Page 167 of Poison Vows

At this, the old cripple actually laughs happily.

“The scared but brave little girl who screamed for your mother to be saved even after she had just lost her grandfather grew up to be a resilient, beautiful girl with strong survival instincts.”

I get up, unable to remain seated.

The old man sent me the link to listen in on the conversation he had with her, but he kept a lot of details, as if to threaten her.

“Why were you trying to intimidate her then?” I ask, watching him.

“To make sure she wouldn’t have any funny ideas of marrying your cousin, of course!”

“What?”

“After you threw off the marriage with Beaumont’s daughter, I had to find the reason why! I thought that you loved that Beaumont girl! You even went through the motions of sealing a marriage agreement with her with the help of your father, but imagine my shock when I realized it was all an act!” he seethes but in the next second, he smiles. “But then I foundher.”

“How?” I snap.

“Alessio, I’ve been doing this all my life. You resent me for pulling you in, training you to beyond the scope of fear and pain at a young age, but I killed my first man at the age of three! I have gathered intel far longer than you.”

The knowing smile on his face makes me realize I severely underestimated this old cripple.

“It took me years to connect the dots and see a pattern that whenever you ordered your men to kill, whenever you ordered a violent wipe out toward your uncles’ allies and friends, it was always after an attempt was made on Ivy Marie’s life, isn’t it?”

It’s like a bomb just dropped out of nowhere and exploded.

Grandfather stares at me, studying me while I sit there, speechless.

“Even that Beaumont girl you were supposed to marry, you were never as brutally violent and merciless for her as you are for Ivy Marie, so what does that mean to knowing eyes watching?”

I don’t know what to make of this man, yet he’s easily describing my one pressure point with such calm. It’s sickening.

“All the other times, you didn’t give a damn about my sons’ actions. In fact, you ignored them,” he states. “But whenever they tried to kill that girl, the attempted burglary when she was in boarding school, the fire when she was at that public library, the doctor that poisoned her inhaler when she was seventeen, all those times you shook Heaven and earth just to destroy mystupid sons and their so-called power… what do we make of that?”

It's the fact that Grandfather is reciting most of the attempts on Angel’s life without hesitation that makes me realize he has known about all these matters long ago.

“You never left them any breathing space. When you moved, you were diligent, swift, and fatal. You completely weakened them for years to the point where they’ve realized they have absolutely no chance at all to take over my position, and I let you.”

I scoff then. “Didn’t you do that to keep your position safe?”

“Well, yes, but if I died earlier, what would’ve happened to you?” he questions coldly. “You were still young and hadn’t established your own foothold yet. Meanwhile, your uncles had already made friends all over the world. Even if you controlled the Outfit, if those idiots were to partner with their friends to come for you, how long would it take to kill you?”

He's right. My uncles were well connected and established, but I wasn’t. I was alone.

“You also thought of this too. Isn’t that why you’ve been working to destroy those connections?” Grandfather questions with a chuckle. “You made the hope of power become impossible for them, but they kept going for the girl and you kept working for me to increase your power. How could I not realize it’s because you had fallen in love with her and had dedicated your entire life to protecting her?”

The new heart in my chest beats painfully.

“So you had her brought out,” I start, the anger in my veins starting to intensify. “Why the hell did you do that?”

“You gave your life for that girl, but she wasn’t dating you? What the fuck is that? Did she reject you? How dare she reject my grandson!” he snaps, banging his fist on the arm of the chair. “How dare she not give her heart to you? Of course, I had to skipthat dating phase and jump straight to marriage! Now she has no choice but to pay you back for your feelings.”

I gape at him, unable to process what he just said. “You did what?”

“I saved your unrequited love! How dare she not love you back?”

“Grandpa!”

“Don’t ‘Grandpa’ me! You’re a perfectly handsome, tall, in-shape young man! I know that you’re desired by numerous women of great renown and lusted after by drones of girls! Why isn’t she one of them? How dare she ignore your feelings!”

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