Page 184 of Dark Romeo

I snorted. “They didn’t do a very good job of finding me.”

“Or you did a very deliberate job of hiding from them.”

I shrugged. “I was upset over what happened to…Mercutio.” I tripped over his name. But quickly composed myself. “I took a few days out on my own.”

My father let out a sneer. “Whoring and drinking, I suppose. You look like shit.”

So, he’d noticed the bags under my eyes and where they were red from being rubbed. He always found something to criticize. Somehow this time, it stung less. Maybe because I had finally let go of caring what he thought of me. More likely, the underlying fear over Julianna’s safety overruled anything else.

I raised my glass in a mock salute. “You just know me so well, Father.”

I walked to the chair beside his on the bearskin rug and sat, crossing my ankle over my leg, taking a large sip of the liquor, letting the burn ease down my throat, soothing me.

When I looked over to my father, he was watching me closely. “I hear we have a…guest,” I said as casually as I could. I wanted nothing more than to knock him to the floor and slam my fist into his face until he told me where she was. My father would never give her up if he knew that was the thing I wanted most.

My father tilted his head at me. “And how do you know this?”

I shrugged. “I hear things. I have my own sources, you know?”

“What does that mean?”

I leveled a stare at him, some of my antagonism leaking out. “It means that some of the men in our business understand the way things are going. They wish to future-proof their standing in my empire.”

“My empire,” he growled.

“For now. I am the heir you are grooming to fill your shoes. After all, nobody lives forever,” I said with a lightness that hid the threat underneath.

For a second my father’s nostrils flared, a touch of color rising to his cheeks. Then he let out a small laugh. “Spoken like a true Tyrell,” he said, his words bitter jabs.

I took a large gulp of my drink so that I didn’t lash back out at him, letting the fire going down my throat burn my anger away. At least for now.

“What’s the plan for our guest? I’m a little disappointed that I haven’t been made privy to them.”

“I’m disappointed I haven’t been made privy to your whereabouts,” my father snapped.

“You’re already privy to that, Father. Drinking and whoring. Do you really want the details?”

My father snorted and swallowed the last of his drink in one large gulp.

“So…” I said, steering the conversation back to the burning question. “The girl?”

“She’s a negotiation tool.”

“With whom?”

“Her father will be missing her in a day or two. I’ll have a set of demands for him soon.”

“What demands?”

My father tilted his head. “All in good time, son. For now, you are not to leave this compound.”

I could push. But I didn’t want to make myself seem so desperate to hear the answers. My father wasn’t a stupid man. At least I knew that Julianna was alive.

For the moment.

No weapon, no evidence, no witnesses.

Julianna was a witness. My stomach twisted. Whatever he had planned would not end without her dead and taking his secrets with her.

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