This isn’t the impulse arrangement I’d thought it was. It has structure. Contingencies. Scope.
“I wasn’t involved, Isla,” he says to the glass.
I could interpret his admission in a million ways, however, it’s only hope that takes root beneath my ribs. I hold my breath, afraid the smallest shift will stop him from proceeding.
“The arrangement between our fathers had gone on for years without me or my brothers knowing.”
I try to picture it. To mold his confession into something believable, but it doesn’t fit. “How is that possible? What about the preferential treatment?”
His jaw ticks. “I mistakenly thought it was goodwill—professional respect, maybe even friendship. The kind of trust you earn after decades in business together.” Disdain enters his voice. “I didn’t realize every piece of insider information had been bought and paid for.”
He was a victim, too?
Obviously not anywhere near your-life-is-now-leverage-in-a-blood-debt capacity. But still caught up in the fallout all the same.
I hug my arms around my middle. “When did you find out?”
“A few months before Giancarlo passed.”
“Did he tell you himself? Was he apologetic? Did he justify his actions?” The questions tumble from me, one after another, the list compiling quicker than I can get them out. “What did he plan to do with me if the agreement?—”
“The details don’t matter.”
I bristle. “They matter to me.”
“Let me rephrase.” Finally, he turns to meet my eyes, face drawn, stern. “Not all details can be discussed.”
I bite down on the urge to push harder.
“I’ll tell you everything I can, Isla, but some secrets are better left unsaid for the safety of all involved.”
I nod, though my stomach knots hard. “Why didn’t you say something years ago?”
He studies me in silence, gaze steady, calculating, as if weighing how much the truth will cost him. “It wasn’t my place.”
“But we were friends.”No, that word feels too small. “We were…”
“Wewere,” he reiterates, sparing me from conjuring the right description to explain our relationship. “But it was better for you to hate me than to hate your father. I couldn’t tell you the truth, and I couldn’t pretend I wasn’t keeping secrets. Distance was the only option.”
And there it is—the confirmation of what I suspected.
He suffocated whatever had been building between us. All to protect me…andmy dad.
“I was right.” I lower my gaze to my hands clenched in my lap. “All of this was an act.”
“No.” The denial cuts clean.
My eyes snap back to his.
“The man you knew was me. But the ruthlessness? The cruelty?” His jaw hardens as a shadow passes through his expression. “That’s part of me too, Isla. It’s in my blood?—”
A knock sounds at the door, our momentum collapsing under its weight.
Raffael exhales slowly, the sound heavy with an unspoken curse. “Come in.”
A stewardess enters, hair slicked into a ponytail. “The food you requested, sir.”
Raffael inclines his head. “Place it on the bed.”
