After coloring for a while, Noah wants to go to the enclosed play area that has a jungle gym and slides. I offer to take him, but Tatiana tells me she prefers to watch him herself.
I’m about to excuse myself and join them when the waitress arrives to take our order. I shift on the bench, ensuring I have Tatiana and Noah in my sight, and signal for Ulysses to keep an eye on them.
Once the waitress is gone, Jasper pins me with a look.
I stretch my arm along the backrest of the bench. “What?”
She snorts.
“If you’ve got something to say, Jasper, then go ahead and say it.”
“Fine.” She leans forward and rests her elbows on the table. “What exactly do you think you’re doing?”
I shrug a shoulder. “Having dinner.”
“Very stupid.” She pulls a face. “And not funny. You know what I mean.”
“If you’re worried about Tatiana, you don’t have to be.”
“Oh, I have reason to be worried, and if you think I’ll believe a single word that comes out of your mouth, you’re delusional. Look what happened the last time.”
I nod at Reino. He slides out of the booth and walks toward the play area, giving us privacy.
“Tatiana should’ve trusted me,” I say when Reino is gone.
“Trust you?” Jasper sits up and bites out in a lowered voice, “You killed her family. We thought she was next on the list.”
That comes as a surprise. “Why would you think that?”
“I don’t know, Dante.” She heaps on the sarcasm. “Maybe because you took everything that belonged to her family the minute they were dead. You were running her father’s territory before his body was cold. It sends a clear message, don’t you think?”
“What went down wasn’t about the territory or the money.”
“Yeah, Tatiana told me. You had a vendetta. But you must realize how it looked from her point of view.”
“She shouldn’t have run from me. Killing her was never my intention.”
She huffs. “Excuse me for pointing out the obvious, but you were never honest with her about your intentions. Did you expect her to simply sit there like an obedient little girlfriend and wait to see what was going to happen?”
“She should’ve given me a chance to explain.”
“Jeez, Dante.” She gives me a duh look. “How did you think that was going to go? You’d tell her you killed her father and mother out of revenge, and she’d simply forgive you and the two of you would’ve moved on and lived happily ever after?”
“It would’ve taken time. I never deluded myself about that.”
Her smile is pitiful. “If that’s what you think, you’re either stupidly optimistic or genuinely clueless.”
I tap into my infinite patience. I don’t have to explain myself to Jasper, but she’s Tatiana’s best friend. The two of them obviously talk, and it will help if Jasper knows both sides of the story. Maybe she can make Tatiana see reason.
I straighten my tie. “I did what I had to do. Eventually, Tatiana would’ve understood even if she couldn’t forgive me. But I would’ve been able to take care of her and Noah, and she wouldn’t have gone through everything she did alone.” The thought that something could’ve gone wrong at Noah’s birth—that I could’ve lost either or both of them—and that she or my son were cold or had gone hungry fills me with such violence that I shut those notions down before they drive me to do something I’ll regret, something such as punishing Tatiana for putting her and my baby’s life in danger. “She kept the existence of my own child from me, and she was never going to tell me.” The knowledge only provokes regret and anger. “That was wrong.”
“You can’t hold the fact that she ran against her.”
I don’t and I do. I understand why she did it, but I wish she hadn’t.
The set of Jasper’s features is obstinate. “She didn’t have a choice. She was alone and vulnerable.”
Like hell she didn’t have a choice. “She could’ve stayed. Leander would’ve protected her.”
