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“Look, I know you’re mad⁠—”

“As far as apologies go, that one is pretty shitty.”

He huffed out a frustrated breath. “What do you want from me, huh? This is a business.”

I jabbed my finger in his face. “A business you’re putting before anything and anyone else.”

“Hey, if I brushed off every client who acted like a prick, we’d have gone under years ago. I’m sorry that asshole scared you, but you aren’t the first realtor to have to deal with a shithead, and you won’t be the last.”

I was fuming by the time he finished that sentence, and the only thing that kept me from quitting right then was the fact that this job was the only reason my mother’s medical bills hadn’t swallowed me whole yet. But I didn’t know how much longer I could tolerate his sexist, uncaring bullshit.

After everything that had gone down with North, I wasn’t exactly feeling very man-friendly, and it was taking everything in me to keep from scratching Marty’s beady little eyes out with my pretty, manicured nails. Especially when I caught them sliding from my face to catch a glimpse of my cleavage.

“Something happens to Angela, it’ll be on your head. You get that, right?”

I noticed the glow of sweat forming along his hairline. The man had such a weak constitution that this argument turned him into a sweaty mess. He heaved out another sigh, his ruddy cheeks flushing a deeper red. “If it makes you feel any better, I’ll be on the lookout. Nothing’s gonna happen.”

I didn’t bother saying anything else. Marty was an asshole in the way you knew there was no chance of him ever changing, and continuing would have amounted to beating my head against a brick wall. For him, the bare minimum was good enough.

“You better hope not.”

Standing straight, I whipped around and stomped out without giving him a chance to get another word in.

I was finished with that particular brick wall for one day.

ELEVEN

TOLLIVER

The creak of the wood beneath my feet as I climbed the front porch steps added to the dark ominous feeling like an anvil had been sitting on my chest all goddamn day.

Ever since the call came in.

No, not a call. A fucking summon. Like I was a fucking child to be bossed around and not a grown ass man with his own authority. But I knew better than to ignore the old bastard when he made his orders.

I jabbed at the doorbell and waited. Thirty seconds later, Grandpa’s housekeeper answered the door.

“Mr. Brady,” she greeted with a nod of her head. “Your father and grandfather are waiting in the study.”

Taking off my coat, I shoved it at her as I passed by on my way to the old man’s office. She was a maid, another member of the help, so like all the others, I didn’t bother learning her name. They were here to do a job, not be a friend of the family.

Grandpa was sitting behind the massive executive desk, it’s deep, dark wood matching the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that made up three of the four walls. The shelves were lined with pricey first edition classics, leather-bound volumes, and law books, nothing a kid might have enjoyed. Not that it mattered, seeing as I hadn’t been allowed in this room as a child. Nothing in Grandpa’s house had been kid-friendly while I growing up, and that sure as hell hadn’t changed over the years.

My father sat in the chair across from him, closest to the door. “Dad,” I greeted, jerking my chin at him. “Grandpa.”

I headed for the bar cart in the corner of the room and reached for the bottle of Macallan, ready to pour myself a drink when my grandfather spoke up.

“Sit. Down.” His husky weathered voice might have changed with age, but there was one thing it still held all these years later, the power it had to turn me back into that little boy who was such a pussy he’d piss his pants and cower in corners. Every time I thought about my childhood, I wanted to go back and beat that whiny, sniveling shit senseless so he’d grow a set of balls faster.

I shook off the tremble that started creeping up my back and steeled my spine. Lowering the bottle back onto the glass top of the bar cart, I moved to the chair beside my father and took a seat.

The old man sat behind his desk like he was holding court. The years of lawyering still engrained deep. I followed my father, becoming Chief, the position my old man took after his dad became an attorney, and eventually became the DA then the judge. He might have been retired for years now, but you wouldn’t know by looking at him.

To this day, he still dressed in his standard uniform of button-down, slacks, suspenders, and loafers. Like he was so goddamn important, civilian clothes weren’t worthy of gracing his wrinkly old body.

Christ, I can’t wait for the old bastard to die.

As I took my seat, my father (the raging asshole) got to his feet and made himself a drink with the exact Scotch I’d just picked up. With his eyes right on me, he lifted the glass and took a healthy drink.