And so I just lay there. I lay there and lay there, wishing for a miracle. Wishing, for example, that things might be different. That my father wasn't a crook. That the man I loved wasn't a killer, and that he wouldn't have to spend the rest of his life running- I didn't dare even think about just how long that actually might be at this point.
Those both seemed ridiculously tall orders, even for fantasies. I knew that neither of those things could ever change, and so I set my sights on a wish just a little bit lower, though still hardly more feasible.
I wished, more than anything, that it could be Jay who unlocked that bedroom and stepped through to take me into his arms, rather than my father.
Jay was the only thing, the only one I wanted in the whole wide world. The only thing, really, that I could ever want again.
But I knew I was only fooling myself if I thought I would ever even get to see him again.
If Daddy got his hands on him, he wouldn't give him the money. Daddy would kill him. I knew my father better than anybody and while he'd never been emotional, he'd always protected me.
Maybe it was for my mother. Maybe it was just because he saw me as his prized possession, his beautiful girl.
I closed my eyes.
I waited. And I waited.
And after hours, too many hours, I heard the click of the lock.
That, finally, brought me close to tears.
But then I heard the sound of a voice, and instantly I was jerked back hard from the brink.
“Keisha. I'm back.”
I sat bolt upright in bed, my heart racing. His words were pleasing, but his tone urgent and harried.
“Oh my God! Jay!” it took a moment for me to get past the unspeakable thrill of simply setting eyes on him again, for me to notice the look on his face, and the blood pouring from a hole in his arm.
I didn't let him get another word in.
“Jesus Christ! Jay, you're hurt!”
Instinctively I reached out to touch him, but he brushed my hand away, lacing my fingers up into his own.
“Look, that's not important right now. Listen to me, Keisha. I have something to tell you. Your father is dead.”
I blinked at him. I wasn't totally sure I'd understood this correctly.
“Wh-what? He- he is? Really?”
“He tried to have me killed. He brought a sniper and tried to take me out after I told him where you were. Then the shit hit the fan, and one of the sniper's bullets-”
“Oh my God,” I said, slapping a hand to my mouth.
Maybe I should have felt something resembling sadness. Or horror. Or anything else, really, than what I was suddenly experiencing.
He was really dead. Marlon Hillary... my father. I wanted to cry. I wanted to pretend like there were memories between us to look back on. My father and my relationship was non existant outside of the financial details.
He'd always treated me the way he'd treated his work: cold and detached.
Still. I didn't want him to die.
“I'm very sorry,” said Jay, and I shook my head.
“Don't be. He had it coming. Sooner or later, he had it coming...”
It felt horribly callous of me, and suddenly I felt more guilt than anything else. I looked down at my hands.
My heart was exploding with a mixture of emotions as I tried to process the news. Marlon, dead. Me, the heir to his fortune and to all the trouble that accompanied it.
I felt sick to my stomach.
My father had built wealth for himself but he'd hurt a lot of people doing it, including me, his daughter.
I stared for a long time until Jay interrupted my train of thought.
“They're coming for you, Keisha. Your father's men, his enemies, all of them. They know where you are and I could have taken the money and run but... I can't leave you behind in this life. I can't let you live surrounded by these people. By these killers, these criminals. You deserve so much more than that. So much better. And I know...” He stopped here, his voice choking up.
I stared at him with slightly teary eyes, longing at that moment to reach out, and put a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. I resisted the urge, however. I had to let him speak.
Finally, he resumed, a tear rolling down his face. “...I know that I'm really no better than anyone, in this life you'd be leaving behind. I know I've fucked up. I know that, maybe, you have absolutely no reason to trust me. I've killed, and I've hurt people, and I know that. And I can never change that Keisha. But I mean what I said about leaving that all behind me. I never, ever want to hurt anyone again if I can help it. I regret the day I ever even got my hands on a gun in the first place.
“To be completely honest with you... I didn't think I could ever outrun all that I've done. That I could ever really put it behind me, or be happy again. But this past week I've been with you, Keisha. This time we've spent together... It's the happiest, the most at peace I've been, in a very, very long time. I don't want to leave that behind. Even if I survive all of this, I don't think I can live without you. I love you, Keisha. And I don't know what I can promise you. I don't want to make promises, only to find out down the road that I can't really keep them, or that it isn't enough.
“But I need you in my life. That much I know. If it's what you want, I can take you to a place so far away from here. So far away from all of this. But only if that's what you want. All you have to do is say the word, and we'll leave this all behind forever. Or, you can say the word, and I'll be out of your life. I'll never bother you again if that's what you want. But please, Keisha. I need to know. I can't leave without knowing what you want from me. What I can do to make up for everything I put you through. Because I really do love you, Keisha. And I need you to know that, too.”
I was floored.
I stared at him for a very long time, straining just to process all of this. The pros and cons. The risks, the moral quagmires, the endless array of factors there were to consider, in far too little time to even begin to scratch the surface. But somehow, I knew that no matter how long I tried to think about all of these things, I could never really wrap my head around it.
It was one of those things where, no matter how much time you spent thinking it through, agonizing over it, you would only end up spinning around and around in the same old circles, totally unable to reach any sort of conclusion.
All you could ever really go on, in an instance like this, was your gut.
And right now, my gut felt twisted into knots by the three little words he'd buried in all of that. The only three words that really, truly mattered.
I love you.
That was all I needed. That was all I'd ever wanted. From my father, from anybody.
