of us.
By the end of our marriage, Chad had been so absent that it was almost like he wasn't there at all. To a two-year-old, I didn't imagine it felt like there was much difference between that and dead.
As horrible as that felt to think.
For Axel, there was an enormous difference. He knew what it meant when I told him his father was dead. He remembered the father who'd been present before work absorbed him.
“So, Ryker,” my Dad commented as he sliced through a slice of cake slowly. “What is it you do?”
My fork clattered to my plate, and I coughed around the bite I’d been chewing and tried to clear my throat.
“You okay, Calla Lily?” Dad asked, and Ryker patted my back reassuringly. How he seemed to think anything about the moment could be comforting was beyond me. He’d confessed less than a week prior to being a murderer.
That wasn’t exactly the typical dinner conversation a father wanted to have with his daughter’s boyfriend slash kidnapper.
Not that he knew that, but eff my life.
“I work in private security. Making sure people meet the justice they deserve,” Ryker answered with a smile. “I have several clients through the city, but I delegate most of my work to my employees at this point. I only consult on the particularly nasty cases.”
I knew without a doubt that it was a lie, or at the very least a gross misrepresentation of what he did. If he truly believed the men he killed deserved what they got, then the justice part was true enough.
Security seemed like a stretch.
“Like a cop?” Dad asked, crossing his arms over his chest as he leaned back in his chair and studied Ryker. My dad was a shark when it came to knowing when someone lied. Being a single father to a teenage girl made that a necessary skill he honed over the years.
“The specifics are confidential, but they vary from job to job. I promise you, nothing I do will ever get me in trouble with the law.” Knowing what I knew, I noticed the delicate nuances in his wording.
He didn’t say it wasn’t illegal, just that he wouldn’t get in trouble for it.
“Calla seems to have a type then,” Dad chuckled, and I huffed my own laugh and downed some more wine even if it was gross to mix it with the Oreo cake. The irony of the moment wasn’t lost on me. Dad unknowingly compared my cop husband to my murderer boyfriend.
How quaint.
Ryker stroked a hand over my bare thigh under the table and took pity on my discom
fort. “Are you going to let me teach you to swim soon, Princess?” Ryker asked my girl. She shook her head viciously, picking at her food with her fingers as her appetite vanished.
I had no clue where the intense fear of the water had come from, and as grateful as I was for it some days, others I cursed it. “No,” she pouted.
“I’ll hold you the whole time.”
“No,” she repeated, smacking her hand down on the high chair tray in a rare moment of defiance against her beloved ‘yker.
“We’ll work on it,” Ryker said with a chuckle as he turned to me. He’d wear her down, eventually. He seemed to excel at doing that.
Dad shoved his last bite of cake in his mouth, and I could already see that he was ready to go home. My old man had always been early to bed and early to rise. When he finished chewing, he studied my face intently. “You look well rested, Calla Lily,” he noted. “I don’t think I’ve seen you look so relaxed in years. Ryker must take good care of you.”
“He likes to think so,” I said in return, shoveling my last bite into my mouth as I stood from the table. Both men chuckled, and even Axel chimed in.
“He lets her sleep in unless he has to go to work, and she’s been on vacation from the studio,” Axel said.
“Sounds like he spoils her,” Dad concurred, standing from the table and pressing a kiss to each of the kids’ heads. “I hate to eat and run, but I need to get to bed. I promised I’d open up at six tomorrow so a friend could drop off his Cadillac.” Ryker stood too, following Dad closer to the front door. He stopped next to me, wrapping an arm around my waist and tugging me into his side. “Thank you for having me over, Son,” Dad said, and I swore I felt my heart pumping at my feet as my world bottomed out. He’d never, not once, even come close to calling Chad Son.
“Anytime, August,” Ryker returned, and emotion clogged his throat. Despite my rising concern, I pressed further into his side. Given the loss of his family, I could only imagine how it felt to have someone call him Son.
"I have to say, I questioned if this was smart. It came out of nowhere," Dad said, his eyes on Ryker as he stood at the door. The kids still shoveled cake into their mouths, distracted by the sugary sweet mess of frosting.
"I'm sure it seemed that way," Ryker said evasively, but Dad's eyes came to me knowingly. He saw through some of Ryker's shit I suspected, but I also didn't think it would stop him from encouraging the relationship either. "I'm a man who sees something good and doesn't let it go. A woman like Calla has got no place living alone. It's too dangerous, and all I've ever wanted to do is keep her and the kids safe. I'm sure you've figured out that I have the resources to do that here."
Dad grinned at him. "Safe to say I figured that much, yeah. You take good care of them, I can see that, even if my Calla Lily doesn’t want to admit it."
"I do my best," Ryker admitted, and I felt my throat burn with tears when something in my father's face shifted.
"All I ever wanted was a man who saw everything she was worth and wanted to protect that. Chad never appreciated her or the kids, not really. You give her that, then I'll be in your corner."
"Daddy," I whispered, feeling my heart break for him. I hadn’t considered how it might hurt him to see me live out a lonely marriage, knowing his life and loneliness had influenced my relationship.
"I'll walk you out," Ryker announced, and I didn't know if I should be suspicious or just grateful for the reprieve to pull my shit together as I sniffled back my tears.
It didn't matter, because my father murmured to me softly, "See you soon, Calla Lily."
And then they both walked out the door.
