“You have to know,” he says. There is a wildness in his eyes now. “The reason Felicity has been targeting you…The reason she sent you those strange texts…” Gabriel forces the next few words out, even though it looks like they burn as they cross his tongue. “Felicity Huffman is your mother.”
Everything stops for one second. My heart, my brain, my breathing. It all stops on a dime, and when it starts up again, the panic sets in.
“No…” I shake my head, backing out of his grasp. “That’s not possible. I had a mother. I sat by her bedside while she died of what I thought was cancer.” I point at him. “You were the one who found out that my father had been poisoning her. You know she existed!”
“That was your father’s mistress,” he replies. “He left Felicity when he moved you to New York, but you were too young to really remember her. I had my men search out your original birth certificate and—”
“What about our dads, though?” I spout. “They were friends! Don’t you think my dad would have mentioned that your dad’s new squeeze was his ex-wife?”
He steps toward me, and I step back, sending him a warning look.
Gabriel sighs. “Felicity is a world-class psychopath who lives to manipulate those around her. I expect when she popped up on my father’s arm, she and your father made an agreement to keep their past a secret. She was looking for a first-class ticket to the top, and he was looking to relieve his guilty conscience from dumping her in Kansas all those years before. Of course, that’s just my speculation, but—”
“How long have you known?” My voice booms through the room.
He meets my gaze unflinchingly. “Silvano told me after the ambush.”
Anger sends a hot flush through me. “Gabriel, that was nearly two weeks ago.”
“Yes, but—”
“For the past two weeks you’ve been lying to me, and now you drop this bombshell on me right before this important dinner?” I yell, tears clinging to my lower lashes. I’m two seconds away from turning into a swamp monster. “Are you fucking kidding me?” I point to the door. “Get out. I’m not going to this dinner!”
My chest is too tight. I need to get this dress off. My eyes sting. I just want to curl up in bed and cry, but I can’t do that while Gabriel is still here. I’m so angry at him for not telling me.
Gabriel stands a little taller, and rather than looking sheepish as I expected, his features hammer out into a stern frown. He steps closer. I step back. He steps closer. I step back. We continue this dance until my back is against the wall, and he is breathing down an inch from my face.
“You will come to the dinner,” he says. “The dinner is in your honor, and if you don’t come, you will humiliate me in front of my men. And once you are there, you will eat and drink and dance. You will not mope.”
The harsh authority in his voice sends a tingle through me, as it always does, but I’m still furious. I grit my teeth and glare at him.
Gabriel runs a hand through his hair. “I didn’t tell you sooner because I was waiting for the birth certificate. I’m sorry you had to hear it at all, but you did, and now you know.”
A tear spills down my cheek, and Gabriel looks away. “Finish getting ready,” he says, and I know he means clean yourself up because, for the first time, I was ready early. And now I’m going to cry off my makeup.
Gabriel lopes out of the room, and both Clara and Sandra tiptoe back in a moment later.
Clara comes to my side and wraps an arm around me. “What happened? We heard shouting.”
Sandra is already dabbing away my tears and fixing my makeup. I want to snarl at her to leave me alone, but it’s not the poor girl’s fault my birth mother’s a witch.
I tell Clara what Gabriel told me, and how he’s still forcing me to go to this stupid dinner. She listens, nodding along sympathetically.
“He’s not wrong, you know,” she says when I finish.
This shocks me. I blink, unsure that I just heard her right.
“You’re on Gabriel’s side?” I ask incredulously. “You’ve hated him from the beginning.”
Clara frowns. “I still think he chose his moment to tell you poorly, and you should absolutely give him shit for that later, but for now, you’ve got to go to the dinner. The main currency in this life that we both seem to have waltzed into, besides actual currency, is obligation. If you say you’re going to do something, you do it. If you vow not to, you keep your word. If you’re going to be the queen of it all, you can’t be flaky, even when you’re upset and would rather do anything but.”
“You’ve got a point,” I mutter begrudgingly. “When did you get so pro-Gabriel?”
Clara smiles thinly. Behind me, Sandra starts to pack up her things. My time is running out, and soon I’ll need to put on a brave face in front of everyone.
“I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m pro-Gabriel,” Clara replies. “But what I would say is that I see how happy he makes you, and now that I’ve gotten a taste of this world myself, I understand why you’re here.”
I go to the mirror. Sandra has done a good job, though my eyes are the tiniest bit pink.
“But give him hell later?” I repeat.
Clara smiles at me in the mirror. “Girl, you’re a queen now. Later, you get to tear an absolute strip off him.”
31
Gabriel
Alexis hasn’t looked at me for the entire limo ride. Her gaze is fixed on some distant point out the window, and the silence between us is unbearable. I should have told her sooner. I know that now. Alexis deals in hard facts, and I thought it would be better if I had the proof to back it up first. I told her the second I did have it, which just turned out to be right before we left the house for this dinner. And now she is furious with me.
“Alexis,” I say.
She glances over, as though annoyed that I’ve interrupted her reverie. “Yes?”
“This is an important test. You’re a Mafia queen now. Can you maintain a Mafia queen demeanor with this news fresh in your mind?”
“Is it really true?” she asks in a small voice.
The mask slips, and I realize she’s not angry anymore; she’s devastated. A single tear rolls down her cheek, and she rushes to pull out a hand mirror to clean up the black smudge it leaves. My chest tightens. I can’t stand seeing her like this. I hated having to be so firm with her back in her bedroom, but I did what was necessary. Even so, I’m half tempted to cancel the whole circus and spend the night spoon-feeding her Ben & Jerry’s while we watch home improvement shows.
But duty is duty. If she’s going to be my queen, she has to understand that.
“It’s true,” I say.
“You should have told me the second you found out,” she chastises. “I can’t believe you’ve been sitting on that for two weeks.” She shakes her head, brushing past sadness and into anger again. “This whole time, you’ve been making me prove that I’m worthy of your trust. But what about proving yourself to me?”
“You’re right,” I admit. “I should have told you. But I didn’t, so all I can do now is promise that I’ll be more up front next time.”