Page 51 of Heartless Union

I pause. “Wait. Are you saying you’ve been uncertain whether I’ve been ready to take over?”

“Yes.” He doesn’t even blink, the bastard.

“You don’t think I’d make a good leader?”

“Right now, I have my reservations. You’re not strong enough, Rocco. You’re not willing to make the hard decisions.”

“So, if you were in my shoes last night and had to make a choice between your sister and your wife, you would have made that choice?”

“In a heartbeat.”

I scoff. “Well, I know you never would have chosen your wife. You hated Mom.”

“I never hated your mother. I loved her.”

“No. You beat her. I saw it with my own eyes.”

He waves a dismissive hand. “You don’t know what you saw. You were a child. I loved your mother more than anything.”

“So, then, why did you kill her?”

He blinks before sitting up straighter. “I never killed her.”

“No? She just ended up mysteriously dead one day?” I should be keeping my mouth shut. My father was not supposed to know about my suspicions of him.

But too much has changed, and I’ve held back for far too long.

It’s time to change things even more.

“Your mother made me angry at times, yes,” he says. “But I didn’t kill her.”

“Then who did?” I start walking closer to my father. He doesn’t move an inch.

“She died of a heart attack. It just happened. Bad luck.” The way says the word “luck” doesn’t sound like he thinks it was an accident. It sounds intentional.

“You killed her.”

“I’d be careful, if I were you.” He pulls a gun out of his desk and points it at me. “You’re not thinking straight right now, son. You’ve been through a large ordeal. You better be careful.”

“I’m done being careful.” I lunge for the gun and grab his hand, pointing the gun toward the ceiling as he pulls the trigger. The bullet lands in the ceiling.

He scrambles backward, but I grab his shirt and hoist him toward me. My father isn’t a young man anymore. And I’m much stronger now anyway.

I throw him onto the desk and wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze. He tries fighting it, but it doesn’t take long until he stops moving. His hands slump to the side. His breathing stops. His struggle stops. His eyes glaze over.

He’s dead.

Then it hits me what I just did.

I step away and let him go, and he falls to the ground, unmoving. I killed my father. It’s finally happened.

Which means I’m the rightful boss now.

But my brothers and I had a plan. We were supposed to gain support from Father’s men before killing him. I haven’t done that. I wasn’t supposed to kill him yet.

He pushed me to it. He wanted me to punish Lara just like he punished Mom.

The sight of his fist hitting her cheek is burned on my mind forever. The sound of the slap. The look of pain on her face.

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