Page 13 of To Curse A Knight

His words were dipped in acid, intending to burn; this man did not know I was already marked for death—the words of little men were of no consequence.

Scoffing brusquely, I took the seat in front of me, directly across from him, ignoring his useless taunt. Being rid of my parents would be the most positive outcome of my disappearance. Soon, I would make their riddance a permanent state of being.

“My parents will plead temporary insanity one day soon.”

I reached for the basket of bread rolls in the center of the table and cracked one open with my hands. I began buttering it from the whipped pat beside it. “You are misguided if you believe I am nothing without them. Hillary and I have more than enough prospects to rival your newest arrangement.”

I shrugged and leaned back in my chair, as if I were unaffected by his moves on the board. “I have no need for false promises for more money and power. Veronica and Vicente would whore themselves out for an additional ounce of either.”

I bit into the bread roll, tasting nothing as I chewed and swallowed the crusty dough as Marco Alvarez chuckled heartily.

“Your parents were easily swayed,” he said, agreeably, slicing into his rare steak and taking a bite. “You and Hillary may be harder to break, but I assure you, you will break.”

The amusement in his eyes morphed into the steely determination of a jungle cat hunting an elephant—the look of a man whose hubris far outweighed any source of sense. He was cunning and ruthless, certainly—only such people would dare get into bed with my parents, let alone vie for their attention.

His threat was confident, his intentions clear. It was not enough he was challenging Antonio and pulling down the sheets for the bed he’d made with Veronica and Vicente—he was determined to remove Hillary and I from the board as well.

A false prophet was dangerous when he believed in his own rhetoric.

“We are not breakable,” I mused, pouring myself a glass of red wine from the table, raising the glass to him in a toast. “But if you choose to invest resources to discover this for yourself, you’ll invest poorly. Be my guest.”

I drew a sip of the rich, earthy wine and mulled it with my tongue, enjoying its delicate sweetness and sharp finish as my opponent watched me with hawkish eyes across the table.

His medium build had rounded over the years; his body no longer held the threatening aura of a hardened criminal. He drew fear from his eyes, able to shift from content family man to cold-hearted murderer with a single blink; a psychopathic light switch.

I held no fear of the pathetic visage of a man in front of me. He was another stooge in a sea of small men, determined to rise on the backs of others by breaking spines and snapping necks.

True power came from resilience and resolve; a cause worth fighting for. I had been an aimless man before now, handcuffed to my wealth and tethered to the expectations of others. I would now bask in my freedom from a gilded cage, thoughfar freer than I’d ever been in this lifetime, under the protection of a woman who cared for me.

Hillary was now my purpose. Trusting her and keeping her safe by temporarily removing myself from the equation. Trusting in Kellan to protect us both while we knocked more pawns off the board.

Weak men rush into battle without swords and shields, proving their stupidity, not their bravery. Patience is a virtue, and I had it in spades. I would bide my time until I inserted the knife into Alvarez’s heart myself.

“I am here as a warning.” I fingered the stem of the wineglass and eyed the tawdry man over its rim. “Your entire operation will be exposed within days if you come after Lane Enterprises, or any of our outstanding contracts. I am still aligned with our previous friends, and they will not take kindly to your interference.”

An outright lie—Antonio expected me dead and buried any day now, but Kellan had assured me the hit on my life was a private request. None of what I said mattered, regardless. Today wasn’t about taunting Alvarez into useless confessions. It was about being seen, and hopefully, heard.

Alvarez chewed, looking thoughtful as his gaze never left my face, scrutinizing my intentions.

“You’re bluffing, Rodriguez. Run home and hide before I come to get you. You’re next.”

There it was; the thin wisps of a threat, but there it was.

Satisfied, I rose from my seat and stared down at the man who would be tortured by my hands soon enough.

“Even great men bow to the sun,” I quoted one of my favorite poets as my bulk loomed over his thin form. I smiled. “Consider me the star in your night sky.”

Walking down the restaurant aisle, I dialed a number and hovered in the entryway near the hostess desk, where a petite Latina woman was sanitizing menus.

“If anything happens to me, it’ll be Marco Alvarez’s doing.” I growled into the phone within earshot. “He just threatened me.”

“Good,” came Kellan’s reply. The masculine roughness of his voice slightly filtered through the phone line. “And you got the recording?”

“Yes,” I said succinctly, eyeing the woman who was poorly eavesdropping, as I’d hoped.

“Good work.” Kellan’s praise slid over me like a warm blanket; I was surprised by how much I enjoyed its comfort. “That’ll be all we’ll need when the time comes.”

I hung up without another word, bracing for my incoming life of solitude and seclusion, a temporary reprieve while we made our next move.

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