House of Payne: Rude

by Stacy Gail

  Sass was so stunned all she could do was return the hug, weak from relief. “You’re not upset or disappointed?”

  “Are you insane?” In a heartbeat, Mama Coco pulled back, her hands clamped around Sass’s upper arms in a firm hold. “Young lady, what do you mean by that?”

  “It’s just… you know everything about me. I mean, everything. I’m not exactly the ideal woman a mother hopes her son will one day bring home to meet her.”

  “Sage Ambrosia Stone, you did not just say that to my face.” Mama Coco swung from teary-eyed to fiery-eyed so fast Sass wondered how the entire table didn’t suffer a collective case of whiplash. “After all these years, it’s like you don’t even know me. You think I’m a snob?”

  “Of course not, Mama—”

  “And why do you think this would be so one-sided—that I’d only look at it from the perspective of being Rudy’s mother? I may have given birth to him, but I chose to be your mother, don’t forget. You can bet your bippy I’ve worried over what sort of man you’d fall in love with and bring home to meet me. If he hadn’t been the kind of man who worshipped the ground you walked on, I would have broken him over my knee.”

  Sass rocked back, stunned that Mama Coco would look at it that way. But all she could manage was, “What’s a bippy?”

  “Google it,” Mama Coco shot back while across the table, Tonya’s paralysis broke with an undignified snort. “My point, sweetie, is that I do know you, and you’re perfect for my Rudy. I also know him, and I think he’s the perfect man for you. My only wish is that both you and Rudy get the best person in the world for them, you understand? That’s why seeing the two of you together makes me so happy.”

  Relief and pure happiness bubbled up from deep inside to spill out in the form of laughter. Sass let it loose in one happy burst before she took a page out of Mama Coco’s book and threw her arms around the older woman’s neck. “Just when I thought things couldn’t get any better, you give me more. Thank you, Mama Coco.”

  “Silly girl, I didn’t give you anything. Just be happy.”

  Happy was something Sass could definitely pull off, and for the rest of the meal she couldn’t stop smiling. Having Mama Coco’s approval was a huge weight off her shoulders, so much so she thought she might fly away by the time she hugged everyone farewell and wrapped her coat around herself. She barely even felt the icy wind that held the promise of the year’s first snow in its breath. Nothing could bother her now.

  She rounded the corner of the building on her way to the parking lot just as the first flakes fell, and crashed headlong into a wall-sized person.

  “Sorry! I’m so sorry, I was getting my keys out and not looking…” Her words choked off as she looked up while the man she’d crashed into reached out. Horror struck as she stared up at Mr. Hot Italian Suit, his aviator glasses, cashmere coat and sexy black leather driving gloves all in place. Before she could move, he grabbed her by the wrists in a grip so strong it telegraphed to her very clearly that there was no way she’d escape.

  “It’s a bad idea to not look where you’re going, Sass. Don’t scream,” he said as she sucked in a sharp breath to do just that, and his tone was nothing like the genial one he’d used only seconds ago. It was a voice without mercy and as cold as an unmarked mass grave he’d worked hard to fill himself. It was enough to freeze the air she’d just sucked in until she couldn’t make a sound. “If you scream I’m going to have to get ugly, and I don’t want to start off our friendship on a sour note. First impressions mean so much, and I don’t want to be forced to make a bad one with you.”

  Sass stared at him, her entire being icing over while her fear-saturated brain tried to make sense of his words. Friendship? First impressions? Was he fucking serious?

  “There we go. See? Everything’s fine and we’re already getting along.” His tone warmed up, and the leather-clad hands that manacled her in place gave her wrists a squeeze in what she thought half-hysterically was a gesture meant to comfort. It only terrified her more. She hadn’t believed his grip could get any stronger, but he’d just proved her wrong with ridiculous ease. “You seem to think I’m the bad guy, but you’ve got it all wrong, Sass. I’m on your side, all right? You have no idea how much I’m on your side.”

  “Who the hell are you?” Thank God, her voice had finally decided to come out of hiding. “What do you want with me? Why are you following me? How do you know my name?”

