“Huh,” I finally reply, realizing I completely zoned out.
The stern look on my father’s face lets me know I missed something of great importance. But the softening in his honey-brown eyes tells me he knows where my head has been.
Emi.
This place will never feel as vibrant as it was when she was alive, but we made an oath as a family that any significant decisions that impact the family must be made here, where she can be included.
“It’s time for you to get married,” my father announces, and I nearly choke on a piece of steak.
Clearing my throat, I rasp, “It’s time for me to what?”
It’s my mother who answers. “You’re thirty-two, Braxton Oshiro. You’re not getting any younger.” I meet her gaze, and I know she’s about to begin the same old argument. “All of my friends have grandchildren. Why can’t I have them too? Are you trying to wait until I’m too old to run around with them?”
“Okaasan,” I begin, but she’s far from finished.
“You need a wife. It’s well past time that you get one. Do you want the Oshiro line to end with you?”
I swear there must be a class parents take to guilt their children into bending to their will. This is the equivalent of me asking ‘why’ and their response of ‘because I said so’.
Her lips twist into her famous pout, and I know I’ve lost this battle without even knowing I was waging war.
My siblings snicker around the table, and I make a mental note to deduct a million dollars from their monthly allowances.
Suckers.When will they learn that I always get the last laugh?
“It’s time,” my dad adds. “Your role as the heir and future leader of this family requires you to be married and have children. There is no escaping this rule.”
Rubbing the bridge of my nose, I shake my head and expel the breath I didn’t realize I was holding.
My father spent decades cleaning up our family business, delving into more legitimate endeavors. Are we still the top Ninkyo Danti?Yes. However, we’d be hit with some white-collar or RICO charges and not drug and skin trade charges like the Gordons.
The mention of that family’s name is enough to incinerate my appetite. Dropping my steak knife and fork, I wipe my mouth and my hands before discarding my linen napkin.
“I made a promise to a friend who saved your mother and Akio’s lifethat once his daughter was of age, you’d marry her, and the time has long since passed.”
With the amount of favors owed for lives being saved, I’m surprised all of my siblings don’t have arranged marriages. I mean, my name is after an army buddy who took a bullet for him.Braxton Paige. It’s one of the only reasons I don’t have a traditional Japanese first name.
“Who is she?” I ask, hoping to placate him by pretending to take the bait.
“You’ll know when it’s time,” my father replies. “For now, just know that your wedding is scheduled for May 30th, six months after her twenty-seventh birthday.
It’s not that I’m against getting married or having kids. It just has to beher. No one else will carry my name.Talia al Adil. I refuse to use the poisonous name of her adopted family. The Gordon last name is steeped in blood, and not in the same way the Oshiro family’s is.
My gut clenches as the memory of how and why we met surfaces.
Three years ago…
“How are things at the firm?” my father asks before he takes a seat across from me.
Placing the files down on the desk, I clear my throat and then reply, “We didn’t get as much out of the last deal as we should’ve, but I’m meeting with the client after this to see if we can’t renegotiate more favorable terms.”
He nods, looking for the first time like a man with the world on his shoulders. A far cry from the man nothing could touch—Tetsumenki.The ever-present vein bulges between his furrowed brows.
“It’s been too long with no word,” he snaps, dropping all pretenses of our former conversation. “Emi has been missing for too long.” His jaw tenses. I count each tick of his pulse, focusing on him instead of the unbridled rage festering inside me.
Th-um… um… um-p… p… p.
“Someone took her fromherhome. Inourfucking territory, Braxton.”