Twenty-Five
Ryker
"I could use your input on the paint job for the Chevelle. The guy I usually use had an unfortunate accident," I said, conveniently leaving out the part where he'd been using the connection to me to spy on the Bellandis for one of the rival territories outside the city.
It hadn't ended well for him. Somehow, I didn’t think Calla would appreciate me telling her father the accident had involved my hatchet.
"That's too bad. I have a guy, and he'll do whatever you want, but he has an expert eye if you're willing to just let him run with it."
"If he has your trust, he has mine," I agreed, and I shuffled my feet when we stepped up to August's Mustang Cobra. The woman had me tied up in knots so hard that I couldn't even imagine how I could ask her father the question I needed.
“I’ll have him call you. He’ll love that car,” August laughed, opening the Cobra door. He sobered. “Don’t hurt her. She’s been through too much, and half of it she doesn’t even have the first clue that she should be upset. I don’t know how he managed it, because my Calla Lily is far from stupid, but Chad twisted her up, made her think it was normal to raise their kids practically on her own. She was too young when they met, and I don’t think she ever really got to experience what a healthy relationship was supposed to be before that snake dug his teeth into her.”
“Calla fights for what she loves,” I answered him, pushing the hair back from my face with a sigh. I needed a haircut. “She fights hard. But she never fought for him to give her more. Now, you make what you will of that, but I know what I think about it.”
“You don’t think she loved him?” August asked, and his eyes were intense on mine. As if he thought I might condemn his daughter for her loveless marriage.
“I think Calla believes she loved him, but actions speak louder than words. If she loved him, she’d have wanted him to be there more. She’d have pushed for him to be more active with the kids. I think Calla loved the idea of Chad, of everything he could give her, but she didn’t want to admit she’d chosen him because she knew he never would.”
August’s face twisted in confusion as he studied me, and I knew he was trying to process how I knew so much about Calla so quickly. But he seemed to shrug it off when he sighed. “She’s always been a loner. My girl doesn’t let people in easily. I think you’re good for her, so don’t take this the wrong way, but you’ve got a hell of a road ahead of you if you think you’re going to work your way under her skin.” I glanced at the sky, enjoying the sight of the stars that I could never see from inside the city limits.
The light pollution of the city, the lack of true darkness and shadows, made me feel claustrophobic. It reminded me of my childhood and sleeping with the lights on so I could always see what was coming.
I found joy in the fact that I’d long since become the monster who went bump in the night.
“I know, but unlike with Chad or other people, she doesn’t have much choice with me,” I admitted, and I expected it might be that moment where I could have lost Calla’s father’s blessing. But just like with her, I wouldn’t lie. I might omit certain truths, but there was no disguising the fact that I’d pushed my way into his daughter’s life and taken her as my own. Not to some extent, anyway.
His chest heaved with a restrained chuckle as he cleared his throat. “I suppose that is a key difference, yes.”
“I’m going to marry her,” I admitted, pulling the ring box from my pocket where I’d kept it tucked away safely all night. “I’d like your blessing, but know that I’ll marry her without it, too.”
“Isn’t it a little soon for marriage?” August asked, taking the box from my hand and opening it to peek inside.
“Isn’t it a little soon to have her moved in with me?” I shot back, and he grinned at me as he shook his head. “I told you, I’m a man who sees something good and doesn’t waste time. Calla’s mine, and she’s always going to be.”
“You love her?” August asked.
“I would say more than you could ever understand, but I suspect that wouldn’t be true.” I glanced down at the wedding band he still wore even decades after Calla’s mother’s death.
He handed me back the ring box, running his hand over his face. “She’ll kill me for it, I suspect, but if you love her like that, then you’ve got my blessing to marry my Calla Lil
y.” He sat in the driver’s seat, looking up at me in warning. “Just don’t make me regret it.”
I was smiling when he pulled the door closed and the sound of the Cobra engine engaging echoed through the space in front of the warehouse. When he drove down the driveway, the guard on duty opened it immediately.
When I finally turned back to the house, I did it feeling good about my place in Calla’s life. I’d sufficiently won over nearly everyone, but her until only her aunt remained for me to contend with.
Aside from my Sunshine, I knew she’d be the hardest for me to crack.
Still, I went inside with a smile on my face, only to be hit with a fierce glare from Calla while she finished drying the pots. “What is it, Tesoro?” I asked her, stepping up to hug her. She jerked back from my touch like I’d scalded her.
“It isn’t bad enough that you’ve taken my children from me? That you’ve made them love you because they know you can give them a life I have no chance of providing?”
“What are you talking about, Sunshine?” I murmured, risking it to reach out for her again. She smacked my hand away so hard that the sound echoed through the kitchen.
“You had to take my father too? Will you leave me with anything of my own when you’re done with me?”
“Calla,” I whispered, and I knew my voice went hoarse with the emotion that clogged my throat. She had no clue, couldn’t see that I wasn’t trying to take from her.
All I wanted was to give her the life I knew she dreamed of having. A husband and father to her kids who got along with her family and cared enough to facilitate that relationship. I wanted to give her everything, but as she stormed into the living room and picked Ines up off the couch to bring the kids to bed, I knew I’d pushed too hard, too fast.
Her walls were firmly in place and fighting her on it would go nowhere fast. Calla needed time to process things. Her father’s heartfelt confession as he left would hit Calla right where it hurt. If there was one thing about my Sunshine I knew without a doubt, it was that her claws came out when she felt cornered.
Grieved Loss: A Dark Mafia Romance (Bellandi Crime Syndicate Book 3) Page 18