The Game Changer

by Scott Hildreth

  “She call you?”

  “You know she did. Wouldn’t have skipped out on this week’s episode of New Girl and come here on a Thursday night at eleven o’ fuckin’ clock if she didn’t.”

  I stared beyond him. Angry and frustrated with what my life had quickly become, I was focusing my frustration on a knot in the wooden door frame. So far, it wasn’t very satisfying. “What’d she say?”

  “Said she fucked up.”

  “She tell you who she is?”

  “Yep. Talked to her for damned near an hour, then met her for a cup of coffee. You gonna keep staring at a fly on the wall, or you gonna—”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “I gathered as much. I’m here to change your mind, though.”

  I exhaled audibly through my nostrils, then glanced at him. “I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “We can do this all fuckin’ night, Tripp. You said you don’t wanna talk, and I said I’m here to change your mind. Suppose it’s gonna be a long wait—you bein’ stubborn and me bein’ a man of my word.”

  I shifted my focus back to the wall. After what I suspected was no less than thirty minutes, I glanced in his direction. He was staring right at me.

  “What?” I was aggravated, and the tone of my voice made it clear. “You gave her your word you’d talk to me?”

  “Sure did.”

  “Why?”

  He walked around the corner of my desk, and pulled out the bottle of scotch. After pouring two glasses half-full, he placed one of them in front of me.

  He sat down, took a sip and widened his eyes. “This shit’s better each time I take a drink. You really wanna know?”

  My mouth salivated at the thought of a drink, but I told myself doing so would be a sign of agreeing to discuss matters, and I was far from prepared to talk. Thirty seconds later, I reached for the glass.

  “Sure. Enlighten me.”

  He nodded sharply, took another sip of the whiskey and then stood. “You’re a stupid fucker, that’s why.”

  Midway through a sip of the scotch, I was caught off guard by his statement. “Say again? I thought there for a second that you said I was a stupid fucker.”

  “You are.”

  I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, and then chuckled. “I want to hear this.”

  He locked eyes with me. “I don’t feel like arguin’ with ya, so let me speak my mind before you go jumpin’ my ass for giving my opinion.”

  Driven by nothing more than curiosity, I raised my glass in agreement.

  He began to pace the floor directly in front of my desk. “You met Terra, and then you started stumbling around this place all starry-eyed and stupid. I asked you about her. Remember? In case you don’t, I’ll refresh your memory. You bullshitted me and said you weren’t serious. Hell, I knew you were, but I let you decide when you wanted to tell me. You fell ass-over-teakettle for this chick, and couldn’t see what was right in front of you.”

  “Don’t turn this around and make it—”

  “I’m talking,” he growled. “You’ll get your chance later.”

  I finished what was left of my scotch and poured another glass. My silence was his invitation to continue.

  “So, I recommended having Trace do a background check on her. You said no. After that night at your house when I met Michelle, I asked you about her shoe store. Told you it was weird that her friend said what she did about her bein’ a trust-fund baby. You told me I was an idiot, and that they were just joking around.”

  “I didn’t say you were an idiot, I said—”

  He cleared his throat. “I ain’t done yet.”

  He’d already made his point. So far, he’d done a pretty good job of convincing me that he believed my haphazard precautionary measures had placed me in the position I was in. It did little to change the fact that Terra was the daughter of the city’s mob boss—and that she failed to disclose that information upon meeting me.

  I raised the rim of the glass to my nose and inhaled a slow, shallow breath. He was doing nothing to convince me Terra was right, and everything he could to suggest I should have known the truth beforehand. I now wondered if his trip to my office was nothing more than him taking advantage of an I-told-you-so moment.

  “So, you’re just here to say ‘I told you so’?”

  “You’re confused,” he said. “I came to tell you you’re a stupid fucker.”

  “I’m not in the mood for this shit, Cap. I’m really not. She fucking lied to me.”

  He turned up the palm of his left hand. “She lied to you.” He turned over the right. “You lied to her.”

  “I didn’t lie to—”

  “You sure as fuck did. Didn’t tell her what you did for a living, did ya?”

  “I told her I was an investor. I did it to preserve—”

  “You didn’t tell her the truth. That’s what you did. Did you tell her about saving her brother? I mean, you didn’t know at the time he was her brother, but did you tell her about that? Rescuin’ a man who was the son of the mob boss?”

  “You know good and goddamned well that I didn’t—”

  “You think keepin’ secrets from your lover is different than lying?”

  “Intentionally saying one thing when you know another to be true is a lie. Not saying anything isn’t. I told her nothing about what she needed to know nothing about.”

  “Sounds like a Tripp-ism,” he said with a laugh.

  “A what?”

  “Tripp-ism. Just made it up. Like it?”

  I wasn’t in the mood for Cap’s bullshit, or to decide who told what lies. One more minute of his comedic comments, and we’d end up in a fight. I finished my whiskey, slammed the glass down on my desk and pointed to the door.

  “Go home, Cap.”