  “Lots of questions. I get that. I’m sure I’d be the same way.” Another seemingly reassuring squeeze made her bones creak. With all her might she did her best to stifle a wince as she took an imperceptible step back. She wasn’t sure what she could do to get away—maybe twist around and underneath his hold until he had to break it. But that would be one hell of a gamble as it would bring her into his body…. “My full name is Marco Polo Scorpeone, though almost no one in the world knows that. Feel privileged. My enemies and people in the business—a veritable cast of thousands—know me only by one name, and that’s Scorpio. What few friends I have call me Polo. You can call me Polo is you want, and I’m going to keep calling you Sass. The last thing you are is fucking Sage Ambrosia.”

  So he did know her legal name. That didn’t surprise her. But if she could surprise him… “Why are you following me?”

  “I don’t follow you all the time, if that helps the creep-factor any. Sometimes it’s another guy. Sometimes it’s no one at all. That usually happens when you’re with your man, Rudolfo Panuzzi. You call him Rude, yeah? I admit I’ve been getting a kick out of that. That’s very you. Very sassy.”

  Dear God, he even knew Rude’s name. “Why are you following me?”

  “Why else? To keep you safe. That’s why we don’t watch over you whenever you have your guy Rude with you. I mean, it’s obvious that if someone were to target you, they’d need a fucking tank to get past that g—”

  She twisted, pivoting on her foot so that her back was to him and his arms had to cross. This brought her close enough to stomp a heel on his foot with all her might. But when her heel crashed down, it hit only pavement, and she heard it snap off.

  Damn it.

  “Excellent move.” That dreadful voice was back, the voice of Death in the land of the living. His arms tightened, and suddenly she couldn’t move. “Seriously, my hat’s off to you. I didn’t even see it coming until you were already there, and for me, that’s saying something. You’ve got more of your father in you than just your looks, that’s for damn sure.”

  Sass turned into a statue and the world ground to a halt at that one word.

  Father.

  Oh no. No, no, no, no, no…

  “Though I should’ve known that was the case,” he went on, again slipping back into that friendly, oh so jovial tone she now knew was a flimsy cover for the inhuman being this Polo Scorpeone was. “The way you took out that fucking perv, Dietrich, when you were just a baby should have warned me that you don’t give two shits about gambling with your life. Fucker could’ve beaten you to death for clawing him up the way you did. And he almost did that very thing, according to hospital records.”

  Hospital records? Dietrich? Everything inside her that wasn’t already frozen in fear iced over. This guy, whoever he was, had the power to not only get his mitts on her juvenile history within Chicago social services, but he could get his hands on confidential hospital records as well.

  Not good. Not good at all.

  “But,” he went on, either oblivious or indifferent to the fact that his knowledge of her past scared her in ways far deeper than being threatened with bodily harm, “in the end, you got that piece of shit in a way that no other little girl had had the balls to do. Willing to take life-ending risks to execute a plan is an admirable thing, Sass. But you need to know there are people out there who’ll be more than happy to take you up on it.”

  “And you’re one of them.”

  “Yes.”

  Frantically she looked around, her eyes falling onto the bumper of a B
MW almost within kicking distance. If this man was tied to her so-called father, her life was already forfeit. She had nothing to lose by dropping her legs out from under her. That move would leave him holding suddenly dead weight, and the unexpectedness of it would make him step forward. Then she could kick the car so hard it would set off the alar—

  Before she could turn thought into action, it was his turn to pivot, and in a half-second she found herself slammed up against the building, his face an inch from hers.

  “Pro tip—you go real still when you’re planning something, and give yourself away,” he said softly, and all she could see was the reflection of her pale face in his glasses. Goddamn it, she looked so scared, so fucking weak, it sparked a deep-down rage. She had promised herself that she’d never feel this helpless kind of fear again, and this bastard had made her shatter that promise.

