I headed down the hall and approached the front door. To my surprise, I heard footsteps behind me.
“I did care, Maverick. Of course I did.”
“Didn’t seem like it.” I reached the door and opened it. The second it was cracked, the cold draft blew into the house. There was no sign of rain or snow, but the cold and dry air was immediately harsh against my skin. I knew I was leaving my family’s home for the last time—and I would never see it again.
“The reason you’re alive is because of me.”
Just when I was about to step out into the elements, I steadied myself and let those words sink in. My hand was still on the door, and I stared at my black car in the driveway. The wind was picking up, and the trees on the property were starting to sway. His words shouldn’t entice me to stay, but now I couldn’t leave. I turned back to him, hoping I wouldn’t regret it.
“I had one of my men facilitate the game. He remembered where he put the bullet in the chamber and made sure you went first. When he flipped that coin into the air, he never showed either of you what it said—because he lied.” His boots thudded against the floor as he slowly approached me, his shoulders not as powerful as they were when he’d first let me into the house. Now his weight sagged him down, made him droop toward the earth with age. “I made sure Kamikaze died and you lived. Like I would ever let anything happen to you.”
Now I ignored the coldness on the front doorstep and locked eyes with my father. That afternoon was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. While I’d kept a straight face for Arwen and Kamikaze, I was dying on the inside. At any moment, this life could have been over. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
He shrugged slightly as he sighed under his breath.
“Because that would require you to admit that you cared?”
“Maybe…” It was the first time my father had chased me down so I wouldn’t leave. It was the first time he’d stopped his psychological warfare. Now he was just a man…a father. Vulnerable and defenseless, he let himself be weak…even if it was short term.
In disbelief, I continued to stare at him. My father actually had done something on my behalf. During that conversation, he seemed so indifferent to my potential death that it numbed me down to the bone. “Why is that so difficult for you?”
“I don’t know. Maybe because you remind me so much of your mother.”
“I look nothing like her.”
“But you have her spirit. You have her attitude, her strength. Whenever I look at you, it reminds me how I let her down, how she would give anything to stand where I am now so she could look at you. My family has been ripped apart…and it’s all my fault. It’s easier to stop feeling than to let that depression spread through your veins like a disease. She’s dead because of me…and that truth has been very difficult for me to accept.” He dropped his gaze and looked at the floor like he couldn’t stand it anymore. Now he was just a broken man, not a crazy dictator. His armor had been shed and his weapons abandoned. There was no more fight in him.
My anger disappeared.
“I lost my mind because the pain was too difficult to swallow. It was self-preservation, the only way I could function. I focused on killing Ramon because I thought it would give me some kind of release…but it never did. I wanted to do the same to his wife and daughter because I had nothing else to do with my time, except sit with a drink in my hand and think about the terrible things I’d done. Getting angry with your wife and threatening to kill her gave me something else to focus on. It was better than actually accepting responsibility for all my wrongdoings.”
It was the first time I’d really seen my father in two years. It was easy to forget how he used to be because that version of him seemed long gone. But here he was…still the same man I used to know. He was buried under guilt, pain, and remorse…but he was still there. “Lily and I lost her too. We needed you, especially her.”
“I know…”
“Mom would be disappointed if she knew you’d been acting this way since she died.”
“I think she does know. I think she’s watching me now and wishing she could smack me upside the head. I was a terrible husband, and now I’m a terrible father. Your mother’s greatest mistake was falling in love with me.”
I remembered the way they used to kiss on the couch when they thought I wasn’t looking, the way my father would carry anything remotely heavy so she wouldn’t have to worry about it. I remembered the way he complimented her every time she got dressed up for a party. When I looked back on my parents’ marriage, I remembered seeing two people in love. They rarely fought and worked equally at the relationship. My father never would have gotten involved with the underworld if he’d known it would cost him his wife’s life. “If she had the choice to do it all over again, I’m sure she wouldn’t hesitate. She wouldn’t trade in that life for anything else in the world.” Even if she’d known she would die a gruesome death, she never would have traded in being a mother to Lily and me, to being a wife to my father. She could have married someone else and lived a long and happy life…but she wouldn’t have done it.