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My throat tightens, and I nod, unsure what to say.

I am about to dive into the scary unknown, and my body seems to have gone into shock.

But Charles offers me his arm, and somehow, I’m able to walk out of the room.

14

SUNNY

The penthouse living room glows with the soft light of twilight when we walk in.

Two men wait for me by the windows overlooking the glittering city. John Marco sees me first, and his face breaks into a grin.

Then he steps aside, and my eyes collide with Dante’s.

He stands in front of the dying sky in a black suit. He’s not wearing a tie, and the top button of his white shirt is open enough to see the edge of dark ink on his chest.

It's offensive how handsome he is. How sharp his jaw is.

How blue his eyes are.

It seems grossly unfair that a man with a heart that black gets a face like that.

He watches me cross the room the way a wolf watches its prey step out of the tree line, and my skin pebbles under his gaze.

When I stop in front of him, he doesn't smile or offer me his hand. He simply looks at me like I’m something he's already won.

The celebrant is a small, nervous man with sweat shining on his upper lip, looking like he'd rather be literally anywhere else on earth.

That makes two of us, buddy.

"Where is my father?" I ask, looking up at Dante.

"He’s otherwise detained. But he sends his regards."

Alarm shoots up my spine. "What have you done with him?"

"Nothing." He holds my gaze. "Yet."

"What do you mean, yet?"

"Well." His voice is low. "That depends entirely on you, doesn't it, Miss Meadows."

Fury blooms through my chest, so hot I feel it in my fingertips. I grip the calla lilies hard enough to bend the stems.

I want to slap him. I want to shove this bouquet down his throat, ride the elevator sixty floors down, and never look back.

But sixty floors down doesn't exist for me anymore. There is only this man, and the gun he's still holding to my father’s head.

I lift my chin. “What about the contract relinquishing him of his debt?”

He removes a folded piece of paper from his breast pocket and hands it to me.

I open it and read every word to make sure he’s keeping up his end of the bargain.

Two paragraphs relinquish my father of his debt and the crime of appropriation of funds, and the signature at the bottom tells me it is Dante Di Zaro’s.

I refold it and lift my gaze to him.