Page 35 of Dangerous Obsession

I don’t know how far of a walk it will be, so I go down to the kitchen and look through the fridge and cupboards. I could have ordered something from the delivery app, but I didn't think of that when placing the order. I’ll just have to make do. There are a few granola bars, so I put one in my pocket. Then I take a bottle of water and sit on the couch to wait for the delivery.

It could be a few minutes, and I’m bored, so I turn on the television. The news channel is still running stories. I’d rather watch something else, but I also feel curious if the Italians have done anything else. I watch for several minutes. They repeat the information about the drive-by shooting yesterday a few times, and then a fresh story comes on. It’s my father again. I reach for the remote and turn it up.

“I am begging anyone with information about this case to come forward. If you have my daughter, please let her go. Bring her home. Her family misses her.” His eyes plead with the camera, and thus the viewers, to heed his words. He has crow’s feet now, and his hair is thinning. I creep over to the TV and touch it softly as he speaks.

“I’m here, Daddy,” I tell the screen, though I know he can’t hear me. I want to call the number on the screen right now, but I also don’t want to leave a record of where I went or what I am doing if Leo checks his phone. I can’t use his phone to call. I just have to get out there and walk to the station.

The last time I saw his face in real life was when I picked up my purse and wallet from home—the day Alexsi forced me to take that money and leave. He was upset about a work issue, snapped at me for being in the way or something. I wanted to tell him goodbye, give him a hug or something, but he was impatient. I was only twenty years old back then, had never lived a day on my own at all. The farthest I’d ever been from home was my grandmother’s house in Upstate New York, and I’d never spent a night in an empty house.

Alexsi met me at the park, an arrangement he forced me into under threat of violence, and trembling I blew my father a kiss goodbye that I’m not sure he even saw. I met Leo’s father and he had suitcases with money in them. Huge, heavy suitcases. I had a choice to take the money and the new identity he created and leave, or I would die. And my father would die with me.

I was naïve and young. Terrified of dying and losing my father. I didn’t want to take the money. He had already offered it to me twice, but I was in love with Leo. But that day, after Leo had dumped me the night before, it was different. I had no more fight in me. To protect my father, I took the money and left.

The television screen changes to a commercial and I touch my damp cheeks. It’s time for me to go home. I refuse to be intimidated by this dying man ever again. He can keep me from Leo, but I won’t let him keep me from my father a second longer. I stand and wipe my face with my sleeve just as the knock comes at the door. The delivery people are here. I wait a few seconds, then look out the window. They are already back in their car pulling away, so I carefully reach through the doggy door and feel around the step for the delivery.

I feel a paper bag and I grab it. There is a small box inside of it. I sit there and tear it open and find exactly what I ordered. It makes my heart race a little and my palms sweat. In my gut I already know the answer but I have to prove it to my mind or I won’t believe it. I haven’t given away my suspicions to Leo yet. He just thinks I ate something bad, but food poisoning doesn’t make your tits hurt.

I drop the phone on the end table and go upstairs to the bathroom. I don’t even have to pee, so I turn the water on and bend down and drink from it. I drink a lot—slurping and gulping until my stomach sloshes around and hurts. It threatens to make me throw up again, but it’s the only way to induce urination. I don’t know how long it takes for the human body to process liquids, so I just yank my pants down to my knees and sit there waiting for the urge while I tear the box open and read the instructions.

The tiny plastic stick stares at me from the counter. I fucked a mobster and now I’m most likely pregnant with his baby. A Bratva baby—how nice is that? I’m legally connected to the largest crime syndicate in this city now, by blood. And what’s scary is, if Leo followed me around for twelve years waiting for me, there is no way I’m escaping his eagle eye while pregnant unless Dad helps me get out of New York for good.

I wait at least twenty more minutes before I get the urge to piss. My hands shake as I pick up the little stick and hold it between my legs in the flow of urine like the box indicated. When the cotton tip is soaked, I lay it on the counter and finish peeing, then wipe myself dry and pull my pants up. The box says it should take three minutes, but within seconds two pink lines appear. A positive test indicator.

“Fuck’s sake,” I sigh, confirming my suspicion.

I toss the test and the box in the trash and flush the toilet. I have to get out of here. I can’t let Leo know I’m pregnant.

I head downstairs and go straight for the kitchen. I don’t have a key for the door but I don’t need one. I’m going to get the cast iron skillet and throw it through the front window. That’ll be just what I need to get out.

Except, as I walk out of the kitchen with the skillet in hand, Leo walks through the door damp from rain. “What are you doing?” he asks, looking at the skillet.

My chest tightens and I feel anger rise up. “Getting ready to cook,” I say, lying. “Want something to eat?”

I pray he can’t see the anger in my expression or I might have to use this skillet to knock him out instead of breaking a window.

21

LEO

“This isn’t your fucking life, Dominic!”

I’m ready to punch him. My gun may be lying on the nightstand at the safehouse, but this man could be dead in seconds given the amount of rage I have.

“Calm down, Leonid,” my father croaks. He has pushed me to my limits for the last time. They called me here to tell me I have responsibilities and if I don’t come back and take care of them, I will be cut off permanently. It’s a scare tactic. They need me. I know they can’t run the business without me.

“You just don’t seem to understand. I don’t give a single fuck if the Italians take everything you own. Willow’s life is more important to me than any of this.” I swing my arm in a wide sweeping gesture, indicating all five faces that stare back at me and all that they represent. All of my brothers and my father seem to think this is an intervention or something, but I’m not quitting her now.

“Do you understand how her father will react when she finds out she’s been hidden away by us this whole time? Do you know who he is?” Dominic looks at me like I’m stupid. I shake my head.

“I don’t care. He is nothing. We’ve handled cops like him before.”

“And when Willow confesses to everything she’s seen? We’ll have to kill them both to protect the family, Leo.” Sven acts high and mighty, like he’s trying to save me from something, but he isn’t. He’s on their side too.

“You dumped five million dollars into her lap to pay her off. You threatened to kill her if she didn’t take it and stay away from him, but back then she knew nothing.” I rake my hand through my hair angrily as I glare at my father. “You want to fix this the right way? You need to pay her father off. Flip him. Get him on our payroll and make sure you have dirt to keep him there.”

“It’s not that easy,” Dominic grumbles. Dad falls into a coughing fit which takes the attention of everyone in the room but me.

Yeah, he’s sick. Yes, I care.

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