Marc paled.
“How long have you been a dirty prosecutor for Arko, Marc?” I pressed, seeing his composure crumble. “How many criminals have you let walk for him?”
“You don’t understand,” he said in terror. “They’ve owned me for years. And now they want payment. Please… I need Alisa to come back with me now.”
Marc didn’t deny it. The final illusion shattered, and I felt Alisa trembling beside me.
“You promised me to these… Pavlovs?” she asked, her voice hollow.
“Arko needs a wife who is true-born American,” Marc replied pitifully, as if that explained everything. “It was the only way to clear my debt.”
I felt sick. Arko Pavlov’s a vicious, vile man.
“We’re leaving,” I said, standing and pulling Alisa gently to her feet. “This conversation is over.”
“You can’t just walk away from this,” Marc warned, his eyes wild with panic. “They’ll come for her. They’ll come for both of you.”
“Let them try,” I replied, my voice dropping to a deadly whisper. “I protect what’s mine. And if you follow, Marc, I’ve got guys lined up outside who would love to test their new guns.”
And with that final threat, I walked Alisa out of there.
Chapter 18 - Alisa
My lungs couldn’t catch up with my racing heart as Dante guided me out through the café door. My legs felt like jelly, and the world blurred around me. Even voices and sounds were muffled under the roaring in my ears, like I wasn’t really there.
And in a way, I wasn’t.
Once Dante came to my table and took over, once Papa confirmed what he’d done, there was no going back to believing he could be redeemed.
My throat hurt. My eyes burned. Everything I thought my life was felt like a fairy tale. I felt different because the old Alisa believed her father to be good.
Now, he’d become the monster I feared.
“Who are the Pavlovs?” I asked in panic, my voice sounding like a stranger’s to my ears. “Why did my father look so terrified when he mentioned them?”
Dante pulled me close as we weaved through the midday crowd. “The Pavlovs are the most ruthless crime family on the East Coast. Arko Pavlov makes my family look like saints.”
My stomach dropped. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, they don’t just kill people, Alisa. They enjoy it.” His eyes darted around us, and I followed, seeing that he was checking if his bodyguards were in proximity. They were. “I’ve heard rumors of Arko’s violence. He… enjoys toying with people who he thinks have betrayed them.”
I felt sick, bile rising in my throat at the thought of who my father promised me to. A man who would use me and discard me when he grew bored?
“We need to get to the car,” Dante said, urging me to walk faster. “Federico has men watching the perimeter, but it’s not safe out here with your father still around.”
I followed on weak legs, my brain running circles in itself while trying to figure out what my life would look like now. I had stayed married to Dante in the hope that I’d find something to someday help Papa out of his mess. But now there was no need for that, was there? And I couldn’t go back home. What did that mean… for me?
We turned the corner, and I saw his black SUV parked half a block ahead. Just a few more steps to safety.
“I’ve been living a lie,” I whispered, the truth hitting me like a punch to the gut. “All those times he showed up for me with love, was any of it real? Or was he just raising me to cash me in when the time came?”
“Oh, Alisa.” Dante clicked his tongue with sympathy that cracked my chest open in a way where the walls felt the need to defend it.
“Stop, please.” I pulled away from him suddenly, backing up against the brick wall of the building beside us. “No, don’t say anything. I don’t need your pity.”
Tears sprang to my eyes as a memory flashed in my mind and—Papa surprising me with a new computer just as I was heading off to college, Papa visiting every Sunday, Papa sitting by my bedside all night when my appendix burst.
“Alisa,” Dante said gently, like he was trying not to scare me as he reached for me again. “Please, let’s get in the car and talk. We need to keep moving.”
