She rolls her eyes. “Yes.”
“I’m here to fight for her.”
Her eyes light up, and she sits up a bit, jostling the baby as she moves, but he’s so intently sucking down his bottle, he doesn’t even notice. “You are?”
Ivy and I have never been particularly close. We’re just from different generations with twelve years between us, so we’ve never built much of a relationship. But considering it’s her best friend I’m talking about, I guess maybe we’ll start to get a little closer.
“Yeah. I did some thinking, and I love her, Ivy. I fucking love her. She drives me nuts, but it’s been two days since she ended things with me, and these have been two of the worst days of my life,” I admit.
“Then what are you doing here?” she asks. “Go get her. She just left. She’s probably at her parents’ house. I’ll watch the baby whileyou go. Go!”
I press my lips together. “I appreciate that, but I have to take care of some other things first. I have to prove I’m serious about her. About us. About a real life together.” I don’t know what Ivy knows about our father’s illegal casinos, so I leave it at that.
“And that somehow involves…Dad?” she asks, clearly confused since I showed up asking where he was.
“It does. It’s complicated, but he has me helping with some business-related projects in Vegas, and I’m here to tell him I want out.”
“You’re here to tell me what?” my father demands, his voice booming as he steps into the room.
Well, fuck.
This isn’t exactly how I rehearsed this.
“Can we talk?” I ask.
He looks livid.
“How was dinner?” Ivy asks as my mother steps into the room behind dear ol’ Dad.
Mom rolls her eyes. “Awful. The Goddards had the nerve to ask us to donate to their next charity endeavor when they wouldn’t shut up about their new villa in the Caymans. We bowed out before dessert. What are you doing home, Dexter? Don’t you have a game this weekend?”
I sigh. “Long story, but I’m benched this weekend and not traveling with the team, so I came here to discuss business with Dad.”
He lets out a frustrated sigh, and then he tips his head toward his office. I follow him in that direction, and he slams the door shut behind me when we’re both in there.
“You want out?” he hisses at me.
I throw my speech out the window and wing it. “Someone was tailing me the other night while my wife and my child were in the car. That’s unacceptable, and I can’t be putting them in danger even if you don’t give a shit that you’re puttingmein danger. I want out.”
I left my suitcase in the other room, but this is where I’d planned to pull out the contract and tear it in two.
He runs a hand along his jawline. “Thirty-five, Dexter. We agreed. I’m sorry you don’t like it, but that’s life.”
“Fuck that,” I say. “You want me to go to the cops with the contract? Because that’s the only other option here.”
“Where did I go wrong with my sons? First Madden threatened me with that nonsense, and now you? I thought you were the one I could count on.”
“You could until you cost me everything that means anything to me,” I hiss.
“So your loyalties are no longer to your family,” he says flatly.
“Actually, quite the opposite. My loyalty is to my wife and son. If you try to block me from extracting myself from your illegal activities, you know I have enough on you that I can tip off whoever needs to know. I want out, and I want your word that I’ll be protected. That whoever’s on your tail leaves me and my family the fuck out of it.”
“You know as well as I do whoever followed you could’ve been anybody, Dex,” he says, his tone so logical that it only serves to piss me off. “It might’ve been a fan. Or an anti-fan. It may have had nothing to do with me. And even if it did, it’s not like I can control other people.”
“Really?” I scoff. “Seems like you’ve done a pretty goddamn good job of that where your kids are concerned for our entire lives.”
He rolls his eyes. “You know that’s not true.”