  She threw her head forward, hitting the edge of her brow against his nose. It wasn’t much of a headbutt since she hadn’t been able to rear back thanks to the wall behind her, but it was enough to give her a sliver of room to at least step sideways away from him. Any chance of freedom vanished, however, when she was hauled back in place, this time with an arm held across her throat and her toes barely touching the ground. Her breath trickled to a near-halt, and when she looked up at him she saw that all she’d managed to do was knock his glasses off.

  Outstanding.

  “You’re making life harder than it has to be,” he muttered, while she took great pleasure in the small cut on the bridge of his nose. Then his forearm notched her chin up another inch, and what little breath she had been getting dried up. “You can’t do a fucking thing to stop this, Sass, no matter what plan you come up with. No matter how hard you fight or how brave or reckless or fucking stupid you are, I’m not going away. You know why? Because you can’t change who you are, or who your father is, so stop. Fucking. Fighting.”

  “Don’t. Have. Father.” She couldn’t even hear herself, but that wasn’t surprising. All she could hear was the loud thudding of her heartbeat while the rest of the world began to gray out.

  Then all at once it was back. He’d backed up a step while she sucked in air, his hands tucked casually into his coat pockets as if they were just a couple of friends idly chatting about the weather. Half a second later a pair of women came around the corner, barely sparing them a glance before getting into a car and taking off. And all the while Sass and Mr. Hot Italian Suit, Scorpio, stared at each other, his gaze coolly detached while she tried to suffocate the life out of him with hers.

  “You could have screamed for help,” he pointed out when the car disappeared. “I actually thought you would. Why didn’t you?”

  “Because this is obviously a case of mistaken identity,” she rasped, refusing to put a hand to her throat like some melodramatic twit. But, oh, how she wanted to. “You know my name and you know people in my life, I’ll give you that. But you’ve still got the wrong person. I don’t have a father. I don’t have parents, or family. I don’t have anyone, you fucking psycho. I never have.”

  “You weren’t hatched, Sass. Everyone has a father, and it just so happens that I work for yours. That’s why I watch over you. That’s why I’m here now. Your father, Borysko Vitaliev, wants to see you. And what Borysko Vitaliev wants, I make sure he gets.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Sass’s pulse pounded in her temples as she slammed the apartment door behind her. The silence of her empty home closed in on her, but it brought her no peace. Instead she launched into action by dropping her purse and rushing to her desk to yank open the middle drawer. After pawing through its contents for about a minute she cursed under her breath, yanked the entire drawer out and dumped its contents on the desktop. After another minute of sifting through the drawer’s detritus, she did the same thing with all the other drawers, then went through the kitchen and gave it the same hurricane treatment. When that search proved to be fruitless she came to a standstill, her breath heaving out of her in short, frantic gusts as she tried to figure out what to do next.

  God, God, God, she was so screwed.

  Why, for fuck’s sake, did life have to kick her in the teeth just when she’d plucked up the courage to be happy? It was like the universe begrudged her the happiness and fulfillment that everyone else seemed free to pursue. But not her, oh no. Fate clearly believed she didn’t deserve to be happy.

  Maybe this was what it was to pay for the sins of the father.

  Her father…

  A faint memory tickled at the edges of her consciousness. She wheeled around and made a beeline for the bookshelves by the balcony’s sliding glass door, flinging books behind her in a wild frenzy—

  There.

  Suddenly she couldn’t move any faster than a snail’s pace as she reached out for the old, wrinkled manila envelope, vaguely noting how her fingers trembled.

  Why had she kept this? Why? She should have thrown this garbage away ages ago.

  Her legs wouldn’t hold her anymore. Now that she’d found what she was looking for, her adrenaline crashed and she crashed along with it, sinking down hard onto the floor where she stood. She closed her eyes and tried to push everything into her Nowhere Place, but something had happened to it. It was as though letting herself fall in love with Rude had destroyed all the pathways to the Nowhere Place.

  Don’t feel. Don’t feel anything…

  She waited for the panic to subside, then bit her lip hard when another wave of it hit.

  Damn it.

  With nothing left to do but push through, she tore open the envelope that hadn’t been touched since she was eighteen.

