When I let myself inside, I shut the door quietly behind me. Like the last time I came to this office, I can’t find it in me to relax enough to sit down.
“Yes?” he drawls, looking up from his computer.
“Sorry if now is a bad time,” I start.
“If it were a bad time, I would have sent you away.”
“Right.” I nod folding my hands together in front of me. “So, uh, I want to ask you for something. But I don’t think I can until I’ve been completely honest with you, and there’s something I haven’t told you.”
“If you’re about to tell me you’ve hurt my daughter?—”
“No. God, no,” I interrupt, shaking my head furiously. “It isn’t anything like that, and it never will be.”
“Then confess your sins, Matteo,” Anton grunts, sitting back in his chair and crossing his arms. “If you feel you must.”
“That’s the thing,” I say awkwardly, rubbing the back of my neck. “I don’t know whether you’ll think they’re sins or not. Secrets, yes. But…complicated ones.”
He gestures for me to continue, clearly just wanting me to spit it out.
“Three years ago, a box was delivered to your front door. It was full of body parts. The heads, hands, and shriveled up bloody dicks of dead men. There was also a computer chip with encrypted video files that contained hours of torture footage, all executed by two masked men. Those masked men were Nico and I.”
Several different emotions flicker on his face and none of them are readable to me. I can’t tell whether he’s shocked, angry, alarmed, or all three.
“Explain,” he demands.
So I do. I go into detail about Uncle Cesar hearing what happened, and how he had all of us looking out in case any of the scum were spotted near our territory. I tell him how I couldn’t help but doing more than sitting back and waiting to see if they’d be noticed on a whim.
Nico wanted blood, and I wanted to help him take out the trash. I admit that it was the first time I’ve really been called to such a gruesome act, but there was nothing that I could do to stop it. I enjoyed it, even. Not in the way that Nico did, but knowing that I removed two stains from this earth made it a little easier to sleep at night after the fact.
He listens to every word and eventually asks, “Does Anya know?”
“No,” I admit, wincing. “I don’t know if I should tell her. I don’t think she would be upset if she found out and knew I didn’t tell her. I don’t know if she’dwantto know. It was years ago and I wasn’t the Matteo who loves her when I did it. I was just a teenage boy who was fucking pissed off and wanted to hurt them worse than they hurt her. I don’t know if we managed it, but we tried our damndest. Fourteen hours of performing torture is harder than it sounds.”
“I don’t think she would want to know, either,” he admits after a moment. “But you might consider telling her anyway. Let her know that you had a hand in their deaths, but don’t go into details if she doesn’t want you to.”
“Yeah,” I say, considering it. “Maybe that’s a good idea.”
Anton grunts and nods. “With a secret as big as that one, I’m going to assume you’re here to ask to marry my daughter.”
Reaching into my pocket, I pull out a small velvet black box and step forward, setting it on his desk and pushing it to him with one finger. He hesitates before he takes it, opening it up with a soft click.
“I love Anya. I’ve said it before, and I’ll never stop making that clear. I think she’s ready to wear that. Maybe not to jump right down the aisle, but to have a symbol of my commitment to her, no matter her timeline. So yes,” I say, taking a deep breath. “I’m here to ask for her hand.”
He sets the box back down but doesn’t close it. Looking between me and the ring, he drums his fingers on his desk.
“I put that crest on your chest.” Anton points to my shirt-covered tattoo. “I made you a part of this family. So when you marry my daughter, you know that she won’t become a Moretti, don’t you? You’ll become a Morozov instead.”
I know he’s trying to warn me.
But Matteo Morozov doesn’t sound so bad at all.
“Yeah, I know,” I confirm, bobbing my head once. “I also know that I can’t live without her, and I want to spend every single day I have left on this earth making her happy.”
Closing the box, he pushes it back to me and asks one simple question. “When?”
“Would you flip your desk if I say tonight?”
Anton shakes his head, sighing loudly. “You’re lucky that she adores you, kid.”