  He drank what little scotch was left in his glass, slammed it down on my desk and met my gaze. “I looked it up on Google before I came, asshole. Lie: to present a false impression; be deceptive. You deceived her, and deception is a lie.”

  I glared back at him. “Tell me why you’re here. And don’t say to tell me I’m a stupid fucker. Tell me why you’re here, Cap.”

  “Her whole life she’s been scared to tell people who she is because she’s a little embarrassed, and a lotta scared. When most people find out who she is, they turn and run. So, she tells ’em she’s someone else—sometimes just to get a chance at bein’ heard. Or to have a friend to talk to without bein’ judged. When she met you, she didn’t want you to turn and run. So she told you she was someone else.”

  “She had plenty of opportunities to tell me who she was long before now.”

  “She did,” he agreed. “But for whatever reason, she decided not to. Told me she was scared of losing you.”

  “Which is exactly what happened.”

  “You love her so much you proposed to her, and now you’re willing to let her go? Is that what you’re tellin’ me?”

  “I already let her go. When I walked out.”

  “Just like that?”

  It wasn’t easy, but it was necessary. I nodded. “Just like that.”

  “What if she’d have told you two months ago?”

  Honestly, I wished she had, and then wondered if it would have made a difference. It didn’t matter. It just didn’t matter. “She didn’t,” I huffed.

  “What if she had?”

  “I suppose things would be different.”

  “Explain to me what’s the difference? Then or now?”

  “Which side are you on, Cap? Jesus fucking Christ.”

  “You stubborn prick. When she broke it off over the whole gun-dealin’ fiasco, you were a miserable fucker. So was she. You two are good for each other, and I don’t want to have to live
with ya—or work with ya—if you ain’t got your head screwed on straight. And, although you might not admit it, I know your head’s gonna be elsewhere if she ain’t in your life.”

  The though of Terra not being in my life left a void inside me that I was afraid time wouldn’t—and couldn’t—heal. My mind wouldn’t be elsewhere, it would be nonexistent.

  “Doesn’t matter much.” I shrugged. “She’s gone.”

  He nodded an exaggerated nod. “What do you suppose Ol’ Anthony’s gonna think about the broke-off engagement?”

  His tactics weren’t going to get far with me. Terra made her decision to keep her secret out of nothing but fear. She hadn’t told me who she was for fear of rejection. No differently, I was sure she hadn’t told her father for fear of retribution. Knowing there was no way he’d accept me was my primary reason for not accepting her for being who she was.

  There was no way the Italian mob boss would—or could—tolerate me as being the husband for his beloved mafia princess. Especially when considering that he knew me.

  It was best to simply end it, and end it now.

  “He doesn’t know.”

  “You sure?”

  I was. I nodded. “Damned sure. She wouldn’t tell him.”

  He chuckled. “Don’t think so?”

  I couldn’t believe he was asking such a question. If Anthony Agrioli knew I was seeing his daughter, he and his men would have stormed my office with guns drawn. I would be floating side by side with the man we tossed into the river.

  “I’m sure she didn’t.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “She did.”

  “Bullshit.”

  He folded his arms in front of his chest and laughed. “She did.”

  It frustrated me that Agrioli had a daughter I didn’t even know about. The fact I had been seeing her frustrated me even more. It wasn’t surprising that I was in the dark about her; the mafia was tight-lipped regarding family who were out of the organization.

  “Oh, she did, did she?”

  “Damned sure did. Yesterday.”

  It wasn’t impossible for me to believe that she told him. For Agrioli to accept our engagement—and me—however, was incomprehensible.

  “Okay, I’ll bite. What’d he say?”

  “Sounds like he was pretty fucking happy.”

  Anthony Agrioli happy about his daughter and me?

  I had my doubts.

  “Doubt that,” I said.

  “You can doubt it all you want.” He shoved his hands into his pockets, then shrugged. “I did what I set out to do. I’m goin’ home.”

  As aggravated as I was at Cap, I appreciated his devotion. “See you tomorrow,” I said.

  “Probably not the only one you’ll see tomorrow,” he said over his shoulder. “Least that’s my guess.”

  I wondered what he meant, but then realized if Agrioli truly was pleased with my having proposed to Terra, he would undoubtedly pay me a visit as soon as he found out the position she was in.

  I needed to decide just how I was going to handle him when the time came.

  Chapter Eight

  Terra

  Cap’s talk with Michael may have done some good, but it didn’t convince him to come home. I spent the night alone, disappointed in myself, devastated and without much hope that Michael would ever get over what I had done to him.

  As much as I liked to tell myself that I hated my father’s involvement with the mafia, he was still my father. And when an Italian girl’s heart is broken, her father is her only salvation.

  “Papa, I need help.”

  Sitting in his office with his eyes glued to the computer’s monitor, he motioned to the chair opposite his desk. “Sit.”

  Wearing sweats, suffering from lack of sleep and showing the signs of a few bouts of crying, I looked like a homeless raccoon.

  “You spoke to him?” he asked.

  I sat down and let out a sigh. “It didn’t go well.”