  The contents were just as she remembered. There had once been three grand in cash, but she’d banked that right away, then used it as part of her down payment for the apartment. The plain white card of a law firm was still in there, the same law firm where she had been abandoned as a newborn. There was also a picture of a blonde woman with a sunflower in her hair and a dreamy smile, and a plain white business-sized envelope. She pulled the envelope out and went for the single sheet of paper folded within.

  Dear Sage (if that’s even your name now),

  So, this is kind of awkward, but the person who’s writing this letter is your mother. Wow, that’s something I thought I’d never be—a MOTHER. Crazy, right?

  The thing is, I’m not ready to be a mother, but don’t take that personally, okay? This is totally a case of “it’s not you, it’s me.” Know what I mean?

  I can tell you my name’s Heather, and that’s why I named you Sage. Plant names, get it? I think it’s cool we kind of match like that. I’ve left a picture of myself as well. It was taken as my senior yearbook photo, so it’s a couple years old now. I hope you don’t think I’m too ugly, haha! From what I can tell, you didn’t inherit anything from me in the looks department. Oh well. I’m sure you’ll still be hot like me when you grow up. Right now, though, you just look like your dad.

  Your dad’s the main reason I’m giving you up for adoption. When I met him, I was visiting my sister who’d moved to Chicago, and he majorly dazzled me. But I’m sorry I fell for him, because your dad’s the most dangerous person I’ve ever met. Normally, I’m into bad boys, but he’s not a bad BOY. He’s a bad MAN, and I don’t know what he’d do to me or you if he knew you existed. If I’d known he was one of those crazy Russian mob guys, I never would have spoken to him. At least, I don’t think I would have.

  My sister helped me work out your private adoption with a super-nice lawyer, who’s going to take this letter and make sure you get it on your eighteenth birthday. Don’t look for me, okay? And don’t look for your father. He’s a monster. The adoption I’ve set up for you guarantees you’ll have a life filled with happiness. Sounds great, right? No need to thank me!

  “This is so fucked up.” The sound of her own voice startled her, and it broke the spell that had frozen her in place. Stuffing the letter back into the manila envelope, she hauled herself up and marched into th
e bedroom. From the age of eighteen, when she and Scout had uncovered this epic pile of crap, Sass had eye-rolled whenever she thought about the letter her dingbat of a birth mother had left her. It was just so ridiculous. At the time, it had seemed obvious her mother had gotten knocked up by some douche with an edgy look and a half-assed tale about being a Russian mobster. Anyone would have seen through that story, but clearly this Heather person had been such a wide-eyed bumpkin she’d swallowed it hook, line and sinker.

  For years, that was what Sass had believed.

  For years, she’d been wrong.

  The second she’d heard about Liam being found with Russian writing on him, she’d known deep down that she’d been wrong all along.

  Was this what she had to fear now—crazy Russian mob-style interference in her life and the lives around her? That Scorpio guy had mentioned Rude by name. And she’d been shown a picture of Scorpio from a surveillance video outside of PSI. He’d been watching them.

  No.

  That wasn’t right.

  He’d been watching Rude.

  A shiver tore through her at the thought. Because of her, Scorpio had been keeping close watch on Rude. Why? To see what kind of man his boss’s daughter had gotten tangled up with? To see if he was a threat? To see if he was like Liam?

  What if Rude wound up like Liam?

  And there it was, the eight-hundred pound gorilla in the room. Rude’s life was hanging in the balance, just as much as it had been when he was in combat, if not more so. He was now the target of a dangerous man who’d donated sperm over two and a half decades ago to create her.

  That wasn’t fair.

  Dropping the manila envelope on the bedroom floor, she moved on automatic pilot to the closet and dragged out her suitcases. She hefted the largest one onto the bed and methodically began to empty the dresser drawers. She’d once been an expert at the quick-pack; no doubt every person who grew up in the system could claim the same. But it had been a few years since she’d had to do it, and she had a lot more stuff now. No doubt it would take more than two suitcases to get the place cleared out.