I took a very deep breath, feeling that whatever answer I gave him, it had to be my final one. I watched the suspense building on his face, his eyes occasionally shifting toward the door, paranoid that the time for talk might be over, at any given moment.
I exhaled and I fixed him with my gaze, letting him know my mind was made up.
“I love you too, Jay,” I said, gently flaring my nostrils as I said the words. “And wherever you go, I'm there.”
He blinked at me, looking like a deer in headlights. The dumbfounded expression on such a serious rugged face as his struck me as adorable beyond words. And I knew, from that look alone, that I'd made the right decision.
I knew, from that look, that he really, truly loved me.
And I knew, from that look, that he would keep me safe wherever we ended up together. That he would do everything in his power to be what I needed him to be.
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Sexy Billionaire Dom Series
Book #1: SPANKED
After a month of sun, sand, and surf the last thing I wanted was to be coming back into the office. My monthly sabbatical was perfect because not only did I get to spend a perfect thirty days off the southern coast of Italy, I’d also been able to brush up on my Italian giving me the perfect opportunity to request a raise from the C.E.O. of Roman Enterprises, my current place of employment.
As Chief Financial Officer, I kept tabs on every dollar that came in or went out of this company and it was time that some more of those dollars went into my own pocket. Since my tenure at Roman I’d slashed expenses by a whopping ten percent, saving the company millions of dollars. And now with the ability to say that I was fluent in Italian, it was another feather in my cap. We imported premium olive oil straight from Italy and being able to converse with the suppliers and contacts in Italy in their native tongue would be more than beneficial.
Roman Enterprises was owned by the almighty and powerful Alaric Caesar. His come-up story was one of legend, unlike a lot of CEOs he grew up poor and moved to the U.S. at the age of eighteen after immigrating from Florence, Italy. He found work under a shipping magnate who took him in like a son. The old man taught Alaric the ways of the industry and by the time he was thirty he’d built his own empire. An empire that would eventually be given to his spoiled playboy son.
His son was smart enough to keep his pictures out of the society pages and kept a pretty low profile, but everyone knew that he’d rather spend his father’s billions instead of work for them. Everyone knew that his father at sixty was ready to retire and pass the company on to his son, but everyone also knew that his son was much to irresponsible to run the company. I shuddered at the thought of how much money he’d probably wasted in his lifetime.
Men like him knew nothing about hard work and getting the job done. He’d been spoiled all of his life and didn’t know anything different. Which was world’s away from how I’d grown up. I could relate to Alaric and his rise from the bottom to the top. Although my parents weren’t dirt poor, they were simple people. My mom was a schoolteacher my entire life and my father a mechanic. I didn’t miss any meals, but you can bet your ass those meals weren’t lobster. What could a spoiled Billionaire know of a life like that?
Which was why I concentrated on facts and figures instead of flights of fancy. I kept my head down and worked my ass off. Knowing that one day it would all pay off. Although, I’d never become CEO at Roman, I knew I could at least become Vice President. I was more than just a numbers person and with my new skills I’d picked up I was sure that the VP position would be mine.
I’d been so preoccupied with my speech to Alaric about promoting me to VP I hadn’t seen my assistant standing at my door waiting for me to look up. She looked nervous, as usual, but this time she was actually shaking like a leaf. I’d told her a thousand times about being intimidated by those of us in the C-Suite.
“Cassandra, come on in. What’s going on, now?” I asked absent mindedly as I finished up calculating our latest income projections.
“Mr. Roman wants you in his office…now.” She said as she continued to tremble.
“Calm down. I’m sure he just wants to see me after my sabbatical.” I said as I pushed a stray strand of hair back into my bun. Standing up I grabbed my blazer off the back of my chair and walked to the full length mirror I kept in my office. I gave myself a once over and liking what I saw marched down towards Mr. Caesar’s office.
As I got closer to his office I practiced my speech in my mind. Sir, I believe that with my new language acquisition along with the continued growth of the company during my tenure, that the open position of Vice President would be a great opportunity for me.
The dark mahogany door of his office was closed and I could make out a one-sided conversation. He must be on the phone I thought. I looked over to his receptionist who was parked outside his office and she nodded at me to go in.
Before I walked in I telegraphed my intentions by knocking lightly. Opening the door, I saw the still handsome Alaric Caesar holding the phone to his ear and mumbling to the person on the other line. When he saw me, he raised up one finger and then told the person on the phone he had a visitor.
“Come in, come in, Jayla,” he said as he stood to greet me. He walked over to where I stood and gave me a very European two cheek kiss, which I returned. “You look well rested,” he commented as he took a seat at his small conference table near the front of the room. “Sit, sit,” he said as he motioned to the chair next to him.
“Thank you, sir. I feel well rested, too.” I started.
‘That’s great because you’re going to have a big job ahead of you.”
I couldn’t help the grin that began to spread across my face. This was it, he was giving me the empty VP slot. I could just feel it.
“Yes, it’s going to be a big job grooming my son for the Vice Presidency. I think it’s just the thing he needs before he takes the reigns of Roman Enterprises.
The grin I’d started turned immediately into a stink face. This meeting wasn’t about me at all, it was all about getting some brat in his thirties up to speed on a position he was in no way qualified for! I knew that nepotism was rampant in the corporate world and even expected Alaric to give his son the company, but to place him as a VP as training wheels was an insult to the position.
Mr. Too Big: BWWM Hitman Romance Novella Page 9