  He glanced up, and upon seeing me, looked me up and down. “You look terrible.”

  I dragged the tips of my fingers beneath my eyes in hope of clearing the mascara from running down my cheeks, but doubted it did any good. “I know. Believe me.”

  “Did you sleep?”

  “Not really.”

  He stood. “You need espresso.”

  “I need Michael to forgive me.”

  “I’ll get you an espresso.”

  He bent down and kissed my cheek on his way to the kitchen. I looked around the office, and made note that although it seemed much smaller than when I was a little girl, nothing in it had changed over the years. The same bookshelves, the same furniture and the same ornate desk littered with handwritten financial reports.

  After a moment, he returned. “Here. You’ll feel better.”

  I took the small porcelain cup from his grasp. “Thank you.” I nodded. “But I’m going to need a lot more than this.”

  “What did he say?”

  I realized I hadn’t told my father that Michael and I were living together, and chose not to elaborate on our living arrangements. In my father’s eyes, I was still a virgin, saving myself for marriage. Tarnishing that belief, at least at that moment, wouldn’t be in my best interest.

  “He got mad. We haven’t spoken since.”

  “He’ll come back. Men are... They’re...they’re stubborn.”

  I took a sip of espresso and winced at the bitterness of it. “I need your help.”

  “What can I do?”

  He didn’t understand my sense of urgency, but then again, I couldn’t expect him to. At least not yet. “Help me?”

  He didn’t respond.

  I carefully placed my cup of espresso on the edge of his desk. “I can’t lose him.”

  He sipped his drink. “Give him some time.”

  “You don’t know him like I do. Giving him time will make it worse.”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Talk to him for me. Explain everything.”

  “I—”

  “Papa...please. I need... I need you to talk to him.”

  I felt like I was being crushed by the weight of my stupid decision.

  I lowered my head and covered my face with my hands. In doing so, I realized I was crying.

  My father did, too. “Don’t cry.”

  I wiped my eyes on the shoulder of my sweat suit.

  “Do you love him?”

  After the discussion we had in the kitchen, I couldn’t believe he felt the need to ask. I looked up, hoping that my puffy eyes and smeared makeup would convince him to help me. “You’ll never understand.”

  “You’re sure he’s...that he’s right for you?”

  I couldn’t believe it. Instead of feeling better, I was feeling much worse. His lack of understanding was sure to be the final nail in my relationship’s coffin. Desperate for help, and sure my father could provide the answer to the problem that I had created, I did what any daughter would have done.

  “My heart loves him as much as any human heart is capable of. I was up all night, Papa. The thought of being without him is suffocating me. I can barely breathe. I don’t want you to help me. I want you to tell me what to do so I can fix it.”

  I did my best to smile, but doubted it showed.

  His response was completely unexpected.

  “I’ll talk to him.”

  Chapter Nine

  Michael

  The sound of Agrioli’s footsteps caught me off guard. Halfway through a set of fifty push-ups, I jumped to my feet and scrambled to grab my jacket. Before I had a chance to slip my arms through the garment, he stepped through the door.

  Getting my mind off his daughter wasn’t easy. Ex
hausting myself after spending a sleepless night in my office seemed to be doing the job, though. Dressed in slacks, a ribbed tank top and dress shoes—and drenched in sweat—I fought to catch my breath.

  “Good—” I cleared my throat. “Good morning.”

  “Most men—” he looked at me and grinned “—they go to the gym.”

  “You ought to know by now. I’m not most men.”

  While I fumbled to put on my jacket, he found his usual spot on the opposite side of my desk.

  “You look tired.”

  “Appropriate, I suppose. I haven’t slept yet.”

  He wiped his hand along the edge of my desk. “First time I’ve seen the top of your desk.”

  I relaxed into my chair. “I filed a mountain of paperwork last night. Last night and this morning, I guess.” I knew the answer, but I thought I’d ask nonetheless. “What brings you here unannounced?”

  He shrugged. “To talk.”

  I pulled the scotch from the drawer. The few inches left in the bottom of the bottle—and my throbbing headache—stood as a reminder of how much I drank after Cap left the night before.

  Before I could offer, he gave a nod.

  I poured two glasses and handed him one. I started to take a drink, but he raised his index finger in what I suspected was opposition.

  He then lifted his glass. “To family.”

  It seemed an odd toast considering the fact I had no family. I struggled to remember if I had told him I was an orphan. I raised the glass nonetheless. “Hear, hear.”

  I emptied it in one gulp, and upon seeing me, he did the same.

  “I don’t like surprises.” He paused, studied the empty glass and then set it on the edge of the desk. “But the one I received the other day. It was good.”

  I gave him time to continue, but he didn’t. I wasn’t thrilled about being goaded into a conversation about Terra with him, but there wasn’t much I could do about it.

  “What was it?” I asked.

  “My daughter. She told me about the man that she loves. She’s been in a relationship and her father knew nothing. So, I keep thinking. You know, about how you were trying to keep a secret from me. But.” He shrugged. “I remember you had no idea.”