Distorted Love (Dark Intentions Duet 1)

“You can go and say goodbye, Quinn.” He looks past me to where my father is, nods his head, and opens the door, going in. Quinn has been with my father for a long time. They’re close. Quinn doesn’t want to admit it yet, but he’s lost without my father. Lost because someone who he has spent countless hours with is about to pass. He shouldn’t care, though, it’s not in his job description to care. I’m sure if he had a written job description it would say—be ruthless, be cruel, be merciless and pitiless, and there would be nothing more on the page. You have to be close to him to see him for what he really is.

“I’m so sorry.” Livia rests her head on my chest, and her arms wrap around me. She pulls me to her as if I need her support. I don’t. This is something I want to do on my own. Because from here on out that’s what I’ll be, on my own.

“We should go in,” Livia says. I step back from her. She’s already lied once today. Saying we were engaged to Barbie. What the fuck! We aren’t. And I never plan to be, either. Livia is my here and now girl. Not my forever girl.

“No, you don’t need to come in. Wait out here.”

Quinn walks out, his head held high as he walks past us, taking a seat. Pushing Livia off of me, I turn and hear her cry. She isn’t my concern right now. Not even the fact that I have to leave and find someone to manage the clubs is my concern right now.

“Sit down.” The door doesn’t even fully click into place before I hear his voice. His eyes are closed, but he knows it’s me.

“You had to go and die, didn’t you?”

He doesn’t laugh, but the curl of his lips lets me know he heard me.

“The girl…”

My hands want to wrap around Saskia’s tight little throat. Choking her until she doesn’t know who I am anymore.

“Don’t worry.”

His lips form a tight line, and he opens his eyes to look at me. “Love will ruin you. It ruined me.”

His words make no sense. He once told me he’d never loved.

“I loved her. Your mother. That’s why I made her leave.”

My mouth hangs open in shock. Not once did I think he ever loved her. I assumed he used her for one thing and one thing only. To have me. Is everything he’s ever told me about her a lie?

“Her death killed me.”

I can finally see it in his eyes. A father, someone who had loved, and lost. He never lets you see, he’s always so closed off. The most closed-off person I’ve ever known. And that’s saying a lot considering he’s my father.

“She made me kill a member of the Spikes MC. She got involved.”

His eyes go wide. He’s working out why she was at our house now. His hand moves slightly. At first I think he’s reaching for me, but his hand opens showing me a piece of paper. Grabbing it, I quickly open it up. It’s written in my father’s handwriting, and it’s a list of incriminating evidence, plus a number to a safety deposit box. About the President of the Spikes MC—Michael.

“You’ll have to pay your dues, but make it less by using some of that. And hold onto the rest.”

The list is long. The stuff written on here would be enough to ruin the Spikes MC for good if I wanted to use it all.

He’s right. They expect payment. She’s making me pay for something that could have been prevented if she never got involved. But now there’s a witness, and usually, witnesses are dealt with using a bullet to their head. Our law states if you kill one of our own to protect another, you must go to the bottom of the chain. Even if it was your father that invented those laws. So, that’s where I will be. In Melbourne’s underground, where all my girls go, once they’re sold. I’ll be mingling with those who pay me, fighting those that don’t. Something I should never have had to deal with.

“You’re an asshole. You know that, right?”

His lips turn up into a smirk again, but his eyes close.

“Learn, become better. It was where Quinn learned everything he knows.” I nod my head sitting there. “I love you, son.” He goes silent. Sleep evades him. I stay next to him for the five hours without him moving or waking again. The doctors come in and turn off his machines.

Quinn and Livia stand at the door looking in, but not coming in. I can see she wants to come in and touch me. But I don’t want her to. Right now, I don’t want to be touched.